After a gentle start to our day we wander into Arras to visit the Tourist Information office.

Armed with a map and tickets for the 2:30pm tour of the tunnels we explore the town visiting Heroes square again and then Saint Jean Baptiste church where we successfully light a candle this time. It’s a 25min walk to the museum so we walk in the general direction and stop off for a cuppa near the railway station.

We have time for a stroll around the exhibition before joining the guided tour. Tin hats on we hear about the miners from NZ who set out from Wellington having responded to Kitchener’s call for volunteers. They sail to Plymouth first for a month’s basic army training before heading to France. The plan to dig tunnels to get close to the German front line and launch a surprise attack was clever but the overall plan was not and led to a huge loss of life. The tour ends with a moving video bringing to life the history of the NZ tunnelers and their role in the Battle of Arras during the First World War.

The tour continues twenty metres underground. It’s hard to imagine these tunnels being dug out only with pickaxes and shovels or living even short term in them. In the end they were big enough to accommodate 24000 soldiers.

After the tour we wander back into town and enjoy a beer and share a salad in the sunshine in the lovely Heroes square.

Our next stop is the Cathedral we spotted our first night. The cathedral and the attached building used to be the huge Benedictine Abbey of Saint-Vaast. It’s rather ugly and poorly maintained. The abbey is now Le Musée des Beaux-Arts so we wander around there for an hour admiring some of its paintings.

By the time we make it to the Cathedral it’s closed. We are now almost 20k steps in for the day so we head back to the van.

After dinner and a bit of r&r we drag ourselves out again as we want to see Heroes square lit up. Sadly for some reason it didn’t happen so we enjoy a pint in the still busy square and wander home. 22k steps, a tiring but enjoyable day.

Thursday 20:07:23