In The Trenches

Monday we got up, packed a lunch and headed south to the town of Thann to show everyone the cathedral there.  Sounds horrible but after Strasbourg, it was kinda "meh" at best.

After a bit of walking about Thann we loaded the GPS with directions and headed up the mountain passes to Vieil Armand, a World War I battle field and monument perched at the very top of a strategic overlook.  Many of both the German and French trench works are still in place, complete with barbed wire and shell craters from the massive artillery bombardments that blanketed the area hundreds of times throughout the war.

Near as we can tell, the importance of holding the top of the mountain was the ability to either bombard the Colmar to Mulhouse rail system, or to keep exactly that from happening.

Fighting took place mainly during the year 1915. 30,000 men died on the mountain, most French.  After 1915, most of the war was concentrated further north and the battle for the mountain top was a holding action by both sides who occasionally lobbed artillery at one another. 

What is left is both breathtaking and horrifying.  The landscape today is largely tree covered and quite pleasant to walk(climb) through, but the thousands of craters still visible stand testament to the intense battles that took place.

We parked in the closest narrow lot and grabbed our lunch to have a quick picnic in the shade.  After seeing that the complete walking tour of the sight was only 4 kilometers, we assumed it would be a breeze. 

The walk in...

Pics cannot show how deep the shell craters are, some are fully 8 feet deep and 30 feet across.

First of the trench lines starts.

Rough trenches on the German side.

NOPE!

The battle for the mountain kinda took place on a mountain, so we had to climb up through the shell pocked and trenched hills to make it to the summit.  Took a good 2 hours of hiking to get to the top, mainly because Ryan and I had to climb all over everything and examine every section of stone trenches and barbed wire we came across.  After 100 years, it is still all in quite good condition.

Lookout post on the French side overlooking valley

Firing port in French line

Nita inside the highest tunnel on the mountain.  About 100 feet through dark and loose stone.  Spooky as hell.

Existing French, covered trench line with barbed wire barriers in front.

Wire barrier in front of trench line.

From the summit we saw just why they fought so hard for this location.  It grants a commanding view over the entire lower end of the valley between France and Germany along the Rhine, from Colmar to nearly Basel.

The view from the summit toward Colmar

There is a monument for the men who died there, a moving scene of them emerging from right out of the mountain.

The hike back down was quicker, but still filled with hundreds of interesting bits and bobs to explore.

The monument and burial site viewed from the lower of 2 summits.

Later back at the house for an impromptu walk down to the winstub for dinner, we all decided while the hike was a bitch, it was nothing compared to doing it in the same 90 degree weather wearing a heavy woolen uniform.

Well worth the time and effort it took us to get up there and I am very glad we did.