Calais, Lens, Arras

Calais town Hall

It's a challenge to start the blog at 9:15 after a full day and evening walk.  I'll give it a go but may finish and post it tomorrow.  Although Calais was seriously destroyed during the war, it retained its most prominent building--the Town Hall--and used the huge German bunker in the nearby park to develop a museum.  The weather was not at its best--chilly, overcast, occasional rain, very windy.  

Our first hour was spent at the Town Hall and attached Belfry.  The fine stained glass window presents the history of the English taking over Calais (1346) until the French took it back (1558).  We got a tour of the belfry with fine views of the town, and learned that Charles de Gaul married his wife Yvonne (a Calais native) here.  Nearby was the park and the huge German bunker which had served as their headquarters.  The 21 rooms of the museum are filled with uniforms, artifacts, newspapers, posters, artillery, and a video produced by the US, meant to drum up continuing support for the war. Another impressive museum in an unusual setting.

Louvre-Lens main gallery

An hour's windy ride to Lens brought us to Louvre-Lens, one of the Louvre's new satellite museums.  Lens was a mining town (the slag heaps are the highest in France), somewhat in decline, and the museum is one attempt to bring in tourists and cash.  We had lunch in the adjourning restaurant (delicious as always) and then spent about 75 minutes in the museum.  The collections are displayed in a single long room without partitions.  One wanders from the early Egyptian era to about 1850, one object at a time.  

At 6 we started towards our destination of Arras, but got sidetracked by a huge white monument looming on the horizon.  This turned out to be a Canadian memorial to the WWI Battle of Vimy Ridge, when the Canadian Corps succeeded in taking the ridge from the German 6th army.

On to Arras, a town with wonderful architecture and a stunning Town Hall outside our hotel window.  The houses surrounding the two main squares are quite uniform and are described as Flemish Baroque.  The town belonged to the Spanish Netherlands from 1556 to 1714 and the houses seem to reflect that influence.