World War I & II Tour

Below are pictures Mr X and I took from our personal WWI & WWII tour of the Belgium/Luxembourg/France area. One of the museums we perused was in Bastogne, Belgium. It was the called the Bastogne Historical Center and it was a fascinating place. I loved it. Below is the entrance and the incredibly enormous memorial, followed by pictures of the museum displays (we weren't allowed to take pictures but, of course, we did anyway...just with the flash turned off and as slyly as possible).


Visitors can climb to the top of the memorial to look out over the countryside, so naturally we did. Although it was freezing cold up there, it provided beautiful views.

These are authentic uniforms that the Nazi's wore.

This was a French poem written about General McAuliffe's famous response of "Nuts!" to the German's demand that their surrounded troops surrender. I really have no idea what the poem says but I'm sure my FIL will understand it perfectly and then maybe he would be so kind as to translate for me...

It's amazing to me that these soldiers were able to withstand the harsh winters of northern Europe considering these uniforms were their protection from the elements. I sat there looking at the uniforms silently thanking the heavens for the inventions of things like Gore-tex.

The pictures below are from the National Museum of Military History in Diekirch, Luxembourg.

This one I could understand well enough with my less than remedial French. But I'm sure most people will be able to understand this one. It's pretty obvious.