Gallipoli - Least We Forget (How Cold It Was)

---

---

By day three, Beth and I were over our, 3am, 5am, the ‘proper’ 5.30am wake up calls. Breakfast is worth mentioning just for the odd choices of cucumber pieces, olives, some kind of sandwich meaty looking stuff, various spreads - or were they dips? - stale pre-crushed cornflakes with long life milk for the British, and a multitude of other things that I could not put a title to.

Equipped with our over sized Anzac t-shirts and blow up cushion / floating beer holder - every home should have one - we headed off towards the Gallipoli Peninsula, and more importantly Anzac Cove.

Our first exposure to WWI relics was at the war museum in Kanbatepe which holds not only gun shells, uniforms, mine’s, but also letters to and from the men fighting at Gallipoli and a Turkish skull with a bullet hole directly though the middle of his forehead.

Both my and Leah’s loudness made it easy for us to find each other amongst the 100s of other people also making their pilgrimage to Anzac Cove, and caught up on how each others tours were going and how crazy or strangely normal our other tour friends were and the funny things that have happened so far.

A poem, well worth the read should you ever go there, is located on the wall outside the museum, and starts something like this:

“What land were you torn away from
what makes you so sad coming here”
asked Mehmet the solider from Anotolia
addressing the Anzac lying near

“From the uttermost of the world I come
so it writes on my tombstone”
answered the youthful Anzac, “and here I am
buried in a land I have not even known”

“do not be disheartened mate”
Mehmet told him tenderly
“you share with us the same fate
in the bosom of our country

you are not a stranger anymore
you have become a Mehmet just like me”

a paradise on earth Gallipoli
is a burial under the ground
those who lost their lives in fighting
lie there mingled in friendly compound.


We went down to Anzac Cove and we were able to see first hand the unforgiving cliffs that our soldiers had faced 92 years earlier, and then had to start fighting against.


We drove up the hill to the Australian Memorial: Lone Pine, which is a nice and spacious memorial, on the flat half way up the hill. We all had our chance to look around before we continued to the top to Chunuk Bair, the New Zealand Memorial.

Chunuk Bair, is located on the highest peak in the area, one of the ‘key locations’ that needed to be won for a successful campaign. The New Zealanders held the post for 3 days, in one of the bloodiest battles of the First World War.
At the top there is a statue of Atatürk where he gave his infamous command:

‘I don’t order you to fight, I order you to die. In the time it takes us to die, other troops and commanders can come and take our places’

It was also the location where he was hit by shrapnel in his heart, but it was stopped by his pocket watch!

We had a look around the memorial, and the trenches which are still visible. Strangely the memorial seems to be more for Turkey than it was for New Zealand, unlike the Australian one. Although, I guess it’s fair to say both countries lost of a lot of people here.

We got rugged up in all of our warmest clothes, plus anything else we could possibly fit on before heading back up to Anzac Cove ready for a night sleeping on the ‘beach’.
As we walked in we got our bags searched like an airport, which I found out a lot later was due to a bomb threat to the dawn service! Yikes!

Amongst all the people I managed to meet up with Leah and also James, who I hardly recognised with his new goatee! So was great to catch up with another kiwi face after 9 months of being away.

We spent the evening huddled under our blankets over looking the pitch black sky and bay of ANZAC Cove with the cold wind cutting right through us. Matt had forgotten to bring any thermals with him, and then later found that he had, but had just forgotten he had. Crazy guy!
We tried to get some sleep, but due to the cold winds and uncomfortable chairs, I think I managed a total of 0.5 hour throughout the night.

To make the evening pass ‘quicker’, they played documentaries and interviews on large screens approximately each hour, which were great, but seemed to start every time you were just about to fall asleep!

Unbeknown to us, we somehow managed to survive the freezing cold night and the Dawn Service began as the night sky slowly gave way to the first glimpse of light. The service began with a reading out of names of the fallen soldiers, where they came from and their occupations. Most of the ‘men’ were aged around 19-21, with the youngest at age 14 years. It was about this point we realised we didn’t have too much to complain about the cold night compared to what our soldiers went through.

Winston Peters was the representative speaker for New Zealand, and following the other speeches and laying of the reefs, it’s fair to say there was not a dry eye in the house with the playing of ‘The Last Post.’

Following the moving dawn service, we started the long 1.5 hour ascent up the steep hill to Chunuk Bair, approximately another 3 km’s beyond Lone Pine.

Winston was also the main speaker for the New Zealand service (who’s speech seemed to slightly resemble a Wikipeadia print out or high school assignment), nevertheless, it was another emotional service as we looked over the bay far below, where our soldiers fought and died so courageously.

After the service, it was time to find our bus out of the 160 others, and catch the ferry to Canakkale, heading south. Next stop: the infamous city of Troy.

Troy has the ruins of 9 whole cities; each one built upon the other, which I think is incredible, but is obviously better known for the tribulations around the Trojan Horse.

There is not a lot left to see at Troy, but despite our lack of sleep, our tour guide Husnu, shared is wealth of knowledge with our attentive ears. I found it all very interesting, and of course had to climb to the top of the replica wooden horse with the rest of the kids!


Check out more Photos

---

Photos

Least We Forget
Leah, James, Hannah

Anzac Cove
Some of the cliffs that our soldiers had to fight their way up

The Battle of Chunuk Bair
The highest peak in the area, considered to be the winning/losing point of the campaign - where NZ soldiers fought and held on for over three days in one of the bloodiest battles in history.

Chunuk Bair
Hannah & the Statue of Ataturk at Chunuk Bair

In the Trenches - Chunuk Bair
Brent, Beth, Matt, Hannah

Trying to Survive the Night
Brent, Matt, Hannah, Beth: trying to get some shut eye during the FREEZING cold night on the edge of the Turkish coast.

Anzac Cove Dawn Service
Just after the dawn service

NZ Dawn Service
at Chunuk Biar

Troy
The old walls of the ancient city