For our last day in France, we decided to see as much as we could, so after our lovely night at La Cleriere we set off for La Coupole. This is a enormous underground bunker and is shaped like a dome above the ground and goes into the ground with access by large tunnels. There are lots of smaller tunnels that go away from the main tunnel. This place was for the launching of V2 rockets against London. This never happened as the British bombed the factory. We walked through the main tunnels and up a lift to the display floor. This place was built by people from the concentration camps, conscripted French people, Polish people and Russian women. It was like a concentration camp and of the 60000 people who were 'slave' labour, 20000 died. It was very sad and such a waste because the facility was never used.

The Blockhaus was our next stop. This was a giant concrete block building that was also built by 'conscripts' and meant for the construction of the giant V2 rockets as well. This huge building was built from reinforced concrete and eventually was bombed by 12000 lb bombs and put out of action. We walked all around the building listening to the English commentary from big speakers around the facility. We were lucky as we followed a group of English speaking men who started the commentary and we just tagged along. I didn't think we were going to get inside but just as we rounded the last corner there was an entry way and we were able to get right inside this vast space. There was a really interesting story about the construction. The English knew where this place was and continually bombed it so the Germans built a 'turtle shell' over the top. 4 metres thick of reinforced concrete that they raised up and were safely building the structure under this enormous movable roof. The bombs couldn't penetrate the thick concrete 'shell'. 

We drove into Dunkirk and by some fluke found the beaches and the Operation Dynamo museum that opens on the 1st April. Graeme asked a man that was coming out of the building and he went and knocked on the door and they let us in two weeks early. They were still working on the displays but we got to see a lot of the finished pieces. It was excellent!

We then hopped back in our car and drove to Bray Dunes about 15 minutes north of Dunkirk. It was right on low tide and we walked out along the beach to the remains of 3 of the ships that were blown up trying to evacuate the soldiers from the beach in 1940. In all 340000 men were evacuated back to Dover. Graeme collected a small bag of sand from the beach to remind us where we were and a small piece of wood from one of the wooden ships. I think it is the Devonia.

We drove back down the motorway to Calais which was nice because we've been on little back roads and through towns and villages all day and I'm still getting used to driving on the right but the motorway was a welcome relief. We found our room and had some dinner at the hotel and are now ready for sleep and our last day in France. We have a ferry to catch in the morning back to Dover.