Your Experience at 'The Front'
Upon arrival each visitor will be sworn in as a member of the Trench Experience 'Pals' Battalion. Journeying along the network of duckboards in subterranean trenches and dugouts, a sentry dressed in authentic WW1 uniform and equipment will invite you to look through a periscope into themist and devastation of no-mans-land.
Keeping your head downand moving slowly along, the sounds of shell and gun fire mixed with smoke andthe cries of the wounded will make you think twice about 'volunteering' to climb a trench ladder to help haul a wounded 'Tommy' back into the relativesafety of the trench.
No doubt you will decide the best and safest place to be is down in one of the many dugouts, furnished as it would have been on the Somme in France 1916. A visit to an officers' dugout will appear luxurious compared to the smell and horrors of a makeshift dressing station or an 'other ranks' 'Funk Hole' scrapped in the sideof the trench
After the shelling and gun fire stops, bird song will be heard and a Tommy will read aloud a letter from his sweetheart in Blighty. Another soldier sings a song, longing for the war to end and to return to his loved ones. All join in with a song to lift the spirits, questions may be asked and stories told. There will be time to sit quietly, listen to sounds of nature, read some verses of war poets or write some lines of your own.
Later in the day, a visit to the nearby estaminet or make shift cafe / bar will allow you to try some authentic WW1 style food and drink while watching news-reels or listen to 'Songs that Won The War'. The lecture room, library, shop, picture gallery, exhibits and displays are other sources of information.
More adventurous Pals may wish to hire WW1 style uniforms, tin hats and rifles and take advantage of over night accomodation in 'Laude's Hotel', an underground dugout with woodenbunks, candlelight and a stove. Beware, night raiding parties are active and 'stand-to' is 30 minutes before daybreakafter which chores may include filling sandbags, digging new trenches orrepairing old ones, cleaning rifles as well as parade ground drill and tasks that made up Tommy's trench routine.
GROUP BOOKINGS AREWELCOME FOR ALL EVENTS. Please note the above routine is not yet avaliable. To help achive our objective please visit our eBay or Donations pages.