Flanders Field American WWI Cemetery

I told my Grandma that we were travelling to Belgium as part of our trip, and she mentioned that she had always wanted to visit Flanders Field. “In Flanders Field” is a famous poem that she loves (below). Checking the map and the calendar, I realized that our chance to visit it would fall squarely on the day of her birthday. So we caught a train to Waregem, Belgium, a trip of about one hour each way.

As there were no taxis around the bus station, we ventured towards the Field using GPS coordinates and the Blackberry. 3.2km later, we arrived at the beautiful entrance of cemetery, where the graves of American soldiers killed in battle here in 1918. The grounds were immaculate, the outer edges were lined with gravestones and in the center stood a small chapel. Inscribed on the outside of the chapel was the term “Greet Them Ever With Grateful Hearts.”

We paid our respects and signed the visitor’s log, happy to have made the trip to Flanders Field and humbled with the care that is given to the smallest permanent American Military cemetery in Europe.