Back to Roma via Cassino

Back to Roma via Cassino....the morning started out the way yesterday began, rainy. No problem because we were going to be on the road for about 3 hours before we hit the Commonwealth Cemetery in Cassino. WE had taken on a couple of casualties throughout the night and Kelly was down and out and would rarely open her eyes for the next 13 hours or so and never leave the bus until we hit Cassino and my good buddy Liam was getting overtired and feeling a little queezy, but all is well right now.

Scenery, scenery, and more scenery. This section of mountains in the Appenines were slightly more breathtaking than 2 days ago. Truly amazing!!! You will see a couple of the pictures of the mountains and the beautiful towns below. TO be honest it kind of reminded of my favourite Christmas song about Snoopy and the Red Baron as they describe flying over the towns below. We were really above these towns but still well below the peaks of the mountains, in fact for quite a few miles Osvaldo, our excellent bus driver who at this point I am convinced could park a 747 in a single car garage without a scratch, has been driving straight downhill with his breaks on...pretty cool, but we do have a couple of nervous passengers up front. Thankfully none of ours! Note to the Macleans, you might want to tell Vance to look up Osvaldo for a bus tour sometime, unreal!!!

Cassino is a Commonwealth Cemetery where all of the nations of the Commonwealth have soldiers buried. The usual beautiful monument stands in the center of the cemetery amongst the thousand or so graves. Be proud parents because your kids were the best behaved of the 200-300 students in the cememtery. No one ran, no one raised their voice and no one leaned on any headstones or monuments unlike some other students from other provinces. Not dissing anyone, but I was miffed by some of the behaviour that took place and other teachers stood by and watched it, we didn’t!! Mary Ann Lewell, teacher from NB travelling with us, asked a few students to stop lying on a monument and they couldn’t understand teh big deal. Anyways, on to more positive things. By the time we reached Cassino the sun was shining and the day was beautiful, perfect weather for some grave rubbings!!!! WE began to locate some locals right off the bat and off we, not just I, went to work. It was a total team effort, Adam would hold the scroll of paper, Liam would tend to the charcoal chalk, and a combination of 3 students would hold the paper in place for me. Great help!!!
The first grave we located was a young man named G.H. Cameron I believe, Emily MacDonald was quite proud of her great uncle and we quickly pulled off a great grave rubbing. After a while we attracted quite a crowd as many other people didn’t know what we were doing, one even thought we were defacing a stone, not a real bright individual, but they all make the world go round!!! The lack of sleep must be setting in because that is two cranky comments I have made, oh well!

We were able to make up for a lack of time in Moro river, which still bothers me, by spending much time here. I was so proud of them as I watched, in between rubbings, them go through row upon row looking and searching for names and sayings that would strike them. WE did find a number of islanders and potential relatives so we were able to come up with a few more rubbings. Darrell Desroches from Kinkora High was able to find a veteran from Lennox Island, a Sark man. Darrell had told the people of Lennox Island he would find the grave and say “hello”, in fact he spread tobacco on his grave as it is a traditional gift and medicine. MR. Sark’s resting place was now complete!! We found an J.A. Gallant from Richmond , PEI and did a grave rubbing. Adam was quite fond of that one and wanted to know more about this individual. This was “MY” day!!! This was never about me and don’t get me wrong, I didn’t get to go from row to row like I had done in France and Belgium, I actually barely made it to the main sanctuary where the names of the soldiers with no known graves are listed, but it was truly my day!! I don’t mean to be selfish here, and I do know that Kelly, Marilyn and Barb were witness to the students’ eagerness to see and read all the names, but this has been a dream of mine ever since I returned in 2006. They were doing exactly what I did; I was seeing them just as I had hope to picture them, looking at the names and not just rushing by like so many others putting in time on the way back to Roma. They were processing in their minds the fears, the hopes, the dreams that these men had and they understood the courage it must have taken to give up your life to do this. One inscription read, “He gave up his tomorrow, so we all could have ours...” I could not have asked for more from these kids, strike that, these great young adults!! I truly hope my own children have role models like these guys. In the end, it was time to leave and I was able to go through a few rows and say my thanks, I hope I can come back some day and finish each and every row, the same thing I attempted to do in France and Belgium. I truly hope I do, maybe with my own family and maybe even some of yours again, god willing maybe even your grandkids. OK Chiz shut up, you are getting ahead of yourself, besides I’ll be retired by then!!!
I failed to describe a little building that sits upon a mountain top in the background of this beautiful cemetery. The monastery of St. Benedict at Monte Cassino.(Google it!!!) You will see some amazing pics of this Abbey when your kids return home. Unfortunately, I don’t think I have any downloaded so you will have to wait!!...update just found a couple of long distance shots and maybe one video...

I mentioned last night that we had planned to go to the catacombs of Rome. Some chose to go and some didn’t. Well things didn’t work out perfectly as we were only able to go down one level and the kids were disappointed, as was I. The reason being they were closing at 5 and we arrived at 4 and didn’t have time to go well below the city, we did it but it wasn’t as good as it could have been. The disappointment soon turned to amazement as we were able to visit the sacred church of St. Paul. Jeepers, if I thought the Church of St. John Lateran was impressive, I am not sure how to describe this one!!! We were even able to catch part of a mass in the main area. This church contains paintings of every Papa throughout history, even Benedict, who actually is the only one who has a light shining upon him. There are only 3 places left on the ring of Papas, I am wondering where they will go next???
This church also contains the famous holy door which is used only every 25 years by the Papa himself. Once every 25 years, the Papa will knock on the door with a hammer and the doors will open to him and him alone. The next anniversary year is 2025....mark it down and be there...a few said they would.
I am running out of steam as it is 12:41 and I need to be up at 6:15....this will not surprise Julie as she knows I am a night owl. But on the bright side, the 5-6 hours I am getting is better than I have average since September!!!! Tomorrow we are onto the Vatican. I will make sure Liam does not get swiped up by the locals and kept to be next in line for the Papal throne, well at least I will do my best Marsha!!! Tour in the AM, free time to shop after lunch(as if they need any more of that) and Mass at 5:00 PM. No Papa as he is only present in Vatican City on Wednesdays and Sundays I think.....don’t quote me on that one. I am glad to hear that you are enjoying my blogging, it has been tiring but fun and it is the least I could do for you, for allowing your children to accompany me on their experience of life!!! Ciao.....
DC

PS Disregard any grammatical errors as this often done at night without much brain power left!!!