For us, the intense heat of the past few days receded and most of the run was on very pleasant forest trails and cycle paths. Yesterday we had some tricky navigation around private land at Bockholt but I honestly can't see how the landscape has changed much over the years. There is plenty of cover, lots of plantations and crops and scattered farmhouses. Villages can also be identified by the huge church steeples that dominate the flatlands of this area.
The Ems canal is still 100yds wide and much have been incredibly daunting and one interesting fact was told to us by the landlady of where we are staying on these final couple of nights. Many of the train lines Jock mentions are now cycle tracks. Rather than just dig them up like we did after Beeching, the Germans sensibly made them into paths to walk and cycle between villages off the main roads.
This section ends in the Wettringen area, which for us is only 15Km from the border, so we will complete this amazing journey tomorrow.
10th NIGHT
After crossing the line from MUNSTER to LONGERICH at a level crossing we had rather an exciting chase. My friend rather foolishly said “good-night" in German to a Hun who was standing talking to a companion who had a rifle over his shoulder and also a bicycle. The Hun said "Good-night” in return then asked who we were, to which we did not reply. We then saw him drop his bike and run into a yard so decided it was time to hop it.
We hadn’t gone far when a fierce growl made us turn round to find three wolf hounds coming for us. I got the first with a kick on the head which made it turn and go off howling down the road. My friend got another with a stick he carried, after which we took to the wood and ran, as we could see 3 or 4 Huns coming after us. The dogs continued growling at our heels until we struck a fence over which, in my hurry I tried to jump, but was not quick enough to escape the dog which took a large piece out of a very value part of my trousers so that I had to spend the whole of the next day putting in a new one with the aid of a piece of packsheet and some string. The dogs left us after this I am glad to say, but in our flight we had completely lost our bearings and soon found that we were on the wrong side of a fair-sized stream which we eventually crossed a good a bit further north than we had intended. The next obstacle to be crossed that night was the Dortmund-EMS Canal.
This promised to be the worst barrier of all if we could not find a bridge, or if that bridge happened to be guarded. We made for a small village called Bockholt beside which on our maps was shown a bridge. It was fairly light when we struck the canal, and it looked to be about 100 yards wide, a distance none of us felt capable of successfully swimming, so after carefully watching the bridge for some time and seeing no signs of a guard, although for all we could make out he might easily have been standing behind some of the uprights of the bridge. However, there was nothing to be gained by hesitating, so we took the bull by the horns and stole across that bridge with our hearts in our mouths. I am thankful to say we did not see any signs of a sentry; if he was there he must have been asleep somewhere.
CROSSING THE EMS
The final obstacle that night was the river Emms. We were following a cart track when we struck it and saw that there was a chain ferry used to convey passengers across, but unfortunately for us the ferry boat was on the other side. We were all pretty done up that night, and did not relish the idea of another swim, the river here being about 50 yards wide. However, it had to be for one of us at least, so we tossed odd man out with some of the German money we carried.
The idea was that the first man across should, on reaching the other side, see if he could bring back the ferry boat for the other two. I lost the toss, and after tying my clothes up in my now well-worn Burberry, I swam across and found I could unhook the ferry boat. This I proceeded to do and pulled myself back across the river for the other two. While they did the pulling on the return journey I dressed and felt fitter than ever, the swim acting like a glass of champagne on my jaded spirits.
After crossing the main road running due north from Munster to Ibbenduren we got into cover 2 miles west of this road. Our food was running very short now, and to supplement it we dug up potatoes in one of the numerous fields we were constantly passing, and these were sliced up as thin as possible and cooked in a Lyle’s Golden Syrup tin over one of our trusty trench cooker blocks. This meal was a very welcome one, being the only hot one we could get, all our cookable food having been exhausted.
11th NIGHT.
The eleventh night passed without incident except I fell over a fallen tree and nearly broke my neck. We followed the banks of an abandoned canal which, we were afterwards told, the Germans had started to dig in 1914 with prisoners of war as labourers. Cover was obtained in an open ditch some few miles north west of EMSDETTEN.
12th NIGHT.
We continued for a bit along the canal until it turned N. after which we had great difficulty in finding tracks leading in the proper direction, in fact, for most of the night we simply walked over boggy moorland crossing the railway line BORGESTEINFORT—RHEINE and further on a main road and another railway, after which we made better progress. We had now to go with extreme caution as we were within the frontier area, in which all main roads are constantly patrolled and of course all bridges, road, rail and water were guarded.
Our cover was in the middle of a large moor in the centre of a clump of young fir trees, not three feet high. That day was one of the best of the whole trek, the sun shining gloriously all day, so that we were able to take off all our wet clothes and lay them out to dry, lying drinking in the warmth of the sun ourselves meantime. The only signs of life we saw that day were two Huns, evidently farmers, who passed in a cart some little distance away.
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