2008 sees the 90th anniversary of the last year ? and Armistice - of the Great War, and surprisingly, visitor numbers to the Western Front now are greater than ever before. Whereas in the past visitors have been mostly enthusiasts of the subject, historians and those with either family or military connections, more now are visitors who being near to the areas, decide to take a side trip for a few days to satisfy a casual interest, to try and track down some of the sites mentioned in a relative?s diary, or of course the grave of an antecedent. To date they have needed to either take a group tour or made their own way, often missing interesting sites because they didn?t know of them, or ran out of time. Of the many books and guides available, none caters adequately for this modern visitor. As a supplement to the forthcoming ?The Weekend Guide to the Western Front? written by an experienced and knowledgeable guide who visits frequently, Battlefields Podtours has begun to develop audiotours with maps and directions, invaluable to the non-specialist, casual visitor to the history and sites of those 4 years. The first audiotours guide the traveller around the major, and some little visited, sites of the Ieper Salient which was a constant focus of activity throughout the course of the war. All are supplemented with maps and directions. When one hears tales of trenches feet deep in water, and of soldiers struggling uphill through muddy quagmires, with enemy fire raining down upon them, Belgian Flanders epitomises the struggle. Here, muddy patches of barren treeless land were fought over, backwards and forwards for 4 years, with hardly any change in the line of the Western Front, but at massive human cost. The sample Ieper Walking Tour examines the mediaeval town at the centre of the Salient - a bulge in the line which had to be defended on all sides - and introduces the visitor to the major sites, and discusses the role of the town in the war. For anyone who has thought about visiting the Western Front to find out more, or needs to put what they know into perspective, this tour is a rare opportunity to do so and see for yourself, at your own pace.

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2008 sees the 90th anniversary of the last year ? and Armistice - of the Great War, and surprisingly, visitor numbers to the Western Front now are greater than ever before. Whereas in the past visitors have been mostly enthusiasts of the subject, historians and those with either family or military connections, more now are visitors who being near to the areas, decide to take a side trip for a few days to satisfy a casual interest, to try and track down some of the sites mentioned in a relative?s diary, or of course the grave of an antecedent. To date they have needed to either take a group tour or made their own way, often missing interesting sites because they didn?t know of them, or ran out of time. Of the many books and guides available, none caters adequately for this modern visitor. As a supplement to the forthcoming ?The Weekend Guide to the Western Front? written by an experienced and knowledgeable guide who visits frequently, Battlefields Podtours has begun to develop audiotours with maps and directions, invaluable to the non-specialist, casual visitor to the history and sites of those 4 years. The first audiotours guide the traveller around the major, and some little visited, sites of the Ieper Salient which was a constant focus of activity throughout the course of the war. All are supplemented with maps and directions. When one hears tales of trenches feet deep in water, and of soldiers struggling uphill through muddy quagmires, with enemy fire raining down upon them, Belgian Flanders epitomises the struggle. Here, muddy patches of barren treeless land were fought over, backwards and forwards for 4 years, with hardly any change in the line of the Western Front, but at massive human cost. The sample Ieper Walking Tour examines the mediaeval town at the centre of the Salient - a bulge in the line which had to be defended on all sides - and introduces the visitor to the major sites, and discusses the role of the town in the war. For anyone who has thought about visiting the Western Front to find out more, or needs to put what they know into perspective, this tour is a rare opportunity to do so and see for yourself, at your own pace.

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