Standing in the peaceful fields of the Somme it's hard to imagine the horror that thousands of Australian and New Zealand soldiers endured here 90 years ago.
Looking around, farmers busily tend to crops spread over gently rolling hills as the occasional car winds its way down the narrow roads linking the small townships dotted throughout the area.
The scene could not be more different for the Australian diggers who arrived in the midst of World War 1.
Deep mud, constant gunfire, bombings and gas attacks were endured daily as the Australians fought in the trenches alongside their British and French allies against the Germans.
Many of the 180,000 diggers who arrived on the Western Front in 1916 came from the disastrous campaign at Gallipoli the previous year.
However while the heroics at Gallipoli are legend, the stories of the Australians who fought in France and Belgium are less well known.
That could be about to change, with growing numbers of Australians embarking on pilgrimages to learn more about the horrors their forefathers endured more than nine decades ago.
The Somme is rich with tales about the brave diggers, who not only liberated several towns across the region but shot down Germany's famous fighter pilot the Red Baron.
The three years the Australians spent on the Western Front came with the heavy cost of 46,000 diggers' lives.
As more visitors flock to the Somme, tour groups have sprung up to ferry them around the former battlefields, while locals have opened quaint bed and breakfast lodgings as well as museums and monuments.
With the 90th anniversary of the end of the Great War this November, more Australians than ever are expected to visit.
Paul Murphy's Sydney-based business Travel Business Services, takes hundreds of Australians to the former battlefields of France each year.
He has more than 700 booked in ? and turned away thousands of others ? for tours and a dawn service this April to mark the 90th anniversary of the battle of Villers-Bretonneux, which was liberated by Australian troops on Anzac Day in 1918.
Many of those on Murphy's tours have relatives who fought on the Western Front and are curious about retracing their steps or finding their graves.
"I think what people are starting to do is get more knowledge about what Australia suffered in three years in France and Belgium compared to six months in Gallipoli," Murphy said.
"When you compare the two events, and I am not being unpatriotic, but one was a sideshow and one was three years of unspeakable horror and I think that's what is creating this feeling.
"People are saying: `My grandfather never talked about what happened in France and now I want to know what happened'."
A handy place to begin exploring the Somme and its surrounds is the historic town of Amiens, an easy one-and-a-half hour car ride north of Paris.
At its cobblestone main square is the towering Cathedral of Our Lady of Amiens, which was built in the 1200s and features several commemorative plaques honouring the WWI Allied soldiers.
From Amiens simply follow the signs pointing the way to various cemeteries, monuments and museums along what is known as the Circuit of Remembrance.
Villers-Bretonneux, a short drive east of Amiens, is definitely one town not to miss.
More than 2,470 diggers were killed or wounded at Villers-Bretonneux ? dubbed "Villers-Bret" or "VB" by the Australians who fought there ? during the night of April 24 and 25, 1918.
Considered a major turning point in the war, one British general described the victory as "perhaps the greatest individual feat of the war" up until that time.
The town is fiercely proud of the diggers, having twinned itself with the Victorian town of Robinvale and named its main street Rue de Melbourne.
There's even a cosy local bistro called Le Kangaroo while the local school, the Victoria College, was rebuilt after the war in the 1920s thanks to donations from Australian schoolchildren.
Its classrooms and playground bear simple signs: "N'Oublions Jamais l'Australie", or "Let Us Never Forget Australia".
Upstairs, there's a museum (Musee Franco-Australien) telling the story of that bloody night 90 years ago and featuring all sorts of memorabilia including photos, films, uniforms and weapons.
A short drive away is the Villers-Bretonneux Military Cemetery which contains more than 2,000 graves and the imposing Australian National Memorial, a white stone tower stretching above the surrounding farmed fields in honour of the 11,000 diggers who died in France and who have no known grave.
Heading east out of Villers-Bretonneux is the Australian Memorial Park at Le Hamel where you can learn the fascinating story of how Germany's famous Red Baron, Baron von Richthofen, was shot down by Australian machinegunners near the rural town of Corbie in April 1918.
Further north is the tiny but intriguing town of Pozieres, just past Albert.
Pozieres was the scene of the Australia troops' first engagement on the Western Front, when in 1916 a massive 23,000 casualties were recorded in six weeks as the diggers fought to push the Germans out.
The local pub, Le Tommy, is filled with war memorabilia and even has its own trenches in the backyard complete with "soldiers" plus remnants of WWI bombs, bullets and barbed wire.
To get a broader perspective of the Allied troops who fought on the Western Front, a visit to the highly impressive 45-metre tall Franco-British memorial at Thiepval is recommended.
Its towering pillars bear the names of more than 73,000 men who died in the Somme but have no known graves. There is also an information centre at the site with video displays and other documents setting out details about the key battles which raged in the area.
For those with more time to spare, you can head further north to Fromelles, the site of Australia's worst day in its military history when 5,533 casualties were suffered in one night in July 1916.
IF YOU GO
For details about the Somme and its former battlefields visit:
www.somme-battlefields.com;*
www.militaryhistorytours.com.au;*
www.cwgc.org.
