Three Montreal buddies, who had promised themselves for years they would make the pilgrimage, carried bouquets and fought back tears as they joined 800 other people Sunday at Remembrance Week ceremonies at the Canadian National Vimy Memorial.
It was an eclectic group who huddled in the raw cold: serving Canadian soldiers stationed in Europe, local French dignitaries, veterans and their families, and a class of 10-year-old French schoolchildren from nearby Douai who had spent weeks learning to sing O Canada.
Bloc Québécois Leader Gilles Duceppe, on a 10-day working tour of Europe, joined the procession of officials laying wreathes at the site of the 1917 Battle of Vimy Ridge where many believe Canada came of age as a country.
But the most striking note in the crowd was the presence of dozens of younger Canadians, some who had travelled great distances, specifically to be at the memorial on this day.
They came alone and in groups: A Canadian teaching in northern France brought her five-year-old daughter; an actor from Stratford, Ont., who detoured on his tour through Europe; nine students from across Canada, on exchange programs at universities throughout Europe, heard about the ceremony in an email from a Queen's University group.
They came despite the passage of time that's eroding memories: a new poll from The Historica-Dominion Institute suggests Canadians know the most about the current war in Afghanistan rather than earlier conflicts.
Montrealers Robert Stinziani, James Gallagher and Anthony Ferro, all 35 and friends since childhood, brought flowers to lay at the soaring white granite Vimy memorial, the final stop in a whirlwind four-day tour of Canadian war sites in France. They had talked about the trip for years.
"We are all at the age where we're having families or looking at it and we were raised by people who fought in the war," Mr. Gallagher said. "It is up to us now to educate the next generation. We feel very strongly about that."
Mr. Stinziani agrees. "When we were at the (Second World War) Canadian cemetery at Juno Beach, I hate to admit this publicly, but I was moved to tears. These are just such sacred places."
He is not bashful talking about the sense of patriotism he feels, about his duty to remember previous generations whose sacrifices helped create the Canada he inherited.
"I know everyone can't afford to take four days to make a trip like this. But I say every Canadian should try to visit Vimy in their lifetime."
Tim Harcourt, 29, of Guelph, Ont., was one of the first visitors to turn up Sunday, to make sure he got a good spot. He made his own rock-concert-style T-shirt, with a picture of the Vimy memorial on the front and "In Flanders Field" on the back.
He thought, he said, he knew something about the wars; he is travelling with his father, Percy, a history buff. But seeing the endless gravesites in this part of northern France, the trenches, the land at Vimy still wildly pockmarked from the hellish shelling, has shaken him. He has asked himself many times whether he would ever be able to do what those soldiers did.
"Could I have done it? I want to think I could but the answer is I just don't know."
It's a question asked by another group of young Canadians: the 15 university students who serve as guides at Vimy and at the nearby Beaumont-Hamel Newfoundland Memorial.
Canada is alone in providing guides at its war memorials. The students, who come from across Canada and serve roughly four-month stints, are what imbue the memorials with such heart. They know the history of the sites, love to talk about it and find they surprise themselves at their emotional attachments.
"There are special moments that you hold on to," says Catherine Allan, 22, of Corner Brook, Nfld. "The day a family from Newfoundland finds the gravesite of a great uncle (at Beaumont-Hamel), you will never forget."
Stephanie Milligan, 21, of Saint-Lambert, Que., clearly recalls the day she saw the tombstone of a 15-year-old buried in a Canadian cemetery. "Fifteen. Fifteen. How could this be?" she remembers thinking.
"I always was a proud Canadian, but this (experience) has made me so much more so. I want to know more," says Mr. Milligan. She is proud Canada puts such resources into its war sites, noting that 80 per cent of the preserved First World War battlefields are Canadian. "And I feel I have this role in preserving these (sites.)"
On Saturday, the guides were also on call when about 200 people gathered for remembrance services at Beaumont-Hamel, considered hallowed ground to Newfoundlanders. On July 1, 1916, the first day of the Battle of the Somme, of 801 Newfoundlanders who went into battle, only 68 were able to answer the roll call the next day.
"Every Newfoundlander knows the name Beaumont-Hamel," says Sarah Martin, 19, of St. John's. "But coming and actually seeing (the site) for the first time, I just broke down.
"Anyone in Newfoundland can tell you that number - 68 men. Everyone knows that number."
Travis Weagant, 21, of St. Thomas, Ont., bristles when asked about the craziness that led to the First World War. "It was a war started by politicians," he points out sternly, "but it was fought by soldiers and generals. You can't blame the war on them."