For the walkathon, Chelsea wore a red zipper sweater overtop a Canadian shirt and a red arm band.

Her grandfather came to Canada from Holland and she had lots of family members who fought in the war, she said.

She felt good being able to participate in the mass student walk.

"You think about the people in your family and the soldiers that had to walk miles and miles ... fighting for the freedom of other countries," Chelsea said.

She hopes the trip will give her a better understanding of what the soldiers had to do and what they went through.

Clark Ward, of Clarke High School in Clarington, hopes to find his great-grandfather's name on a wall plaque they're expected to visit while overseas.

"I feel good, I feel part of the walk," said Clark, a poppy pinned over his heart. "I like it, it's getting together with other groups of schools and meeting people."

As his group made its way toward the school board, another congregated at the intersection of Anderson and Rossland roads, waiting for the light to change so they could continue their walk.

Meanwhile, in the parking lot of the Durham District School Board, a man practised his bagpipes in preparation for the ceremony the students were walking toward, which included displays, music, presentations, and a reception.

Wim Geerts, Ambassador of the Netherlands to Canada, was among the guests attending.

"By participating in this trip, I think these teenagers will have something to stay with them their whole lives," Mr. Geerts said.

Going to the sites where Canadians had such a presence during the Second World War and where so many Canadian graves stand will give students something they can never find in a textbook, Mr. Geerts said. In the Netherlands, they'll see the graves of Canadians who paid the ultimate price, he said.

"It's important that young people realize freedom can never be free," Mr. Geerts said, and added that both Canada and the Netherlands have troops currently in Afghanistan.

Six decades later, Kenez is preparing for the trip of a lifetime: heading to Europe to put the war in perspective by touring famed battle and memorial sites.

Kenez is one of 35 Eastview history students who will embark on the trip next spring to celebrate the 65th anniversary of Victory in Europe Day ( VE Day).

History teacher Clint Lovell is taking the students on this memorial voyage to Paris, Normandy and Holland in May 2010, for a 12-day up-close history lesson and a chance to partake in the anniversary celebrations.

Another group of 35 students from Bear Creek Secondary School and others from St. Joseph’s High School will be joining them for the trip.

“All tolled, I believe there are close to 3,000 Canadian students going on this tour,” Lovell said. “I took a group of students over two years ago, but this time it’s a huge deal because it’s their blow-out anniversary.

“The number of veterans over there is dwindling, and they figure they won’t be able to do a big celebration like this in future years,” he added. “Many of these students going are representing their own grandparents or a family member. This tour is going to mean a lot to many of them.”

To commemorate their upcoming trip, the Dutch Embassy of the Netherlands in Ottawa sent the school 100 tulip bulbs to plant on the property.

Lovell and a group of 25 students in Grade 10, 11 and 12 gathered outside yesterday afternoon to plant the bulbs around the school’s sign. Armed with spades and trowels, they made short work of the planting.

“We’re going to plant them around the school sign out front, and the idea is that they’ll bloom while we’re over there in the spring,” Lovell said. “The Embassy sent each participating school in Canada a box of tulip bulbs to plant and make their own garden with. That way, Dutch tulips will be blooming all over the country during the anniversary.” “It’s nice to see they still acknowledge what the Canadians soldiers did,” Kenez said, after planting a few bulbs.

“It shows they still care, and we’ll remember that when we see these (tulips),” said Andrea Smithyes, who’s in Grade 11. “These plants will keep growing like our friendship with people in the Netherlands.”

The tour begins at the end of April, with participants first flying to Paris, France, for guided tours of the Notre Dame Cathedral, the palace of Versailles, the Louvre museum and the Jewish Quarter. Next, it’s on to Normandy, visiting Juno Beach, where the dugouts and bunkers of the bloody battle are still visible from when the Canadian Army came ashore.

The tour moves on to Amsterdam, Holland, with a stop at the Vimy Ridge memorial, visit a high school in Apeldoorn and onto Ypres to the Flanders Fields Museum.

“We’ll be taking part in two ceremonial marches over there, and donating a Mother’s Cross to the museum at Juno Beach,” Lovell said.

Kenez said he’s particularly excited about one portion of the trip.

“The beaches of Normandy will be interesting to see, because we’ve talked a lot about them in class,” he said.

For Grade 11 student Sarah Stefaniuk, being in the same area her grandfather was 60 years ago is an experience in itself.

“It’s going to be so exciting for me. I’ve never been to Europe before, and this trip is going to be life-changing,” she said. “Also, my grandpa, Harry Ford, was over there with the navy. That’s another reason this trip is so important to me, because he was once there.”

The trip also has personal meaning to Eric Loucks. The Grade 12 student’s uncle, John Temple Meyer, was a soldier killed in Italy in 1944.

“He was on his way home and he stepped on a live land mine,” Loucks said. “ When I’m over there, I’ll also try to find my stepdad’s grandfather’s grave.

“I wanted to go over because I believe it’s important for young people like us to understand what the veterans went through in the war,” he added.

The presentation is part of the Northern Area Teachers’ Association conference at the Prince Albert Inn this week. Robinson was invited to speak about his experiences travelling with students around the world, as well as promote the trip to teachers.

The excursion is organized through EF Educational Tours, an international travel company that specializes in school tours around the world.

Robinson is the national student tour co-ordinator for the Victory in Europe Day 65th anniversary celebrations tour and frequently takes student groups to commemorate wars where Canada participated.

According to Robinson, a retired teacher from Port Perry, Ont., Canadian and Dutch schools are paired and students are paired with veterans from the First and Second World Wars. Students are expected to research their veterans and represent them during various ceremonies.

Robinson said the tours are a vital way to connect students to Canadian history and Canada’s role in war. He said students must pay for their own trip and can receive help with fundraising for it.

However, he said about 80 schools are signed up and he knows of many more who are planning to sign on in the coming weeks.

“Kids take it much more seriously when they pay for it,” he said.

The trip also gives Robinson a chance to rediscover his own love of Canadian history, he said. Teaching the students about their own history gives him a chance to ensure they’re able to remember a part of history that is starting to fade away with the death of veterans, Robinson said.

“Every time I go there with these kids, it’s like doing it all over again,” he added.

The presentation is part of the Northern Area Teachers’ Association conference at the Prince Albert Inn this week. Robinson was invited to speak about his experiences travelling with students around the world, as well as promote the trip to teachers.

The excursion is organized through EF Educational Tours, an international travel company that specializes in school tours around the world.

Robinson is the national student tour co-ordinator for the Victory in Europe Day 65th anniversary celebrations tour and frequently takes student groups to commemorate wars where Canada participated.

According to Robinson, a retired teacher from Port Perry, Ont., Canadian and Dutch schools are paired and students are paired with veterans from the First and Second World Wars. Students are expected to research their veterans and represent them during various ceremonies.

Robinson said the tours are a vital way to connect students to Canadian history and Canada’s role in war. He said students must pay for their own trip and can receive help with fundraising for it.

However, he said about 80 schools are signed up and he knows of many more who are planning to sign on in the coming weeks.

“Kids take it much more seriously when they pay for it,” he said.

The trip also gives Robinson a chance to rediscover his own love of Canadian history, he said. Teaching the students about their own history gives him a chance to ensure they’re able to remember a part of history that is starting to fade away with the death of veterans, Robinson said.

“Every time I go there with these kids, it’s like doing it all over again,” he added.

The trip celebrates the 65th anniversary of the liberation of the Netherlands. For the anniversary, students will participate in a Groesbeek Canadian War Cemetery Remembrance Day ceremony, where there are 2,338 Canadian graves; a ceremony at the Holten war cemetery; and a Liberation Day in Wageningen signing in recognition of the German surrender in May 1945. Kids will also be paired with soldiers from the world wars or another conflict, such as Afghanistan.

Students will also participate in the largest Holocaust remembrance ceremony to occur there, Mr. Maxim said. They'll visit other sites as well depending on the tour package they choose. The trip ranges from nine to 12 days, and $2,500 to $3,500 a person.

Yan Koorenhof, the Canada-Netherlands liaison officer, is working with the Education First Tours as its man on the ground in Holland.

"Your country is very important in our country," Mr. Koorenhof said.

He spoke of some of the differences in Holland, such as the number of bicycles, early closure of stores, expensive gas prices, and less frequented fast-food restaurants. "It's going to be great," said Dave Robinson, national student tour coordinator and a retired Port Perry High School teacher, referring to the school twinning, student matching and pen pal opportunities available.

Fundraising opportunities include selling Victory in Europe pins or umbrellas at the CNE in August, participating in a national walk-a-thon Nov. 9, and Lest We Forget Cards based on the liberation of the Netherlands. This year's Durham group attending is bigger than usual, Mr. Robinson said. Usually they have about a dozen schools sign up for the trip, but they already have 15 so far. He suspects the well-known relationship between Canada and Holland has something to do with the increased attendance. Schools interested in joining the trip have until February to join, but are encouraged to sign up sooner.

"This is the educational experience of a lifetime for these students," said history teacher Tim Jenkinson.

"We're going to the exact places some of these kids have researched and learned about and done projects on."

Thousands of Canadian high school students are expected to attend the VE Day celebrations. Numerous events are being planned to commemorate the liberation of the Netherlands - thanks in large part to Canadian troops - and the end of the Second World War. Though the trip is nearly a year away, the students' excitement is already building.

"Many of us won't have this opportunity again," said Danielle Tackaberry, a 17-year-old Grade 11 student. "This is a once-in-a-lifetime trip."

Jenkinson and fellow teacher John Faragher explained history enjoys a special place at MSS. Students have researched each of the 106 names on Midland's cenotaph, preparing profiles for every one. In France and the Netherlands, they expect to visit the graves of some of those soldiers.

"It makes it a lot more personal," said Grade 10 student Justin Rastin, 15. "It's one thing to know 42,000 (Canadians) died in the Second World War. To have a name attached to it makes it that much more real."

Starting this fall, the students will also be twinned with a class in the Netherlands. They will correspond throughout the school year, and will exchange tulips and maple trees as symbols of friendship. That conviviality between the two nations is evident whenever a Canadian visits the Netherlands, said Jenkinson. Because of the role Canuck troops played in driving the Nazis from Holland, he explained, people wearing the maple leaf are held in high regard. That connection - as well as the sacrifices made by Canadian soldiers around the globe - fills the Midland students with pride, said Rastin.

"They basically gave us our country, so we should give them respect."

When Matthew Taylor's grandmother died last year, his family found boxes of mementoes his grandfather had kept from the Second World War.

"We never knew about this stuff, because he never talked about it," said the Grade 11 Eastview Secondary School student. "We have boxes of his uniform and letters. It's crazy what you can find."

Encouraged by his history teacher, Clint Lovell, Taylor called the Royal Canadian Legion in his grandfather's hometown of Sault Ste. Marie, as well as the Red Cross. He discovered his grandfather was part of the South Saskatchewan Regiment.

His four medals provided great information about his service record: he was in for the duration of the war right to D-Day, and he volunteered, he wasn't conscripted.

Taylor knew his grandfather returned to Holland for the 50th anniversary celebrations marking the end of the war. And now Taylor wants to be among the thousands of Canadian students to participate at next year's 65th anniversary -- expected to be the last celebration.

The prospect is a tempting one for Debra Kelsall and Ashley Bye, as well. Like Taylor, they've both tracked down family involved in the military.

Kelsall has the canteen and a photo of her great-grandfather, who fought in the First World War, as well as a letter he wrote from the war referring to Canadians as Canucks and Germans as Fritz.

"It's almost like this letter was written by a character in the moviePasschendaele," she said.

Bye's great-great-great-grandfather fought in the First World War for the British, and she happened upon the connection when her grandmother was sent a picture of him. She then tracked down his number, position and some genealogy and a photo of his burial plot in Egypt.

It's those stories that Lovell has been encouraging his students to track down over the years. And trips to the war sites and the cemeteries help make it real for them.

"A lot of us have our DNA in some of those (war) cemeteries overseas," Lovell told his class yesterday. "Next year is a fantastic anniversary" of the liberation of Holland by Canadians.

David Robinson, co-ordinator of the remembrance tour, swung into Taylor's class while visiting Barrie and Orillia yesterday to discuss the trip. All the Canadian students making the pilgrimage will be paired with a Canadian soldier who fought in the war. Only 78 Canadian soldiers who fought in Holland are still alive and many are expected to make their last trip back.

For those planning to participate, the activity begins in the fall when the Dutch government will send tulip bulbs to all the Canadian students planning to make the trek. The bulbs are expected to bloom here at home while the Dutch and Canadian visitors celebrate Holland's liberation.

The tour begins in France and stops at all the major battle sites before continuing to Belgium and Holland where the kids will attend liberation day ceremonies with Dutch and Canadian dignitaries.

In Holland, he promised, the students will witness first-hand how well Canadians are regarded and they will feel the gratitude of the Dutch people.

"They're going to treat you like you've never been treated before," he said.

Lovell, no stranger to taking students abroad to follow in the footsteps of local soldiers who have fought in the war, hopes to fill a bus of 40 with students from his school. But all the schools will be participating, so they can combine students from local schools.

All the participating Canadian schools will also be twinned with a Dutch school. Lovell has already made contact and initial arrangements with a Dutch history teacher for the Eastview students.

Details about the trip, as well as fundraising ideas, can be found at victoryineuropetour.ca.

- - -

Canucks in Holland

Canada's most notable role in bringing about the end of the Second World War was the liberation of the Netherlands on May 5, 1945. To this day, the Dutch Royal Family sends 10,000 tulip bulbs to Ottawa each year as a show of thanks. Two days later, Germany's High Command of Armed Forces signed an unconditional surrender at a schoolhouse in Rheims, France. The following night, a final surrender was signed at a villa just outside Berlin.

In May 2010, thousands of Canadian students and teachers will visit the Netherlands to commemorate the 65th anniversary of Victory in Europe Day and Canada's liberation of the Netherlands.

The tours will include visits to Arnhem, Normandy, Passchendaele and Vimy, as well as several war cemeteries.

Organizers hope to have 7,600 Canadian students take part to symbolically represent each Canadian soldier that died fighting in the Netherlands.

On June 6, 2004, exactly 65 years after the fateful D-Day landing at Juno Beach, a Second World War veteran was sitting all alone on the stony shore.

A Canadian high school student who had attended a commemorative ceremony earlier that day walked up to the old soldier and asked if he was all right.

"Can I get you a drink of water? Do you need help?" she asked.

"I'm OK," he said, explaining that he was sitting in the very spot he had been shot during the landing which claimed the lives of thousands of young men.

"I never made it past here," he told the girl.

"I just need some time."

Then he looked up and asked the girl if she could gather some pebbles for him to take back to Canada.

"I promised my family I'd bring back some stones," he said.

The student picked up a handful of coloured stones.

As she approached the man, he stood up and unfolded his arms. Instead of hands, he had two hooks.

"This is where I lost my hands," he said, asking the girl to place the stones in a pocket of his uniform.

Retired history teacher David Robinson, who organized the school trip five years ago, told this story to the Orillia and District Canadian Club at yesterday's meeting at St. Paul's United Church.

The experience profoundly changed the girl, who had been more interested in shopping in Paris than exploring history in the early part of the trip began, said Robinson.

"It literally changed her life."

She became Student of the Year and is now a very successful university student, he said.

Robinson, 56, was born in Orillia and graduated from Park Street Collegiate. He was head of history and world studies at Port Perry High School in Durham Region when he retired.

Bringing history to life is a challenge, particularly Canadian history, which is often smothered by American history, Robinson said.

"When I was a student, most history texts were American."

Although Canadian students now read texts written by their compatriots, video games suggesting Americans saved the day now distort the truth, Robinson said.

With veterans, many of whom are reluctant to talk about their war experience, dying off, the need to recapture historical events is more pressing than ever.

"If we don't teach this new generation it will all be lost."

Robinson has conducted a number of school trips to European battlefields, as well as Hong Kong, since 2004.

At the ceremony at Vimy Ridge recognizing the 90th anniversary of the epic First World War battle that claimed 3,600 Canadian lives, each of the students wore the name of one of the soldiers who died there on their military-style shirts.

At one point, thousands of students marched silently over the same hill the Canadians finally captured from the Germans.

"Coming over the top, they spontaneously broke into O Canada."

Robinson is currently organizing a trip to the Netherlands in May of 2010, the 65th anniversary of that country's liberation from the Nazis.

Time is of the essence, he says. "A week ago there were 79 vets (still living) who liberated Holland. This week there are 78."

Each of the 180 schools sending students will be twinned with a Dutch school, Robinson said.

Robinson hopes to have 7,000 students on the trip, each one representing one of the 7,000 Canadians who died during the fierce fighting to free Holland.

So far no schools from Orillia are participating, but Robinson addressed history teachers from Simcoe County in Barrie yesterday afternoon.

"We'd like to see people from Orillia join us," he said.

Adults are also welcome to sign up. "In Amsterdam they get to go places the students can't go," Robinson joked. For more information on the Victory in Europe Tour, call EF Educational Tours at 1-416-557-6936 or e-mail greg.owen@ef.com.