Omaha Beach and Pointe du Hoc

This morning required an early get up as we had a 2-1/2 hour bus ride to the D-Day landing beaches. This was one of the parts of the trip I’d been looking forward to, and was not disappointed at all by the experience.

Our first stop was on Gold Beach, target site of the British forces for the invasion. Gold beach is more than 5 miles wide and includes the towns of La Rivière, Le Hamel and Arromanches. Arromanches became the location of the Mulberry harbour, the first man-made port erected under combat conditions. The invasion needed a port to bring in supplies on a huge scale, so the allies built concrete pontoons that were towed across the channel and sunk to form the port’s outer perimeter. Twenty of the original 115 pontoons still defy the waves and can be seen from shore. A small museum sits in the town center with access to the beach. We took lots of pictures and had lunch at a local restaurant, 6 Juin.

It seems everyone in town has hooked into the tourist business, which is fine with me. They keep the beaches well preserved and available to people from all nations who want to visit and understand just what happened here 66 years ago. The souvenir shops aren’t too gaudy, and the locals seem genuinely happy to have folks come and visit.

Our next stop was Omaha Beach and the Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial. Omaha beach, also 5 miles in length, is overlooked by steep bluffs which rise to 150 feet and command the beaches. These naturally strong defensive positions had been skillfully fortified by the Germans with concrete gun emplacements, anti-tank guns and machine guns. Many of those defensive positions still exist, though civilization as grown up around a lot of it in the last several decades.

Our bus parked in the cemetery parking lot and we walked to the Memorial as a group. Our guide, Christof was extremely knowledgeable about D-Day, giving us tid-bits of information all through the trip to the cemetery. After an overview of the landing, using the memorial map as a visual aid, he took us out into the cemetery. It is unbelievably humbling to stand there and see 9,387 white crosses and Stars of David arrayed in perfect formation, row upon row. There was an solid blue sky above and a carpet of green grass below, as we wandered among the silent markers, quietly noting the names, dates and states of each of these brave souls. I found myself noticing things that I could relate to: graves of guys from Pennsylvania, boys from bomber squadrons (one of my former squadrons. the 668th, flew A-20 Havocs supporting D-Day) and parachute regiments. Most were from June 6^th and beyond, but I saw a couple from days before, probably Rangers or Pathfinders who had led the way for the invasion to follow. So many stories untold and lives cut short.

The visitors center was very nice. It wasn’t very big but very informative. They even had a computer system you could use to find the burial plot of people interned in the Cemetery. What I didn’t know was that their database covered ALL the American Military Cemeteries, located on foreign soil. Just on a whim, I typed in the name of my great uncle, Howard E. Robeson, who was killed while flying in North Africa in 1942. I had heard stories about him, but didn’t know any details. His name pulled up a listing that said he was killed on 19 December, 1942, and is buried in the North African American Military Cemetery, in Carthage, Tunisia. It even listed the unit he was assigned to at the time of his death, all information I didn’t know. My grandmother had given me his log book and wings when she died, but until this moment, they didn’t mean much more than a name from a family story. Being here on THIS hallowed ground brought him to life as real member of my family.

After too short a time, we hustled on the bus and drove down the road to a small sea-side village, arriving just as it started to rain a bit, giving us a more accurate feeling of true Normandy coastal weather in the summertime. Upon arriving, we had about 10 minutes to walk down to the beach, take some pictures and collect some actual sand from Omaha Beach. Luckily I had a plastic baggie with me, because the tour guides never mentioned that was going to be on the itinerary. I quickly scooped up a couple of handfuls and carried it back to the bus to share with some of the other members of our group.

After our little detour to the waterfront, we continued west a couple of kilometers to Pointe du Hoc, site of an epic D-Day battle where 225 Rangers scaled a 100’ cliff under a withering German counter-fire to disarm a battery of captured French 155mm guns, which overlooked both Omaha and Utah Beaches risking heavy casualties in the landing forces. Upon reaching the top of the cliffs, the Rangers found the gun batteries empty, the guns moved weeks before to safeguard them from the bombing attacks. Of the 225 Rangers who attacked the cliff, only 90 moved inland from the gun boxes.

The area around the gun defenses is littered with bomb craters, remnants of the allied bombing attempts to disable the huge guns from the air. There very few restrictions to visitor movement on Pointe du Hoc so kids were scrambling down and around both the craters and the busted bunkers and gun emplacements. There are a couple of elevated platforms close to the cliffs where you can see up and down the coast for literally 20-30 miles in both directions, so it is easy to see that danger this location posed for the allied invasion.

At the end of our hour on Pointe du Hoc, our day was basically done; save for the 2-1/2 hour bus ride back to the boat, arriving just in time for ANOTHER great dinner.

Tomorrow we start our journey back to Paris, with a stop in Les Andelys, site of Richard the Lionhearted's Chateau Gaillard, guardian of the Northern Seine.

When In Rouen…

Today we are in Rouen, the capital city of Normandie. Once one of the largest and most prosperous cities of medieval Europe, Rouen was the seat of the Exchequer of Normandy in the Middle Ages. It was one of the capitals of the Anglo-Norman dynasties, which ruled both England and large parts of modern France from the eleventh century to the 15th century. It was also where Joan of Arc was burnt in 1431.

We sailed north from Vernon all morning, and pulled into Rouen, just after lunch, parking beneath a large bridge topped with a river-wide piece of modern art made of orange and tan 2 x 4s.

Our activity for the day consisted of a guided walking tour of the city including the famed Cathedral of Rouen, which sits just blocks from the river. Highlights of the city tour included seeing the old houses, narrow streets, and the burial grounds for victims of the Plague. The Cathedral was another breathtaking experience. The soaring towers and detailed stonework that adorned the exterior of the church is topped off by stone and iron steeples visible for miles in every direction, and made it the tallest structure in the world from 1876 to 1880.

Inside, the building is filled with huge stained-glass windows, many surviving since the middle ages including numerous bombings during WWII. One of the interesting things for me was stumbling across the sarcophagus containing the heart of Richard I (Richard the Lionhearted). Apparently, whenever he wasn’t on a Crusade, he spent most of his life in Rouen, ruling his vast kingdom of Normandy and England.

After her victory in Orleans, Joan of Arc was captured and handed over to the English. She ended up in Rouen, where she was eventually burned at the stake for wearing men’s clothing, definitely the worst punishment ever for bad fashion sense. There is now a modern church located on the site in the town square, dedicated to her as the patron saint of France.

The tour left us off in the middle of the town square, obviously providing the opportunity for shopping and sampling of the local fare. We stopped at a patisserie with a line much longer than any other in the neighborhood and stocked up on chocolate croissants. They were so good, they practically melted in your mouth!

The evening was spent with another wonderful dinner and lounging around the boat, relaxing before our big trip to the D-Day landing beaches in the morning. I think everyone is truly excited about that upcoming part of the trip.

I Went To A Garden Party...

We awoke this morning to the hum of engines and the sound of water rushing by… our first morning underway. It was a cool, misty morning, with cloudy skies, but a promised forecast of sunshine had us very hopeful for a great day touring Claude Monet’s home and gardens.

We docked at the small town of Vernon (don’t pronounce the last ‘n’) about 45 minutes north of Paris by train or 10 hours or so by cruise boat down the winding Seine River. Vernon is a city of 25,000 inhabitants, and was built in the 9th century by Rollon, the first Duke of Normandy. It’s a quaint bedroom suburb of Paris, full of winding cobblestone streets with many fun shops and cafés.

Our first event of the day was to board buses and drive the 6 km to the town of Giverny (Gee-ver-NAY), the home of Claude Monet, and a mecca for fans of Impressionist art. I don’t know much about art, but I do know that I like Impressionism because you don’t have to put in as much detail. A lot is left up to the imagination of the viewer. Kind of like the difference between reading a book and seeing the movie.

Monet’s home and gardens sit at the base of a small set of hills in a little village about half-way between Paris and the Atlantic coast. The streets of the small village are so small, coach buses have to park in a lot off the main road, but you have a nice walk through the narrow town streets past some cafés, gift shops, and several small museums of Impressionist art. It is set up as a tourist spot, and admittance costs about 6 Euros, which was covered by the Cruise.

The gardens were absolutely amazing. A large pond is surrounded by over-hanging willows, rushes, and trees hanging branches. A small path winds around the water, fed by a babbling brook, all painstakingly maintained by a hard-working staff that was busy pulling weeds and trimming trees and flowers the whole time we were there.

As we wound our way around the tiny lake, every vantage point offered another beautiful vista to photograph. If only there weren’t people lined up around the path, the pictures alone would be pieces of art worthy of museum display. No wonder Monet was inspired to paint such masterpieces!

After leaving the pond, we wandered through his gardens that fronted his house. Monet apparently planted long rows of flowers based on color combinations, and let them grow fairly naturally, with little regulation other than containment. Every few steps is an assault of vibrant color and textures. I’m not a flower person, but I couldn’t help myself from taking photo after photo of these amazing plants.

Finally, we were able to tour his house. It is a typical large country townhouse, reminding me a lot of the houses in the Italian village I lived in when my dad was stationed in Aviano, Italy, back in the ‘70s. Most of the rooms were fairly small and confined, but the kitchen and dining rooms, where people tend to spend their time, where huge! The kitchen was a brilliant blue with half-tile walls, and a huge stove and fireplace. The dining room was a bright yellow, with matching yellow cabinets, table and chairs. The yellow china cupboards were filled with blue dishes, which would surely provide a wonderful dining presentation. Definitely my favorite room of the house!

Our last stop was Monet’s workshop, a large single room barn structure that is now a gift shop. Large paintings covered each wall, along with picture of the artist in his hay-day. The roof was pretty much all glass, light being such and important part of an artist’s tool-bag, with movable shades available if needed. It looked like and artist’s paradise!

After lunch we had two options: one was a walk through the town of Vernon, and the other was water-color lessons by a local artist. Laura and the gang chose the walk, while I, and seven other bold souls chose the water-color lessons. It was an interesting experience: The instructor gave us paints and water and a few quick instructions on getting started (mostly where the horizon line was), and then cut us loose! An hour later we had our first impressionistic water-color… I’m not sure anyone but the artist can tell what it is, but again, that’s the beauty of Impressionism, right???

Dinner was a bit later this evening, so I took a stroll up through town to see what I had missed. I found Vernon to be a beautiful, vibrant place with lots of neat old homes, nice stores, old churches and lots and lots of café’s and bakeries. I wish more of the towns in the US were like this. Somewhere in the rush to suburbia, we’ve lost this feeling of closeness and community. Makes me glad we’ve chosen to stay in our little house in Zelienople, where we can walk to any place in town, know a lot of the people we meet along the way, and have a Main Street that is fairly busy and vibrant.

After dinner the girl who gave the water-color lessons gave a nice little presentation on the history of Impressionism, and showed off some of her works. It was nice background to everything we had seen and done today.

Tomorrow we move on down the river, and deeper into history, to Rouen - the capital of Normandy.