Ever since I said I was going to France, my friend Nick Covey said he wanted to go since he had never been to Europe. That was great news for me, to have company for the first 2 weeks of the trip. Nick wanted to see some specific things, but was generally accepting of anything interesting that would come up, just enjoying the experience. We rendezvoused at Charles De Gaulle airport in Paris on June 7th having taken different flights to get there. Once in our rental car, we decided to first go visit Omaha Beach on the Normandy coast, the site of the Allied Invasion of France known as D-Day. We made it to Caan before running out of day. We got a motel and ate at some American Themed burger/malt shop restaurant. So much for experiencing great french cuisine, right? But it was fine. The next morning, we drove to Omaha Beach. We arrived there on June 8th, just two days after the anniversary of the invasion. There are lots of memorials and a museum to learn about this special place (although the museum was not open while we were there).
The beach at Omaha is very wide. There are high hills just above the beach. It was intimidating to think of all of the young american men running through the shallow water after leaving their landing craft and onto the beach during the invasion. With german troops holding the high ground above the beach and having a clear view of these American troops. The landing had to be at low tide so they could see all of the obstacles and traps that the germans had installed on the beach so they had a long way to go on the beach with virtually no cover until they would reach the base of these hills. We learned all of this because later, we listened to an english historian who was leading a tour group. He also said the the British troops at Sword, Juno, and Gold beach had much easier time of things, and even the American troops at Utah beach as well. Omaha beach was the beach where things did not go well due to many factors according to this particular historian. To say it was emotional would have been an understatement!
If seeing the beach itself was emotional, the cemetery was even more so. Acres and acres of graves. Thousands! I really think these men were part of the Greatest Generation!
That is indeed pretty humbling, to imagine the young men having no choice but to try to survive that…what a nightmare and so hard to imagine. I’ve never been there, but the Arlington National Cemetery in DC is pretty humbling too. Keep the posts coming!
Great post Greg!
Some day Rachelle and I will visit France and Normandy will be high on our list of items to see! My late step-father, who was in the navy aboard the USS Nicholas in the south pacific, use to say, “thank god I didn’t join the army or marines”!