I'll be the "tour guide" for 10 days in April, which includes Provence, Paris and Normandy. We'll be staying in Bayeux 4/26 and 4/27. We're dedicating the entire day Wednesday to seeing the d-day sights and Caen Memorial Museum. We'll have our own car, but I was thinking we may want to purchase a 1/2 day tour just to make it easier on ourselves. Rick Steve's guide recommends the Caen Museum d-day tour. I see there's also a company called D-Day Tours that does morning tours right from Bayeux. Does anyone have any recommendations? Thanks for your help!

enter Normandy Tours in the search forum box above and you may find info there. There is a tour company operated by a former Brittish officer in Bayeux that has received high marks on past posts. I don't know if it is D-Day tours.

I was in the Bayeux tourist office last Sep and they have brochures for about a dozen different tour companies and book on the spot - e-mail them for a list or just drop in - they said they book instantly for that day. The Caen J-Jour museum also runs their own battlefield tours. One of the most established J-Jour tours is done by battlebus - www.battlebus.com; many hotels have brochures and pick ups at hotels. Sounds like what you need is a tour guide and not a tour since you have your own vehicle. Again i'd consult the tourist office about guides.

the retired british officer referred to above is Col. Michael Chilcott. He's fabulous and I'd recommend taking the time and splurge to use him if possible. We had a full day booked with him and ended up getting more than our money's worth. He will tailor the tour to YOUR requests and does not use a basic route with standard spiels. We were allowed to spend as much time as we wanted at the various sites. You could probably condense the time a bit by not going to his home and taking the hour or so in the map room where he outlines in detail the overall battle plan. You can google and find him on the web; he and his wife also run a b/b just outside of bayeux. reservations can be made via email as we did.

Thanks for the Col. Chilcott recommendation. I had heard great things about him before, but I wasn't sure if his tour was possible if not staying at his B&B. I'll find their website, and send him a quick note. I'm sure my father-in-law would be very impressed to have an actual Colonal do the tour! I'll also check out some of the other recommendations - thanks a lot!

This is Col. Chilcott's response to my e-mail. I'm just not sure this will work for us as we will be bringing our 2-year old and infant. Nine hours is rather too long for them!

"To give you an idea of time and space, I should say that the landings cover
a frontage of 65 miles from the western edge of the US airborne to the
eastern edge of the British airborne sector. To examine either the
British/Canadian beaches or the US beaches takes 9 hours. There are other
things to see besides beaches and no client has yet been disappointed - so
they have all told ME!

My fee is 330 Euros, per day, for the first couple in my wagon, 20 Euros per
head, thereafter, 20 Euros for diesel, mileage, etc. and my lunch, if you
decide you need any.

As you can see, I am also VERY expensive."

My friend just returned from France. He said that a tour of Normandy should include the German cemetery, very different from the American cemetery and very moving also. Hope you can include this in your tour.

Yeah, we really need to mourn the loss of the <i>Herrenrasse</i> who set out to enslave the rest of the world.

Yeah.

You might want to check out Battlebus Tours. I'm just not sure about the 2 year old and an infant, but they are very helpful via their e-mail which can be reached by thier we site www.battlebus.fr

I'm with Robespierre. After spending the day honoring the Americans, British and Canadians who made the ultimate sacrifice why would you want to contradict yourself with a tribute to the Third Reich?

Larry J

The German cemetery is very moving, especially since the black lava rock crosses show the birth and death dates. Most of those &quot;Third Reich&quot; monsters were 16 and 17 years old and fighting just because they were told to, rather like our unfortunate troops in Irag, fighting for an unworthy cause.

Back to the Colonel. I don't recall paying that much but it was in August and the slower time of the year. Don't know what tour would be good for such small children in the group, honestly. Our boys were 14 and 16 at the time and were able to keep up fine.