youngtom2910

We took a train from St. Lazare in Paris-one stop at Caen and then a Bayeux stop-about a 2 1/2 hour trip. We stayed at domaine de Bayeux, which is a lovely restored 18th century mansion. It's about 200 yards from the train station, on the road to the downtown area and the church, which was a short walk. The hotel rooms are quite large-we had an attic room which was VERY large, except there are some attic beams that need to be avoided. both a shower and a tub, 2 sinks in the bath. good wifi. Minimal if any air conditioning in the main house-which could be an issue if it;s really hot. there are some modern annex rooms that do hava AC. A beautiful back yard garden and very nice staff.

We spent the first day at the tapestry museum and the Bayeuz d day museum. The tapestry museum has the famous Bayeux tapestry regarding the battle of Hastings. Quite impressive, and remarkable that it endured.

The d day museum is a very effective introduction to the d day campaign in Normandy from June 6 through August.

The next day we toured a number of things with a guide-utah beach and the museum there, Omaha Beach and the american cemetery, St. Mere Eglise, Pt. du Hoc. It was interesting seeing the varied topography-Utah beach was essentially flat, while Omaha beach (and Pt. du Hoc, of course) had pretty high cliffs. The Utah beach museum had very moving interviews with survivors of d day. And the cemetery had moving stories about men who died. The american cemetery is quite beautiful, on a hill overlooking Omaha beach. About 10,000 graves in the US cemetery-probably about the same number in the english cemetery. don't know how many are in the German cemetery. We unfortunately had a not very knowledgable guide from Gold Beach company. I know something about d day and wanted a guide with more knowledge and passion about the topic.

It was interesting to me that there still seems to be great interest in the d day invasion, almost 80 years later. I guess for many Europeans who had to endure occupation for a number of years, the wounds are still raw. Part of My wife's cousin's family was in the Netherlands during the war, and they tell very chilling stories about almost getting killed.

We did find a very good restaurant-La Maison blanche, downtown near the cathedral. we belatedly learned that if i had made a reservation trough the web site "the forks" we could have received 20% off. apparently this web site is good for some restaurants around france.

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