Taking Normandy by Storm
Sep 10th, 2008, 05:13 AM
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Taking Normandy by Storm
Over the last four months I culled a lot of very useful information from this chat group for my recent trip to France. Out itinerary roughly broke down to 5 days in Paris, 5 days in Normandy and 5 days in Alsace. I don’t feel a description of our time in Paris will help anyone since that topic has been done to death but since so many people seem to do the “Normandy beaches” in one day perhaps some future planner might like to hear more detail. We had a tremendous visit with a lot of thanks to this group. Our group included myself, AM, my husband KR and our two nieces Ashley (21) and Jennifer (23), hence my pen name ASHJEN.
We left Paris on an early morning train to Vernon and picked up our rental car. We left the girls at the train station and walked the mile to rental car place with faultless navigation by DumDum, our name for the TomTom GPS which turned out to be an invaluable tool for our trip. We drove back to the station and picked up girls and luggage and headed out to Giverny. The visit to Monet’s garden was a top three item on my trip. I am an avid gardener, not an art critic, so the garden was all we visited in this town. We arrived on Thurs Aug 28 and there was no line and gardens were not crowded. I spent two very happy hours soaking up the colour and variety and burned off a good chunk of my memory card. From here we drove to Arromanches which was where our bed and breakfast was located. On our way through we took a little detour down through Pays d’Auge. Stopped at a couple of cider farms, in spite of being an avid consumer of Strongbow cider never could acquire a taste for the Norman varieties. Although I had a lot of fun trying to find one I liked! Bonnebosq was a nice little town to drive through but not much to stop for. Beauvron gave us real pleasure. There are a couple of very nice but pricey restaurants which were rec in my guide. We instead had a great lunch thanks to the local bakery. She made great pastries and quiches and heated them up for us. I had salmon spinach quiche, amazing, plus of course something sweet for dessert. She has no seating but there is nice local café that doesn’t mind if you bring your own food, an interesting system not uncommon there. So we walked down the block and had a nice glass of wine with our meal. There were lots of really nice artisan shops with locally made items. This is where I first acquired a taste for the great local toffee/caramels they make in Normandy. They became our constant companions in the car!! We were in Arromanche in lots of time to take a walk on the beach. I was unable to find a lot of information about this beach before I left but it turned out to be a great place to be. You can walk for miles along the sand to the west and sand is hard packed and comfortable for sitting. The beach is all sand under the water too so there is no worry about your feet getting hurt on stones. The remnants of the Mulberry harbour are still present and make it interesting from a historical point of view.
It was that night that we got the emergency call from my sister letting me know that ZOOM airlines had gone bankrupt and we had no flight home. She really saved our bacon because although the airline sent out an email, when I am on vacation I usually stay away from computers. Our agenda for Day 1 then had to be adjusted to start in Caen to get access to an internet café to book new tickets. We were thinking of going there first anyway because we planned our days to try and be in town on market day as we developed a real addiction to French markets. Our big mistake was from an efficiency point of view it looked like we should stop at the Caen memorial on the way into town. We went to many of the D day museums over the next few days and this was definitely the best. I would rate it 10/10. It held all of our interests from KR who is knowledgeable history addict, AM who is interested in the story of how the war affected individuals and the two girls who were being educated from scratch. The museum is well laid out, informative and is a peace memorial. It strives to concentrate on the price countries and individuals paid and why we need to find a peaceful solution to our conflicts. It covers conflicts of the twentieth century not just the two great wars. I was particularly affected by the Nobel Peace Prize winners section. I was blown away when I got to the end and realized they had built it in the old German command bunker. We ended up being there so long we missed the market all together!! After having a walk about tour of down town, booking our new tickets on Air Canada to get home and having a very forgettable lunch we headed of to Suisse Normande. Although many of the tour books had recommended this as a beautiful natural area they were short on details of where and what. We drove toward Roche d’Oetre on back roads and then as we got close stopped at a tourist information centre. It turned out to be in Pont d’Ouilly and we were able to get maps of the hiking routes and information about canoeing. I am an avid paddler and was hoping to paddle in France but the prices were very high at the few places we stopped. I have 6 different canoes and kayaks in my own garage and could not justify the 50€ for an hour it would have cost to get all four of us into a boat. The hiking was beautiful, trails well marked and a good visitors centre. No charge for access to the trails. There was also supervised cliff climbing available but it was late enough in the day we decided not to start that. We returned to Arromanche and had another restaurant meal. This was the only day of our whole trip we ate two meals out and this second one was a breaking point. Food and service was awful and we made sure we did not have to eat out again in Arromanche.
Saturday morning we were up and had breakfast early and headed out to Bayeux for their weekly market. This was one of the best markets. We had great food to munch on as we walked around and bought souvenirs as well as fruit and veggies to cook for dinner that night. Bought a great slow cooked pork roast which fed us for two nights. We even bought a beautiful bouquet of flowers we were able to leave several day later at the cemetery in Bourlon Woods where my grand father’s comrades were laid to rest. He was one of the lucky ones who came home wounded from Cambrai. We went to see the Bayeux tapestry which I was only luke warm about. I was even tempted to just let the girls go in and we would wait outside as they were really interested and I am so glad I did not. It is an amazing thing to see and the free Audioguide included in the tour is a very well done description of everything going on. There is so much detail in the needle work it would be easy to miss details. We walked from here to the Musee de la Bataille de Normandie. It was a bit of a hike on a hot day and not on interesting streets. If I had to do it again I probably would have driven out as it is way on the edge of town. I give this museum an 8/10. My opinion may be affected by the fact it was a beautiful day and I would rather have been outside!! It does cover all the battle with great photos and concise write ups and well laid out. It was the only place I saw detailed information on women in the war, nurses and support staff. There was also a great area on the reporters that the girls and I found very interesting as only the day before we had been talking about all those who jumped into the breach with nothing but a camera. They also have a very touching display of photos of towns before and after the bombings then as they are today. OK looking back I am now going to give it a 9/10!! The plan was to go from here to the D Day beaches. We had a great lunch in Bayeux at a creperie three doors down from the catherdral. I even took the time to write down the name but I have lost it. They were black wheat with amazing fillings, I had apple and pork with Pommeau(apple liqueur) sauce and the others had a variety of seafoods. Even with drinks the whole meal was less than 10€ each and totally amazing. Plus she had these amazing pottery dishes. The owner even took the time to show us where Noron la Porterie, the town where the pottery comes from, was on the map and this became a stop for a later day. KR wanted to start his tour of the beaches at Omaha so that was our next stop. There are two museums in Omaha and you need to be careful. There is a museum that calls itself the D-Day museum, which is a private for profit museum full of salvaged crap and totally not worth the time it took to drive there. Unfortunately it was much easier to find than the official Omaha beach museum. We didn’t go in as we recognized it for what it was. We drove back and parked on Omaha beach. KR went to the museum and the three of us girls headed for the beach for a couple of hours of sun and swimming. KR rates that museum a 6.5/10. Lots of photocopied pages from a book telling individual soldiers stories but no connecting cohesive description of the battle. This is an outstanding beach with lots of shallow puddles for families with small children to play in but big enough there was no feeling of being crowded. I could never quite get rid of the feeling when I turned around and looked at the town from the water of the war still present. All those young boys, sea sick and scared, being dumped out with that huge stretch of open beach to run across. When you’re quiet there you can still sense the panic and smell the fear. Sorry I guess that’s too emotional to be talking about. We drove along the water back to Arromanche and stopped on the way at the German batteries at Longues. This spot is totally worth the stop as it hasn’t been tidied up. You can see where the artillery hit and how it tore everything apart. This was also the first battlefield where I saw poppies blooming. In Canada poppies are a universal symbol of our veterans. I can tell you that after an hour of crawling around the torn out bunkers when we were standing down on the cliff top as a tourist helicopter came unexpectedly up over the edge I ducked. There was that flash for a second that it is starting again. Back in Arromanche we took our books and a bottle of cider down to the beach and sat and enjoyed the good weather for an hour before making a great dinner from the food we had bought from the market in the morning.
Sunday was, I am afraid, not a banner day. Part of the problem was is was the last Sunday in August so everything was packed with locals and tourists. We headed west, driving through Pays d’Auge again we stopped at a village called Cambremer for their market. It is a smaller market. It is more geared at tourists so as apposed to buying things you would eat while there the stalls have locally made jams, honey, cider, pottery etc. It was a lot of fun because everyone was encouraging you to take samples and we did get a few things. As well all the vendors don middle ages peasant apparel which does add to the atmosphere. Definitely worth the stop. It is scenically located in the yard outside the old church. We went from there to Honfleur. It was a town I expected to like but ended up hating. Anything quaint about it is long gone. It is over developed and now a Hollywood version of itself. Instead of artists on the quay I found galleries lining the streets where one 6x8” oil painting that caught my eye was 8000€, to be fair the women did offer me a post card version for 4€!! My conflict is in spite of this I have to say it was totally worth the stop for the amazing churches. There are four totally unique buildings. Eglise Ste Catherine with it’s double knave, Eglise St Leonard with its octagonal bell tower, the fisherman’s church right on the wharf and, most importantly, Chapelle Notre Dame de Grace. Notre Dame is set in a very peaceful glade and you can tell when you walk in, it is a building which has been much loved. Worth the drive out of town and there is a great view of LeHavre harbour and the Pont de Normandie if you are not into churches. We drove from here to Fecamp, randomly chosen as a spot to start our eastward drive along the cliffs as we didn’t want to drive all the way to Dieppe. Since we were there anyway went to the Benedictine palace, took some photos and did some tastings. Unique building. Had a couple of views of the cliffs at Etretat but the town was packed on a Sunday afternoon and the closest parking we could find was 2.5 miles out of town. We decided to call it a day and took the highway directly back to Arromanche to play on our own less crowded beach. Went for a long walk, had an after dark swim and another home cooked meal.
Monday was last day in Normandy, we left Tues morning for Beaumont Hammel and Vimy ( in other words switched wars ). We started in Arromanches. KR went to the Musee du Debarquement while we wandered around the beach and town. He rates it a 9/10 for what it is. It does not pretend to cover the whole war but gives a detailed description of the mulberry harbour how it was set up and worked. All the time being able to look out the large picture windows and see the setting. A must for war buffs. We all went to the Arromanche 360, which was very well done and worth the price of admission. You stand in the middle of a large room and are encouraged to walk about during the show. Show is projected on 8 screens all around you so there is a definite sense of being in the middle of things. They have done an amazing job of putting the old war footage together with the same camera angles taken as the towns and beaches are today. There is no speaking you are just thrown back and forth between war and peace, astounding. We drove from there along the cliff road to Juno. This is the sight of the Canadian landing and so for us important to see. There is an excellent museum well put together that describes the war at home as well as the war in Normandy. A must for Canadians and I believe very informative for all. Ranks right up there with the Caen memorial. We also got a great guided tour of the beach describing the Canadian assault. We headed off to Mont St Michael in the afternoon by way of Noron la Porterie to look at the pottery. Some interesting stuff in this town although about 10 dealers and you need to sort the wheat from the chaff. Didn’t buy anything because the stuff I liked was too heavy for our baggage limit!! I won’t go into a lot of detail about Mont St Michael, it has been well described by others. We arrived at 4 pm in the afternoon, which was perfect. Crowds were going home, lighting nice for photos. Two hours was fine if you aren’t interested in any of the touristy crap which crowds the Grande Rue. I would have like to stay to watch the tide come in and then the building light up but we didn’t want to take the long drive home late at night when we had to make an early start the next morning.
If any of you have made it to the end of this rather long story thanks for your attention. We had a great time in Normandy and I hope this helps with your planning.
We left Paris on an early morning train to Vernon and picked up our rental car. We left the girls at the train station and walked the mile to rental car place with faultless navigation by DumDum, our name for the TomTom GPS which turned out to be an invaluable tool for our trip. We drove back to the station and picked up girls and luggage and headed out to Giverny. The visit to Monet’s garden was a top three item on my trip. I am an avid gardener, not an art critic, so the garden was all we visited in this town. We arrived on Thurs Aug 28 and there was no line and gardens were not crowded. I spent two very happy hours soaking up the colour and variety and burned off a good chunk of my memory card. From here we drove to Arromanches which was where our bed and breakfast was located. On our way through we took a little detour down through Pays d’Auge. Stopped at a couple of cider farms, in spite of being an avid consumer of Strongbow cider never could acquire a taste for the Norman varieties. Although I had a lot of fun trying to find one I liked! Bonnebosq was a nice little town to drive through but not much to stop for. Beauvron gave us real pleasure. There are a couple of very nice but pricey restaurants which were rec in my guide. We instead had a great lunch thanks to the local bakery. She made great pastries and quiches and heated them up for us. I had salmon spinach quiche, amazing, plus of course something sweet for dessert. She has no seating but there is nice local café that doesn’t mind if you bring your own food, an interesting system not uncommon there. So we walked down the block and had a nice glass of wine with our meal. There were lots of really nice artisan shops with locally made items. This is where I first acquired a taste for the great local toffee/caramels they make in Normandy. They became our constant companions in the car!! We were in Arromanche in lots of time to take a walk on the beach. I was unable to find a lot of information about this beach before I left but it turned out to be a great place to be. You can walk for miles along the sand to the west and sand is hard packed and comfortable for sitting. The beach is all sand under the water too so there is no worry about your feet getting hurt on stones. The remnants of the Mulberry harbour are still present and make it interesting from a historical point of view.
It was that night that we got the emergency call from my sister letting me know that ZOOM airlines had gone bankrupt and we had no flight home. She really saved our bacon because although the airline sent out an email, when I am on vacation I usually stay away from computers. Our agenda for Day 1 then had to be adjusted to start in Caen to get access to an internet café to book new tickets. We were thinking of going there first anyway because we planned our days to try and be in town on market day as we developed a real addiction to French markets. Our big mistake was from an efficiency point of view it looked like we should stop at the Caen memorial on the way into town. We went to many of the D day museums over the next few days and this was definitely the best. I would rate it 10/10. It held all of our interests from KR who is knowledgeable history addict, AM who is interested in the story of how the war affected individuals and the two girls who were being educated from scratch. The museum is well laid out, informative and is a peace memorial. It strives to concentrate on the price countries and individuals paid and why we need to find a peaceful solution to our conflicts. It covers conflicts of the twentieth century not just the two great wars. I was particularly affected by the Nobel Peace Prize winners section. I was blown away when I got to the end and realized they had built it in the old German command bunker. We ended up being there so long we missed the market all together!! After having a walk about tour of down town, booking our new tickets on Air Canada to get home and having a very forgettable lunch we headed of to Suisse Normande. Although many of the tour books had recommended this as a beautiful natural area they were short on details of where and what. We drove toward Roche d’Oetre on back roads and then as we got close stopped at a tourist information centre. It turned out to be in Pont d’Ouilly and we were able to get maps of the hiking routes and information about canoeing. I am an avid paddler and was hoping to paddle in France but the prices were very high at the few places we stopped. I have 6 different canoes and kayaks in my own garage and could not justify the 50€ for an hour it would have cost to get all four of us into a boat. The hiking was beautiful, trails well marked and a good visitors centre. No charge for access to the trails. There was also supervised cliff climbing available but it was late enough in the day we decided not to start that. We returned to Arromanche and had another restaurant meal. This was the only day of our whole trip we ate two meals out and this second one was a breaking point. Food and service was awful and we made sure we did not have to eat out again in Arromanche.
Saturday morning we were up and had breakfast early and headed out to Bayeux for their weekly market. This was one of the best markets. We had great food to munch on as we walked around and bought souvenirs as well as fruit and veggies to cook for dinner that night. Bought a great slow cooked pork roast which fed us for two nights. We even bought a beautiful bouquet of flowers we were able to leave several day later at the cemetery in Bourlon Woods where my grand father’s comrades were laid to rest. He was one of the lucky ones who came home wounded from Cambrai. We went to see the Bayeux tapestry which I was only luke warm about. I was even tempted to just let the girls go in and we would wait outside as they were really interested and I am so glad I did not. It is an amazing thing to see and the free Audioguide included in the tour is a very well done description of everything going on. There is so much detail in the needle work it would be easy to miss details. We walked from here to the Musee de la Bataille de Normandie. It was a bit of a hike on a hot day and not on interesting streets. If I had to do it again I probably would have driven out as it is way on the edge of town. I give this museum an 8/10. My opinion may be affected by the fact it was a beautiful day and I would rather have been outside!! It does cover all the battle with great photos and concise write ups and well laid out. It was the only place I saw detailed information on women in the war, nurses and support staff. There was also a great area on the reporters that the girls and I found very interesting as only the day before we had been talking about all those who jumped into the breach with nothing but a camera. They also have a very touching display of photos of towns before and after the bombings then as they are today. OK looking back I am now going to give it a 9/10!! The plan was to go from here to the D Day beaches. We had a great lunch in Bayeux at a creperie three doors down from the catherdral. I even took the time to write down the name but I have lost it. They were black wheat with amazing fillings, I had apple and pork with Pommeau(apple liqueur) sauce and the others had a variety of seafoods. Even with drinks the whole meal was less than 10€ each and totally amazing. Plus she had these amazing pottery dishes. The owner even took the time to show us where Noron la Porterie, the town where the pottery comes from, was on the map and this became a stop for a later day. KR wanted to start his tour of the beaches at Omaha so that was our next stop. There are two museums in Omaha and you need to be careful. There is a museum that calls itself the D-Day museum, which is a private for profit museum full of salvaged crap and totally not worth the time it took to drive there. Unfortunately it was much easier to find than the official Omaha beach museum. We didn’t go in as we recognized it for what it was. We drove back and parked on Omaha beach. KR went to the museum and the three of us girls headed for the beach for a couple of hours of sun and swimming. KR rates that museum a 6.5/10. Lots of photocopied pages from a book telling individual soldiers stories but no connecting cohesive description of the battle. This is an outstanding beach with lots of shallow puddles for families with small children to play in but big enough there was no feeling of being crowded. I could never quite get rid of the feeling when I turned around and looked at the town from the water of the war still present. All those young boys, sea sick and scared, being dumped out with that huge stretch of open beach to run across. When you’re quiet there you can still sense the panic and smell the fear. Sorry I guess that’s too emotional to be talking about. We drove along the water back to Arromanche and stopped on the way at the German batteries at Longues. This spot is totally worth the stop as it hasn’t been tidied up. You can see where the artillery hit and how it tore everything apart. This was also the first battlefield where I saw poppies blooming. In Canada poppies are a universal symbol of our veterans. I can tell you that after an hour of crawling around the torn out bunkers when we were standing down on the cliff top as a tourist helicopter came unexpectedly up over the edge I ducked. There was that flash for a second that it is starting again. Back in Arromanche we took our books and a bottle of cider down to the beach and sat and enjoyed the good weather for an hour before making a great dinner from the food we had bought from the market in the morning.
Sunday was, I am afraid, not a banner day. Part of the problem was is was the last Sunday in August so everything was packed with locals and tourists. We headed west, driving through Pays d’Auge again we stopped at a village called Cambremer for their market. It is a smaller market. It is more geared at tourists so as apposed to buying things you would eat while there the stalls have locally made jams, honey, cider, pottery etc. It was a lot of fun because everyone was encouraging you to take samples and we did get a few things. As well all the vendors don middle ages peasant apparel which does add to the atmosphere. Definitely worth the stop. It is scenically located in the yard outside the old church. We went from there to Honfleur. It was a town I expected to like but ended up hating. Anything quaint about it is long gone. It is over developed and now a Hollywood version of itself. Instead of artists on the quay I found galleries lining the streets where one 6x8” oil painting that caught my eye was 8000€, to be fair the women did offer me a post card version for 4€!! My conflict is in spite of this I have to say it was totally worth the stop for the amazing churches. There are four totally unique buildings. Eglise Ste Catherine with it’s double knave, Eglise St Leonard with its octagonal bell tower, the fisherman’s church right on the wharf and, most importantly, Chapelle Notre Dame de Grace. Notre Dame is set in a very peaceful glade and you can tell when you walk in, it is a building which has been much loved. Worth the drive out of town and there is a great view of LeHavre harbour and the Pont de Normandie if you are not into churches. We drove from here to Fecamp, randomly chosen as a spot to start our eastward drive along the cliffs as we didn’t want to drive all the way to Dieppe. Since we were there anyway went to the Benedictine palace, took some photos and did some tastings. Unique building. Had a couple of views of the cliffs at Etretat but the town was packed on a Sunday afternoon and the closest parking we could find was 2.5 miles out of town. We decided to call it a day and took the highway directly back to Arromanche to play on our own less crowded beach. Went for a long walk, had an after dark swim and another home cooked meal.
Monday was last day in Normandy, we left Tues morning for Beaumont Hammel and Vimy ( in other words switched wars ). We started in Arromanches. KR went to the Musee du Debarquement while we wandered around the beach and town. He rates it a 9/10 for what it is. It does not pretend to cover the whole war but gives a detailed description of the mulberry harbour how it was set up and worked. All the time being able to look out the large picture windows and see the setting. A must for war buffs. We all went to the Arromanche 360, which was very well done and worth the price of admission. You stand in the middle of a large room and are encouraged to walk about during the show. Show is projected on 8 screens all around you so there is a definite sense of being in the middle of things. They have done an amazing job of putting the old war footage together with the same camera angles taken as the towns and beaches are today. There is no speaking you are just thrown back and forth between war and peace, astounding. We drove from there along the cliff road to Juno. This is the sight of the Canadian landing and so for us important to see. There is an excellent museum well put together that describes the war at home as well as the war in Normandy. A must for Canadians and I believe very informative for all. Ranks right up there with the Caen memorial. We also got a great guided tour of the beach describing the Canadian assault. We headed off to Mont St Michael in the afternoon by way of Noron la Porterie to look at the pottery. Some interesting stuff in this town although about 10 dealers and you need to sort the wheat from the chaff. Didn’t buy anything because the stuff I liked was too heavy for our baggage limit!! I won’t go into a lot of detail about Mont St Michael, it has been well described by others. We arrived at 4 pm in the afternoon, which was perfect. Crowds were going home, lighting nice for photos. Two hours was fine if you aren’t interested in any of the touristy crap which crowds the Grande Rue. I would have like to stay to watch the tide come in and then the building light up but we didn’t want to take the long drive home late at night when we had to make an early start the next morning.
If any of you have made it to the end of this rather long story thanks for your attention. We had a great time in Normandy and I hope this helps with your planning.
Sep 10th, 2008, 05:52 AM
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Ashjen, thanks for this, and glad to hear you worked your way around the Zoom collapse.
Like laverendrye, I'd be interested in hearing about your visit to Vimy and Beaumont-Hamel, as we're going to be there in a few weeks.
Anselm
Like laverendrye, I'd be interested in hearing about your visit to Vimy and Beaumont-Hamel, as we're going to be there in a few weeks.
Anselm
Sep 10th, 2008, 05:23 PM
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Sorry about the paragraphs. I wrote it in Microsoft word and then did a copy paste. I didn't realize I was going to loose the layout. I will watch that another time. I wasn't really going to share the rest of the trip because I didn't think there would be that much interest. I love talking about my vacations so I will work on the rest and post it. A
Sep 11th, 2008, 02:45 AM
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An interesting report on your trip.
Beuvron en auge is such a picturesque place because in 1972 the mayor decided to encourage the inhabitants to renovate their houses. It's an encyclopedia on the different styles of half timbered cottages
Bonnebosc is pronouned Bonnboh (not sur why)
The museum at Omaha Vierville that you didn't visit and described as "filled with salvaged crap" is in my opinion more interesting than the "official" one at Omaha St Laurent. It's in what was a cinema for GIs. Two walls and a curved corrugated iron roof. It is full of militaria and has some unique items. A helmet used by film camera men with the front hinged to allow use of a camera. A fax machine for sending photos. An enigma machine.
The owner was in trouble recently for having firearms in working order.
You spent quite some time in Normandy and covered a lot of ground but with, I think, two days on the d-day theme you only visited a third of it. With a guide you would have covered twice as much in one day. Options for guides go from a private guide, minibus tours or a d-day audio guide for use in your car. For your party a private guide would have been more economical than minibus tours and an audio guide even more so.
The 360° cinema is a moving experience. The archive film spread on 9 screens mixed with film shot in the same places with 9 camera surround vision.
I'm surprised you didn't like Honfleur. There are artists on the quays. It became a Mecca for artists since the impressionists went there drawn by the light on the estuary and the coast line and countryside of Normandy. Monet was discovered by Eugene Boudin who was born in Honfleur. Erik Satie of "Gymnopedie" fame was born in Honfleur.
Its wooden church with the two naves was built after the destructions of the 100 years war. It is one of just two wooden churches in france.
Honfleur is as it is because Francois 1st, in 1517, wanted a port to trade with the New World (and keep out the English) so he built Le Havre on the marshy ground opposite Honfleur. Honfleur went to sleep for 400 years.
Beuvron en auge is such a picturesque place because in 1972 the mayor decided to encourage the inhabitants to renovate their houses. It's an encyclopedia on the different styles of half timbered cottages
Bonnebosc is pronouned Bonnboh (not sur why)
The museum at Omaha Vierville that you didn't visit and described as "filled with salvaged crap" is in my opinion more interesting than the "official" one at Omaha St Laurent. It's in what was a cinema for GIs. Two walls and a curved corrugated iron roof. It is full of militaria and has some unique items. A helmet used by film camera men with the front hinged to allow use of a camera. A fax machine for sending photos. An enigma machine.
The owner was in trouble recently for having firearms in working order.
You spent quite some time in Normandy and covered a lot of ground but with, I think, two days on the d-day theme you only visited a third of it. With a guide you would have covered twice as much in one day. Options for guides go from a private guide, minibus tours or a d-day audio guide for use in your car. For your party a private guide would have been more economical than minibus tours and an audio guide even more so.
The 360° cinema is a moving experience. The archive film spread on 9 screens mixed with film shot in the same places with 9 camera surround vision.
I'm surprised you didn't like Honfleur. There are artists on the quays. It became a Mecca for artists since the impressionists went there drawn by the light on the estuary and the coast line and countryside of Normandy. Monet was discovered by Eugene Boudin who was born in Honfleur. Erik Satie of "Gymnopedie" fame was born in Honfleur.
Its wooden church with the two naves was built after the destructions of the 100 years war. It is one of just two wooden churches in france.
Honfleur is as it is because Francois 1st, in 1517, wanted a port to trade with the New World (and keep out the English) so he built Le Havre on the marshy ground opposite Honfleur. Honfleur went to sleep for 400 years.
Sep 11th, 2008, 03:03 PM
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I have no doubt there are more efficient ways to do the d day sites. What we wanted was to mix up all the things Normandy had to offer and alternate between D Day offerings and sunbathing and art shops and markets etc. We were on vacation and I have a high demand job which has a lot of deadlines and structure a tour that tells me when to do what would have put my blood pressure through the roof because I am so type A. Maybe if we are ever back in the area I could send KR on a bus trip while I did my thing, he might get more out of having gotten everything in.
Sep 11th, 2008, 03:37 PM
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Join Date: Aug 2007
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AshJEn, thanks for an interesting story. I am glad to find someone else who doesn't rave about Honfleur. To me it was mildly interesting, but guidebooks and fodorites seem to give it such rave reviews that I felt as if I had missed something.
Looking forward to reading about Alsace. Thanks in advance.
Looking forward to reading about Alsace. Thanks in advance.
