Wednesday, July 22 ~ Normandy Beaches, Northern France
Normandy Beaches
We have experienced unrest a couple of times on our travels including protests in Thailand and a rally in Ireland. In case you have not seen it in the news, the farmers in France are currently very unhappy and are blocking the roads with their tractors and piles of manure, making it challenging to get around. The bridges were blocked leaving Rouen as well as all the major highways and round-a-bouts.
Sample of road blockage as shown on Tim’s iPhone
Thankfully our bus driver was very familiar with the area and was able to get us from our ship, avoiding all the problems, through the countryside and eventually to all of our scheduled destinations. It added on a couple of hours in total, making for a long day, but we very much enjoyed seeing the countryside and smaller villages.
I’m short on time, so will simply post some pictures from our day with a couple of links.
The first one is from our visit here a year ago. The second is simply more information on the D-Day and the Normandy landings.
Sights along the way to Normandy Beaches
Country church
Fields of grain (wheat?)
Pegasus Bridge Memorial
At the beaches and memorials
Another memorial
German Bunker
Closer look at a German bunker
At Omaha Beach at high tide
Sign on the wall in Arromanches
At American Cemetery and Memorial
Memorial Statue
Graves
Rose garden and graves
Bouquet left by our Uniworld Cruises to honor the American soldiers
Gratitude Moment: Today I am grateful for new friends we are making along the way.
A Note From Abroad 
Interesting subject.
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Great post 😀
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I always pore over any pictures and information about the area of Normandy. My father was in all three european campaigns, he was a movie combat photographer with the signal corps. Seems like everyone always takes a pic or two that I have not seen before.
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John, I shared your father’s story with several people on our tour yesterday. We arrived at high tide, so unfortunately they did not get to see the tremendous amount of open beach the soldiers had to cross to reach any shelter. I can not begin to imagine how difficult and frightening that had to have been for your father to have to turn his back to the enemy in order to photograph our troops, You might have enjoyed the special ceremony that was done at the cemetery to honor our troops. They played our National Anthem, placed that beautiful flower arrangement (shown above) below the large statue, played taps followed by a moment of silence. A saw several people greatly moved with tears flowing.
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Great photos. When I went we only had time to visit a few beaches. Thanks for bringing me to the other beaches! I love the art installations around.
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The Normandy beaches were very moving and memorable to visit.
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