Bayeux

Exhausted, we fell asleep on Christmas Eve listening to the Notre Dame Cathedral of Bayeux bells ringing and ringing and ringing.  We can see the spires on the right from our window.  We slept well and woke to the happy sounds of children playing. After breakfast, we wandered the empty streets of Bayeux toward the Cathedral–a big, beautiful romanesque/gothic building of weathered stone with stained glass windows everywhere.  Although it has been modified over time, it was originally consecrated in 1077.  Along the way we walked through a park which was at one time the center of town.  We saw the hospital and the Aure River flowing next to it.  The river has a water wheel that powered mills and electricity for the hospital back in the day.  We went up one and down another cobblestone street with lovely stone buildings that were all closed. We spent the rest of Christmas Day seeing the D-Day sights at Omaha Beach.  We were one of very few cars leaving Bayeux, in fact we were one of very few cars anywhere!  It made driving easy and our trip to the Atlantic uneventful.  The countryside reminded me of the Cotswolds (maybe because it was cold, damp and dreary) with big fields separated by wooded areas and large stone houses and barns.  Our first sight on Omaha Beach was a monument called Les Braves designed to memorialize the brave American men who fought to liberate France.  It is beautiful.  We walked the beach for a little while (it was cold!), drove to some other sights in the area and then on to Point Du Hoc where the Americans landed on a tiny beach at the base of huge cliffs and surprised the Germans who did not expect an assault from the water.

They shot grappling hooks up to the tops of the cliffs, climbed up, and attacked the surprised Germans. We are still wondering how any Americans survived to free the French.  Seeing these sights and putting ourselves in the soldiers footsteps was quite sobering.

I’ll finish today in the next post…