Friday, May 31st
Checked out of the Hotel Saint Honore. Took a taxi to the Europcar Rental and picked up a sporty Toyota and headed out of town. This drive through the French countryside was a sheer joy. Some modern towns were seen but the endless green fields, trees, flowers and weathered brick villages were out of a time machine. It was not confined to this area, either. It was everywhere, until we got back to De Gaulle Airport.
Checked into Les Villas d'Arromanches, an 1890 house transformed beautifully into a country inn. Every detail was tastefully selected to make our stay a pleasure. Our room overlooked a green pasture with sheep and cows peacefully grazing.
Normandy - our first destination was the D-Day beaches on the Normandy coast. June 6th would be the 75th anniversary of the D-Day Landings and tourists (and Presidents Macron and Trump) were gathering to commemorate that bloody but glorious event.
D-Day Beaches tour by history buff Elena (Lena) who is part of the Tours by Locals network. Lena met us at our hotel and acted as navigator and narrator while Gabi drove. She had a folder of materials on what was planned, what actually happened and showed us the locations, pillboxes, fortifications, bomb craters, gun emplacements, cliffs, beaches, abandoned landing craft, etc. All this was being told while restored army jeeps, personnel carriers, artillery and uniformed soldiers each of the Allied Forces were passing by or parked in rowdy gangs, getting ready for the anniversary.
Joe
