normandy–well worth the wait

I’ve always enjoyed living in the United States, but spending some time away from home has really given me a wider scope of appreciation for where I come from. I also love history, there’s something about understanding the past and how the world got to where it is today that is extremely invaluable to me, so naturally a visit to Normandy was on my list.

What’s nice about traveling in Europe is that you can still ball on a budget, even if you’re organizing things last minute. However, because the train companies have a pretty big monopoly on travel here, the tickets can be expensive. In any case, I have pretty much thrown caution to the wind because I want to see as much as I can while I’m here, and it has definitely been paying off (#noragrets).

Mont St. Michel views (from Sunday’s day trip).

I began hastily researching for this trip on Tuesday, and I found and booked an Airbnb room with a French family in the town of Bayeux, near the D-Day beaches. I eagerly signed up for a full day tour of the U.S. beaches, and a Mont St. Michel tour the day after that.

On Friday, we set out from Lyon and arrived five hours later in Bayeux, where our incredible Airbnb host Marion kindly picked us up at the train station. Saturday began early with a gourmet breakfast spread laid out by Marion that included pastries, baguettes, cheese, fruit, espresso, homemade caramel sauce, Nutella, jam and fresh squeezed orange juice.

A map of the Allied Invasion in Normandy, with a star on Bayeux where we stayed (my own artistic touch). Used with a Creative Commons license.

We then headed out for our beaches tour, which started with a stop at La Cambe German War Cemetery, the resting place of roughly 21,000 German soldiers who lost their lives in the war. Our guide/driver did an incredible job of telling stories with real personal touch and detail. He talked about the German occupation of France in the years leading up to D-Day, and how it wasn’t simply a ruthless takeover, but in many cases, the Germans who were housed by French families were kind and didn’t intend to scare or harm them.

Pointe du Hoc, with Omaha beach visible on the right.

After this stop, we went to Utah Beach and then Pointe du Hoc, a cliff facing the English channel that the Germans used as a lookout. It’s the highest point between the two beaches (Utah and Omaha) and on a clear day (which unfortunately it wasn’t) you can see for miles in either direction. It was staggering to envision so much destruction and death taking place in such a calm and stunning environment.

A monument honoring Richard Winters. He unfortunately passed away in 2011 just before its opening. He’s featured often on the series Band of Brothers.

One of the last and most impactful stops was the Normandy American Cemetery, where over 9,000 U.S. soldiers are buried. What really hit home was learning that the average age of the men and women buried here is just about 21, only a bit older than me. Standing before the graves and thinking of the ultimate sacrifice made by so many at that age definitely instilled a more personal sense of gratitude in me. We were able to be there for the daily playing of Taps as they lowered the flags thirty minutes before the cemetery closed.

One of the 307 unknown U.S. soldiers buried in Normandy.

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This post easily took the longest to write because my experience in Normandy was really powerful, and I wanted to carefully sort my thoughts before writing. The stories and experience absolutely gave me a new perspective on the Germans during World War II. I had previously believed that the majority of Germans who fought in the war were heartless, looking to dominate and destroy any ideologies other than their own. I vastly overlooked any humanistic qualities in these soldiers, but hearing some of the different stories really changed the way I view the war.

It’s not possible to do this experience justice in a blog post, but this trip really meant a lot to me and I definitely plan to return with my family in the future. You can read all the books and watch every documentary, but getting the opportunity to see these places for myself has absolutely given me a different and enriched perspective.