Normandy day 1
I got up this morning early, wrote some posts and then hit the road at 730. I had my first flat tie 10 km out of town so I made a tire change and kept going. I think I have too much weight on the bike and that probably isn’t helping things like tires. My rear tire is showing heavy wear so I may end up swapping the front and rear to make them last a little longer. The ride was along the D7 which is a smaller regional road that goes to the coast from Caen. It had a dedicated bike lane all of the way to Doerville. I mean like swamp goat trail separated. It was really nice. At one point I could see church steeples for the different villages all lined up along the coast (each town being 5km or so apart from each other). I could see 7 church steeples. It was common during the war the resistance would hang a flag from the tallest point which was usually a steeple. Typically done when the town was liberated.
After the D7 I hit the D514 which is like A1A highway along the eastern coast of the USA. I learned that I have too much weight and Normandy is not flat! I am ashamed to admit it but I had to walk 1x because after 2km of climbing I didn’t have the power to push the weight over the top of the hill. I was completely maxed out.
I hit a village every 3-5km and these little villages are pretty neat. One particular village had their weekly market going on the main street. Fruits, meats, cheeses, breads, shoes, knives, seafood, hand spinners (saw 2 tables of the damn things) and fresh cooked pots of food like paella (looked amazing) and I stayed away from the tripes. I bought some meat and sampled the cheeses. Incredibly good! Once done with the break I worked my way towards arselle and aramanches. I was climbing this pretty steep climb when I came upon the Mulberry harbors. Not exactly what I thought it would be but basically, the british built concrete bunkers, floated them to be anchors for the mulberry bridges and literally sank them once they were at the placement wanted, if they shifted then they would pump out the water then move them to where they wanted them to be. Steel bridges set down on these bunkers so ships could come up and off load jeeps trucks and so forth. Pretty ingenious if you ask me. There were 2 sets of harbors. A and B, A for americans and B for british. The American harbors were damaged from a storm 2 weeks after d day, they took the good sections and moved them to the british side to keep that one going strong.
Quick figure, 130k men were put into motion on D day, they did it without the mulberry harbor and it was done completely by what they could move onto shore quickly. Pretty amazing.
Back to the story, I had stopped to take a photo when a man appeared from the side of a hedgerow. His name was max, nice Belgian man, and he invited over to his house for beer. IT was a Belgian triple he gets from his hometown, still brewed by monks and quite amazing. He is a widower, 14 years, wife died of cancer too. I spent almost 2 hours talking with him and meeting the dog and cats. Incredibly nice man. He is a guide that does English speaking tours and was incredibly knowledgeable. He shed a few tears when I found out I was carrying susans ashes with me to drop in a few places. He did his camino in 2009 but instead of ending at Santiago he ended his at the top of Mount Ventoux in a camper with his very loved dog and cat and his wifes ashes. Pretty awesome story. Super nice man. I learned a lot about the war and the strategy. He has a pill box in his yard that connects to another one a few hundred meters away but tunnel. These things line the coast for 4000 kilometers. General Rommell had been given reinforcement charges for the atlantic wall and he create a pretty amazing system. It only last 6 hours on D day though. Below I will post a photo of the bier we had and the bunker on his land amazing.
I left max to get to arramanches. Honestly a little disappointing as it was like every other town on the coast though the mulberry harbors are incredible. I got some bread for my 24 month aged prosciutto or whatever it is (damn good is what it is).
I sat on the street and ate, met a group of soldiers from the Netherlands. They had just completed a 2 day hike from Point du Hoc to Arramanches, 35k. I split part of my bread and meat with a nice soldier named Sebastian who had done a similar bike ride as what I am doing though his was along the coast from the Netherlands. Pretty nice kid, paratrooper and getting ready for a deployment.
About the time I got back on the bike the rain hit and hard. I had to cover up and put on the rain coat for the first time. The coat kept me warm and worked well. The next hour was going village to village until I came to a museum for the Big Red 1. It was small but had incredible pieces like guns and artillery pieces and flame throwers found at the beaches shortly after the war. The parking lot had a bunch of jeeps that are part of the weekend invasion of reenactors for WW2. They all wear 101st airborne patches and not sure one was less than a sargent and most were officers. None were americans, all French. Not sure if they know what a gig line is to be honest. (Im being critical so I will shut up now about it).
The actors had the full jeeps, tents and all of the goodies. I kept going to Omaha beach (the goal was Point du hoc) but after 9 hours of riding and stopping and hitting museums I was pretty beat. Before stopping I hit the operation overlord museum. They had the most impressive collection of tanks, vehicles and general war items I have ever seen. They had vehicles that are the last in existence and a few that may become the last in existence.
From there it was the Normandy American cemetary. That was pretty cool. I got to see the grave site of Thomas dry Howie. The major of st lo and a citadel hero. I also saw theodore Roosevelt jr s gravesite as well as his brothers. As I walked through there were a lot of unknown soldiers. It was explained that if they had an idea of who it could be but not be able to id the body then they would have it as an unknown. She mentioned they are starting to match these with DNA samples which is cool. There were 306 unknowns, they are everywhere, very sad. IT is a an incredible place. Perfect rows and the monument is really beautiful. As I rode away taps started up. I was out of the gates and it echo’d through the fields up to the village that sits above the cemetery. Amazing place. There were flybys from c130s planning on the dday drops on June 6 as well as a c47 doing the same thing.
After this (it was after 6 at this point) I decided to find a campground for the night. Everything is sold out but he had a cabin that was rented but the tenant was not coming till the next day so I got the hook up. Omaha beach campground is pretty rockin. It overlooks the beach and the village. Nice place,weather is cooling down and the call if for rain tomorrow. Bummer.
I had a calvados and met a nice Frenchman that told me trump was an idiot. He needs to respect mother earth A as there is not a mother earth B. I smiled and agreed and sipped the calvados (which is like moonshine). A pizza snack for dinner and did some laundry. Great day!!!! photos to come, internet very slow and would not download my photos this morning thanks