D-Day Beach Tour

On Tuesday, September 26 I booked myself on the last Canadian D-Day Beach Tour of the season. It was a heavy day of learning but a good day.

The morning was spent here at the Memorial Museum. I was perplexed at the buildings simple facade but how is a building that houses the relics and records of such a thing like war to look? It is built on the edge of a steep ravine that houses a German bunker that you can walk through. A book purchase was a must in order to remember everything that I learned here.

The afternoon was spent in a touring van with 10 other Canadians that included 3 Winnipegers! Our guide, Lavron?, spewed forth even more knowledge. We are on our first stop at Juno beach.

The large house in the distance is the Canada House. See below shot. It stood witness to the landings and was the first thing a lot of the boys would have seen upon arrival.

Most everyone had small containers to collect some sand. Hmmm. I thought this was more interesting.

Our weird Canadian government thought it was a great idea to give the troops each a bicycle to aide with the travel inland to accomplish their various missions. What a joke!!

Next stop, a little west of our first stop, is the Juno Beach Centre which opened due to the initiatives of Canadian veterans and their families.

The Germans placed many deterrents for boats close to the beaches.

So many feet visit here...the grass not only doesn't grow...the ground is worn away.

For the First Nations people that fought.

A few miles inland. 2048 Canadian souls. I wanted to walk by and read every name but didn't have time.

We stopped at a couple points quickly to make it here, to our last stop, Abbey d'Ardenne. It is a small garden just beside the abbey that the Vichy family created when the bodies of 20 Canadian POW soldiers were found buried there. That's the young men in the banner...most were the ages of my two girls.

Next, art making is now underway after all the planning and ordering and resizing and scheduling....

Next trip, to Bayeux to see the famous tapestry.