Carnac

Leaving St. Malo, we "cut off" the arm of Brittney and headed to Rennes, its capital. It was weird walking around the town (we went because of a great Saturday market!) that I had the opportunity to live in next year. I spent the time thinking, "what would it be like here" the entire time. The city had a beautiful central core with great old buildings like these, which Marlene and I debated as to whether or not there were built tilted or became this way.

People of my generation (and I'm on the tail end) when they hear "Carnac" they think of the Johnny Carson character.

But in reality, it's a prehistoric site with huge stones lined up in straight lines in fields.

Historians still haven't uncovered the reasons why inhabitants of this region would have made such an effort to move, lineup and set up these monstrous stones.

The day ended with an AMAZING platter of seafood. I'm a big fan of the "wimples" or sea snails. It was all good.

Between Normandy and Brittney

Leaving the Normandy beaches and countryside, Marlene and I headed west first to Mont-St-Michel and then to the region of Brittney, the "arm" of France that sticks into the Atlantic Ocean. It was a peaceful and quiet few days. And, as was true throughout, the weather was beautiful.

The famed Mont-St-Michel abbey. Ever since I saw it on the cover of my friends' French books back in Middle School, I've wanted to see it.

Having seen enough abbeys/churches/castles living in Europe, the tour was interesting, but the only real thing I found cool was the causeway linking the island to the mainland.

Crossing into Brittney, near the town of Cancale, we stopped for oysters by the side of the road. This part of the coast of France is famous for oysters.

Turns out, I like the bigger oysters, rather than the small/baby ones.

We ended that night in St. Malo, a walled city on the water. Beautiful sunset......peaceful.

D-Day Sites in Normandy

D-Day. June 6th, 1944. Normandy. Marlene and I spent the day visiting the famous sites and paying homage and respect to the soldiers who served here, both the Allied and Axis.

In the beach town of Arronmanches, the British constructed an artificial port from which to offload troops and supplies. The Americans attempted to construct one to the West, where they landed, but it did not survive a mid-June storm.

They started by sinking old naval ships to use as ballast from which to construct temporary (and now here are the remnants) barriers to serve as the breakwater for the artificial harbor.

Can you imagine what it looked like when the port was in full swing?

I love this letter Churchill penned that one finds in the museum.

Outside the museum, they have this structure, which turns out to be one of the temporary bridges. You have to watch the videos in the museum. They are AMAZING.

Just to the west of Arronmanches, up high on a cliff, are these structures.

They are the defense structures the Germans constructed to defend this high point. This is a closeup of one of them.

The one closest to the cliff edge was the lookout.

Here’s what it feels like to be on the lookout! When the Allied arrived at this point on D-Day, the Germans had already abandoned it.

This beach is the famous Omaha Beach, where the Americans suffered the greatest losses. Trying to scale the hills above the beach where the Germans had the advantage…..the issue.

The US has a War Cemetery for soldiers who died here. Doesn’t it just look so……American. In both architecture and landscaping?

Just like the cemetery in Florence we visited last year, it’s a beautiful, yet sobering vista.

Marlene and I were wandering through the rows of crosses and happened upon the crosses of the Niland Brothers who are side by side. They were the brothers that were the inspiration for "Saving Private Ryan"

Normandy in springtime!

West of Omaha Beach, in Colleville, is the cemetery for the German dead. Whereas the US cemetery is funded by the American government, the German war cemeteries around the world and privately funded through donations and maintained by German citizens who travel and do the work.

The memorial to the Germans who died here is a stark contrast to the more upbeat memorial over at the US cemetery.

Giving the dates of birth and death, one does the math and learns the most of the German soldiers were no older than 22 years old.

This is a model of what Point du Hoc looks from the air. The first landing of D-Day was a group of climbers who landed and scaled this point to take control of the key location between Omaha and Utah beachers.

Here is Point du Hoc. Some 200 soldiers landed on the beach and using rope ladders scaled the cliff with Germans shooting down at them. Having scaled the cliff in mere minutes, the soldiers, who lost 50% of their squad, managed to hold the point for 5 days. 

Looking east from Point du Hoc.

Utah Beach, the westernmost landing point. The flatness of it, and without beachside cliff, made the landing here swift and without much casualty.

The Utah Beach D-Day museum. Why is all the architecture dedicated to D-Day so……

The memorial at Utah Beach. One cool thing was that they named all the ships that were used by Americans on D-Day and their purpose, even supply ships.

On the drive back from Utah Beach to Carentan (where we stayed and yes, it was featured in Band of Brothers) I noticed this amazing steeple on a church. When we got out to walk around, there was a GREAT set of signs relaying personal stories of individual soldiers and citizens on D-Day. The town is called St.-Mere-Egilise.

All throughout this area, streets and structures are named after D-Day people and events. Here in St.-Mere-Egilise the main road is Rue Eisenhower.

Giverny

The home of Monet, his flowers and Impressionism. The flowers were out, the sun was shining and all was peaceful in Monet's garden and pond.

Consulting the Rick Steves (yeah, I'm a Rick fan) at the "blueberry car" before entering the gardens.

The pond....

The willows.....

Marlene told me that the mix of flowers and colors, instead of the order of one color/flower, is what is the crux of the beauty of the gardens and ultimately the idea of Impressionism.