Tour of Normandy - anyone done it?

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

I booked my vacation for this September but I don't have any plans yet.  I usually head somewhere tropical for diving but feel like mixing it up a little this year.

I was thinking of touring Canadian battlefields in France and Holland.  Anyone done it?  Worth the trip?

Might also go to Engerlund/Scotland to check out where the family was kicked out of.  Or back to Poland to visit the town where I used to work or maybe Russia to meet with some sloppy drunks I met in Thailand last year.

[Longdan]

I have been to Normandy a time or two.  I love it, just don't let anybody like a woman talk you into staying in Paris longer
than it takes to catch the train from Gare St Lazare.  There is nothing like walking those battlefields.  If you have any eye
for ground from a miltary point of view nothing brings the campaign more clearly to  understanding than seeing it in person.
The people are wonderful but don't let them think you are an "Ami".  I have walked that entire area from Juno to Falaise to
Bois de Lalonde.  Nothing like it.  There are some good tours I can recommend for one or two days but I usually stay there
a month at a time in Bayeaux.

[TheCommandTent]

Its on my bucket list....

[Con]

Went and visited Carentan and the battlefieds in Normandy with my dad two years ago.  We found the exact area (within 10meters we think) of where his favorite uncle was killed on June 11th on the assault on Carentan he was in I company 3/502 Parachute Infantry Regiment (PIR) when they were strafed by Stukas on what is now known as Purple Heart Lane.  When we visited one of the local farmers took us around the farm house that was the site of the Coles charge and the cabbage patch battlefield.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purple_Heart_Lane

You can still see the shell craters in the farm house from the 88's and numerous bullet pockmarks, the farmer gave us some shrapnel and M1 Garand and MG34 ammo shells that he had picked up.

Its a very powerful place and a must do to visit for every groghead.  Lots of good museums including the one at Dead Mans Corner.  Gives you a real appreciation of how the bocage was the worst god damn terrain to fight in.

Con

[Longdan]

Not much bocage left and then usually in out of the way areas that are hard to get to.
Modern farm equipment and its requirements have largely gotten rid of it.  You can still find some
but off the beaten path as it were.

[Con]

We saw plenty when we were there the main Bocage around Ingouf farm which we walked around and matched up to the invasion maps and pre invasion aerial reconnaissance photos.

If you go and follow the British progress through Operation Bluecoat this museum is out of the way but for a home run show excellent.

http://www.laperceedubocage.com/en/usefulinfo-world-war-two-tour-museum.html

Con

[Longdan]

Been to most of those museums.  That Normandie Suisse country is pretty far from the beaches where most people
hang out.  Here is something from a Winnipeg paper today:
http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/historic/32003504.html

[bayonetbrant]

I've been to Normandy 4-5 times, but not since the 80s.  I remember looking down from the top of Pont du Hoc thinking "they climbed this?!"- and that was after I'd been up a couple of pretty big cliffs down in the Alps where we lived at the time.

[Longdan]

Stand at the water's edge at Dieppe and face the seawall.  Omaha is a nice beach.

[besilarius]

I found the chapel at the German cemetary very moving.  There is only enough room for perhaps two people at the kneelers.  For some reason being in there was very moving and disturbing.

[Longdan]

There is a marked contrast between the neat and orderly German graves in the Commonwealth cemeteries
and the mass pit where they were interred by the French.  I was at one and asked one of the French attendants
how many soldiers were in there.  "Who cares?" was the answer even though the number was posted.
French soldiers were buried at home where possible.  US soldier's families had  the option to have identified remains
returned home.  Commonwealth soldiers are buried near where they fell.  The remains of German soldiers turn
up regularly in the area of the Falaise pocket, usually found by farmers in the spring.  Those who find them are
to inform the local authorities who inform a German organisation who retrieve them. 

[bob48]

Years ago, we went to France and Belgium with my dad on one of the Dunkirk Pilgrimages. Although the larger cemeteries are very well kept, (and very sombre places), we also stopped at several small plots that contained the graves of German soldiers, maybe with only a few dozen graves in them. These were quite neat and did show signs of being kept clear of weeds and stuff, but were not as well tended as the larger British / French cemeteries.

[Longdan]

Nearly every village in Normandy has a little (or big) monument to the unit which
liberated them, most created and maintained by the inhabitants.  The irony for me
is that more Normans were killed in that campaign than allied soldiers.  They shrug
and say it was worth it because the toll on the Germans was even bigger. 
Gotta love the Normans.

[Zulu1966]

Many years ago went from Caen - to all the beaches up to Cherbourg and all the interesting spots along the way. Fascinating trip.

[bob48]

I'd like to do that, and take a copy of 'The Long Left Flank' with me.