Normandy, France

 

Our plan was to drive to France the first day, see the famous "Pegasus Bridge" back in the Sword Beach area (known maybe from the movie The longest day) and see the battery of Merville. due to the long ride we would then already go to the camoing site to erect the tent, set up the BBQ and prepare for the next day. The second day we would then go see the german Widerstandsnest WN62 directly at Omaha Beach as the main "attraction", some museums about the landing in Normandy and another battery. As an optional target we thought about going to St Mere Eglise with a museum and the church court. The third day would compromise of two more batterys and the Point du Hoc as the main target, then return to Germany by car to arrive late at night. We changed the order of places to visit once there on the second day, since we figured out that we could see a lot more things in shorter time then planned. 

The drive to France was for once really unspectacular. It was just very long. Traffic was not too dense, not too many traffic jams, the ride through Belgium and France took long due to speed limits. At least our new car held up well, the AC kept us cool, the freezer box took care of keeping our drinks and food at a chilly temperature and being a station wagon we had quite some room in it. Also proprogramming the GPS unit was a good idea, I only had to select where to go each time and the rest worked by itself. neat. We also carried a few extra freezer bags since we had food and drinks for two days with us, and they worked sufficiently. Overprepared maybe but thats the way I plan those vacations. ;) 

Following seven and a half hours of driving (and maybe 20 minutes of breaks in between) we arrived in the early afternoon in sunny weather at our first target for the day, the Battery of Merville. Immediately I saw the nicely kept DC3 plane there, which we could climb later on. Very nice, such a plane was used to drop the paratroppers in this are to conquer the german fortifications. It was not announced that this plane was on display since they just got it in, but that was a nice surprise for the start. We got our tickets and then checked out the plane first. 

(Well kept DC3 at the Battery of Merville.)

The bunkers in the background are as I researched beforehand rather small - no comparison to the massive forts of the Maginotline, the ofrts of the first world war or the huge V-Waepon bunkers. Not to speak of the "Ostwall" fortification, the bore most resemblance to the small bunkers and pillboxes of the Westwall. After we were done checking out the plane and its interior we took a look at all the bunkers in the area. Unfortunately we could only walk into two of them, the others are sealed shut or filled with water. But just those two give a good impression on what the looked like back in the daay and how they look now.  

(Bunker Number 4 - one of the bunkers protecting the guns of Merville.)

The last bunker contains a sound and ligth installation that tries to emulate the night of the attack on the site. Nothing for kids, its flashing and banging rather loud. Is worth watching but not essential to experience. The small exhibition in the bunker is quite well done, contains everything these bunkers and the ever present "Regelbauten" at that time contained as equipment. A complete oven, folding field beds, uniforms etc. showed how those bunkers as well as the Westwallbunkers were equipped. Very useful to see this before exploring other Regelbauten later on our trip that only had traces of those installations left.  

(Bunker exhibition.)

We stayed about an hour at the battery and then went on to see our next point, the "Pegasus Bridge". Just a quarter of an hour by car we found this nice museum and the bridge next to it. The museum shows a lot about the history of the invasion, the bridge and the involved armys. Very nicely done. The bridge was a rather important part of the invasion, control  of the bridge allowed the allied armies to move forward away from Sword beach and at the same time confined german troop movements. 

(The museums shape resembles a wing. Nice idea...)

(The old Pegasusbridge.)

(Bulletholes on the bridge.)

(A remodeled Horsa-Glider plane which can't be accessed anymore unfortunately.)

We had a long look at the bridge, the glider and the small exhibition in the barrracks in the back part of the area that dealt with the equipment used to set up pioneer bridges. Quite interesting, it was a rather weird feeling to see this bridge in person. In movies like "The longest day" it seems to be so large, but in reality it is rather small and tiny. It had not at all the impression of being of any significance - but it did. A nice exhibition in any regard and a great start to our tour of Normandy.  

Again after an hour we had seen everything there was and we skipped reading the rest of the information that was given at the museum. We went to the camping ground in Bayeux next to set up our night camp and finally have some food. 

(Camping in Bayeux, France.)

Once arrived there, I used whatever french I could muster to reserve us our spot. Since we were there right at the beginning of the season, there was plenty of room left, the camping ground was sparsely populated and the neighbors interested, yett somewhat reserved. Which was ok with us. The sanitary conditions were... present. France. The bathrooms were partially usable, but nothing more. Showers were simple, but sufficient. And warm. All in all we would be ok for two days. In any case this would be a rather cheap stay, only the temperatures at night were troubling us. It went down to 7C at night, which was very, very cold. Like last year BBQ and drink supplys were excellently prepared, we had a pretty good dinner with steaks, baguettes tomatoes and radishes, some cheese and sauces - pretty good. Icecold beers were also quite welcome after such a long day. But it soon got pretty cold, we started even burning the wax coats of the cheese to get the fire to be a bit warmer, not effective but certainkly fun! But despite being clothed in shirts, sweaters, jackets and even a thermal blanket, we went in to the tent not too late at night since it was just too cold to stay out much longer. 

Luckily a few days before our trip the local supermarket had a sale on thermal blankets of which I acquired a pair. I also brought a woolen blanket with us, so we were able to accomodate us in the tent against the weather a bit. One thermal blanket was on the ground insulating the air mattresses from the bottom, one was on top of them to warm us from below, the woolen blanket came on top of the sleeping bags. Looked funny but kept us decently warm. Of course sleeping in a tent is never as good as sleeping at home in a warm bed, but we were not really here for a comfortable vacation...

Morning came surprisingly early, the sun began to rise and we hit the showers. Following a good breakfast we went our way to see the main target for our journey: the beaches of Omaha Beach and the german stromgpoint 62. It was a rather short trip there, only a small detour thanks to a construction zone cost us a few extra minutes of driving. Directly next to it is the giant american cemetery that was featured in Savong provate Ryan, in the opening scene. We were thinking about visiting it as well, but then opted against that. A short while later we parked the car on the small parking lot above the strongpoint and headed over to check it out. It was an eerie feeling to visit this site in the early morning, long before most tourists would come over to see it. 

The Strongpoint 62 was a heavily defended and partially bunkered german strongpoint located at the east end of the allied landing at Omaha during the second world war. Its claim to fame is that it was the german strongpoint costing the american assault the most lives on the day of Operation Overlord.  

WN 62 consisted of a 332 × 324 Metres big area, which was located between 50 and 100m away from the coast line. It was located about a kilometer north of Colleville-sur-Mer on a 20 degree slope. The various defenses in the strongpoint allowed for an excellent view on the beach and were between 10 and 50 metres hogher then the beach. It was located exactly between sectors Easy Red and Fox Green.

 

(View of the area from above, in the middle is a memorial for the dead. Barely noticable is a small one-man-bunker, a so called "Tobruk" to the right of the path. Zigzag lines on the ground are the remains of the trenches.)

Quite touched we checked out the memorial first. The panoramic view across the beach may seem to look normal at first, but we felt quite not normal then. On this confined ground one of the worlds bloodiest batles was fought. And all that is left of it are a few bunkers, memorials and the massive graveyard. Without those, nobody would really expect something like this here. Makes you feel rather insignificant and helpless compared to nature. 

(Unfortunately a slightly small panoramic view of the beach at WN62.)

DThanks to my reading before I had a pretty good idea what was left to see despite lacking a map. We began with checking out a small infantry bunker that was used to house the german soldiers. It is very close to the memorial. Such simple group shelters were widespread at the atlantic wall. Basically they are fortified earth dugouts with a concrete shell. There are usually "Regelbauten" used at the atlantic couast, but the stromgopints occasionally lacked those when they were not done.  

(On our way into the first bunker, the group shelter at WN62.) 

The ground inside the bunker was filled with trash and in general it was in poor condition. Te ceiling still featured rusting sheet metal reinforcements, the emergency exit was already filled half with earth and someone tried to dug a hole into one of the corners. I have no idea what they thouoght to find there.  

(Inside the Bunker, the rusty ceiling is slowly coming down and there is a good amount of trash on the ground.)

I took some pictures of the inside of the bunker, there was not too much to see here anymore. Early in the morning it was still rather quiet around, gave sort of an idea how it might have been before the invasion started. 

(Still in the Bunker, opposite side. In the middel the emergency exit, in the background a guarding hole to defend the bunker, pointing towards the small mortar bunker.)

We checked out the bunker for a while longer, but then decided to move to the next object, the mortar bunker right behind the shelter. At the time of the invasion it wasn't equipped yet with a mortar, so it was used for other infantry weapons apparently. A very small object which is half way filled with soil now, so entering it was a difficult task. 

(On our way into the mortar bunker, at the end is a communications post in the concrete slab. The trench was made out of concrete here.)

(View from the top inside the mortar position, it is half filled with soil now. Difficult to enter.)

From there we went towards the beach passing the soil-filled Tobruk bunkers. We arrived at the bigger gun casemates and saw huge scars on the bunker from the battle. The bunkers were pretty good shot up. The small bunkers had flanking guns mounted in them to not expose the guns directly towards the sea. They were pointed in general towards the Pointe-du-Hoc, direct defense was done using the smaller Tobruk bunkers and filed positions with automatic weapons. There is however pratically nothing left of the field positions, slilght indentions in the ground is all that is left from it.

(Casematte from the back, the concrete blocks at the entrance were fitted once the gun was placed inside to increase protection.)

(Casematte from the front, the armored shield has been taken out. Craters from the shelling on the bunker are easy to see.)

(The results of a direct hit on the bunker - inches of steel reinforced concrete were simply gone, nobody had a chance to survive that. In the background the entrance with the concrete blocks. The round metal bars on the ground were the tracks on which the gun was moved for targeting.)

The second bunker looked much like the first, also having been hit by a lot of shells. We checked out the devastation the shleeing brought on the bunkers and spent quite a while in them despite their relatively small size. Unfortunately the second bunker filled up with water partially, so we didn't enter it too completely. Due to its small size that is not a propblem since you can easily walk around it. 

We went down to the beach itself then, which was rather small since we arrived at the peak of the tide. On the way down we met the first battlefield tourists, who arrived in a tourbus from battlefieldtours from UK. What was intersting to see at the lower parking lot were the remains of the tank ditch and the small eartehn wall that was built there to trap attacking tanks. Nowadays it is pretty shallow and in a few years it probably will be gone completely. 

(Tank ditch and wall at the beach of WN62 from behind. Notice, how flat the beach is here.)

Viewed from the beach, the slope of the hill didn't seem to be that stepp, but in fact it is. Also easy to spot is the complete lack of any cover on the beach except the small sandwall which is build up by the tides. Not even as high as a person it was the only cover the american solderis had from the german machineguns.  

(Antitankditch and wall at the beach viewed from the side.)

(Keeling in front of the sandwall, the only cover at the beach. Up on the hill are the two bunkers of the WN62.)

We spent a little time walking up and down the beach and climbed back up the slope of the hill. On our way we passed a little campsite, someone did in the bushes right behind the beach. Something idyllic - quite a change from the usual things we see on our bunkertours...

(Camping at the beach, with campfire and hammock...)

A little more then an hour in total we spent here at the beach, then we went back to our car. We planned more time for the visit, but there was (except the cemetery but we ultimately passed on it) just nothing else to see. Our next target would be one of the many museums in this area that was supposed to have ome of the landing craft and interesting equioment on display. 

Following a surprisingly short ride later, we arrived at the Musée D Day Omaha in Vierville-sur-Mer. Instead of the planned two hours for checking it out, we managed to see everything in a good half an hour. That is mainly due to its nature of a wild accumulation of Militaria and scrap metal, disguised as a museum. The informaton texts next to the exposition were someties completely of, the marching music in he background really turned us off and the shown equipment.... well the presentation was seriously lacking. On the positive side we saw a bunch of interesting equipment, which will excite a fan of games like Company of Heroes: There was a complete Goliath mini RC tank on display. That was quite a sight.

(Goliath with Transport box in mint condition on display.)

We were not at all thrilled by the way the museum was set up and the surroundings,but seeing those interesting items was in the end worth it. Still: A museum of the category "see it once but never return".

(Decaying landing crafts, scrap metal and in the background a sanitary catastrophy: French public toilet. An adventure by itself...)

Outside the museum we saw some more or less scrapworthy objects which might or might not have anything to do with the D-Day. A czech gun from the late 60ies...? Spectacular was an armored cloche at the entrance of the museum, but we could'nt enter it. Pity.

We settled down for a small lunch and discovered that we forgot to bring spoons and our pots for preparing the soup. We had the camping burner with us, but without food it didn't really help. So we had some snacks instead which lasted for a while. 

Planned next was a visit at the battery Longues-sur-Mer, but taking into account that we were so early done with our first two targets for the day, we instead decided to visit our optional goal for the day, seeing the museum Musée Memorial d’Omaha Beach in Saint Laurent-sur-Mer. As it turned out this was a good idea, this museum was well worth the visit. Also equipped with interesting items, this museum had a much better way to display its exhibition and showed artifacts in context and even with correct information. Also an interesting movie was shown in the theater, all in all a good experience. Thumbs up for this stop in our journey!

(A "Topolino" car, which the Wehrmacht used during the french occupation.)

(Awesome dioramas and displays, equipped with authentic items and labelled informative - this is how a good museum looks like!)

(In front of them useum was a well kept Sherman tank behind a czech hedgehog-type tank barrier.)

Our plann was now to continue to the battery - we had yet another little snack but then followed our GPS unit. Unfortunately it lead us into a dead-end where we saw - yet another bunker. So we took the chance and checked the bunker and its surroundings out as well.  

 
Größere Kartenansicht

Later research lead me to believe that this was the strongpoint Widerstandsnests (WN65), since a bit up the high we found a few traces of shelters and trenches. My attempt to enter the almost completely disappeared shelter didn't work out too well since I forgto to bring my "dirty activity pants" and in the interest of not looking like a complete tool the next two days, I refrained from trying to squeeze through the small earhten opening. Judging by the picture this wasn't the worst thing, it seems to be filled up with trash again.

(5cm Pak Gunbunker at WN65..)

The WN65 is mostly known for the small gun bunker which is now a well-known tourist spot. It still has a 5cm PAK antitank gun in it, of which we took quite some pictures.but even most descriptions online only speak about this bunker, not about the shelter that we discovered uphill. Semms like the shelter has been dug out again rather recently... There should have been also two mortar Tobruk bunkers, but we couldn't find those.

(The path to the mostly earth filled shelter (?).)

(Entrance of the shelter, not too promising. Note the brick walls instead of concrete...)

(View of the PAK bunker from behind. The beach is barely visible in the top left corner.)

Within half an hour we were done checking everything out and decided we would change plans about the rest of the day a bit. Since all our visits so far were doine much faster then planned, we decided to change our travel and visit Point du Hoc already, do St mere Eglise and two batteries on theladt day and skip the museum in Bayeux. That should also minimize our driving.

And that's what we did: We wen to the Battery Longues sur Mer next and skipped the museum in Bayeux. A short drive later we arrived at the battery, parked our car and went to see the four massive gun bunkers there. Since this battery is not on provate grounds, there is no admission fee to see them. That has its ups and downs...

The Battery Longues sur Mer is the only remaining german coastal artillery battery of the atlantic wall with its guns intact in all of Normandy. Making it a must-see target. It consist of four massive gun bunkers, the guns and the bunkers vary in their degree of destruction. Some of them are rather well in order, some almost runis. Most of the destruction came from ship artiellery hitting the bunkers during the invasion. The bunkers are about 2km away from the coast and are parallel to it. For its crews some smaller bunkers had been installed in shelters under the earth closeby the main bunkers. Not all of those are made from poured conccrete, some are constructed using big concrete slabs. 

Its main armament were four 15-cm-rapid fire guns, besides that there were some machine gun bunkers, mortars in Tobrukbunkers as well as minefileds and of course barbed wire.  

Größere Kartenansicht

Located at the coastline are tow small Tobrukbunkers and the former Surveillance and fire command bunker. The big bunker was used in the movie "the longest day", but not in its original use. There it was displayed as a command bunker, decorated with a quadruple 2cm FLAK gun. These three bunkers were not accessible for a long time, but in 2004 they were all excavated again and made accessible to the public. 

And making those accessible (and free) for the public is here a big problem: We were constantly facing huge crowds of students which were completely uninterested in this part of histroy. Even worse, they kept chatting and texting each other (!) on their cellphones all the time, while being only 10m apart. What the...? And the absolute top of it all was the bunch of 9year old french boys that literally pissed right next to us inside a bunker at a wall. WHAT THE FUCK?

Many thanks for this impressive display of respect for the history and the dead, dear country of culturally developed neighbors. That was a great display of how to deal with both countrys past. We were disgusted.

Too bad, the battery itself is a great visit. make sure to visit it when no pesky students are around.

(All bunkers in one shot.)

(Bunker with tons of students on top.)

(Inside one of the bunkers with one of the guns, Robert serving for scale.)

(The famous observation bunker.)

(Inside the Bunker.)

(Hole in the roof of one of the main bunkers.)

A refreshing walk back to our car later we arrived at the completely overcrowded parking lot, which was used as well as a camping ground, BBQ site and - what else? - a public bathroom. Not too surprising anymore... We decided upon the crowd to leave the premises as soon as possible and head out to our next target of the day, the Point du Hoc. In total the battery was well worth the visit, but visits should be done in bad weather or in the early morning. The other tourists really spoil the experience and they often lack any sort of tact, respect or plain humbleness. 

 
Größere Kartenansicht

We went from the huge parking lot to the tip of the Point du Hoc and saw many, many bunkers on our way. The area is public ground and free of charge to visit. With that of course there is a huge tourist crowd at this place all the time, but at least people acted a bit more civilised here. No peeing that we saw. So the really huge groups of toourists probably keep the kids from misbehaving too much. A nice touch is that the area is belongin to the USA now, so they keep it in rather good condition. 

(Crater at the beginning of the area.)

Pointe du Hoc is a clifftop location on the coast of Normandy in northern France. It lies 4 miles (6.4 km) west of Omaha Beach, and stands on 100 ft (30 m) tall cliffs overlooking the sea. It was a point of attack by the United States Army Ranger Assault Group during Operation Overlord in World War II.

The plan called for the three companies of Rangers to be landed by sea at the foot of the cliffs, scale them using ropes, ladders, and grapples under enemy fire, and engage the enemy at the top of the cliff. This was to be carried out before the main landings. Despite initial setbacks because of weather and navigational problems, resulting in a 40-minute delay and loss of surprise, the cliffs were scaled and the strongpoint was assaulted successfully, with relatively light casualties. Fire support was provided during the attack by several nearby Allied destroyers and British LCS's[6]. Upon reaching the fortifications, most of the Rangers learned for the first time that the main objective of the assault, the artillery battery, had been moved out of position, possibly as a result of air attacks during the buildup to the invasion.

(Another huge crater next to the cliff.)

The costliest part of the battle for the Rangers came after the cliff assault. Determined to hold the vital ground, yet isolated from other assault forces, they fended off several German counterattacks over the next two days, until reinforced from Omaha Beach. The original plans called for an additional, larger Ranger force of eight companies to follow the first attack, if successful. Flares from the clifftops were to signal this second wave to join the attack, but because of the delayed landing, the signal came too late, and the other Rangers, mostly of the U.S. 5th Ranger Battalion, landed on Omaha instead of Pointe du Hoc.

(Open gun platform with small bunker built around itt providing protection from splinters and shells. Used as an outlook platform today with a handrail on top of it.)

We walked for a pretty long while through this rather large site. Some parts of it were inhorrible condition while others looked still very much intact and in rather good shape. There were bunkers galore - we were shocked to see how many small or medium bunkers were spread out in the site. The further away we got from the entrance area, the less tourists were to be seen and seeing the bunkers got more interesting. FInally we found some Regelbauten, where parts of the interior were still in them. 

(Blown up ammo bunker.)

(Open bedding for one of the big guns. These whould have been moved into the bunkers, but were instead removed from the site altogether prior to the attack. )

(Bunker next to bunker, the landscape is dotted with Regelbauten. Notice how the artillery caused shellhole next to shellhole.)

(Inside one of the Regelbauten. On the ceiling are still traces of wood paneling, used for minimzing splinters coming off the concrete when being shelled. There are also still the hooks for the folding beds on the ceiling.)

We were pleasently surprised to find tow or three bunkers in this touristovercrowded area that were not completely plundered by trophy hunters and where we could see still attached hooks etc. Probably because they are located at the far end of the area and full of mud. Not inviting to the casual, ill-equipped visitor, but for us this was no problem. So when we left this bunker a few french kids started to climb into them and of course got stuck in the mud, and left right away cursing their fate... Not a smart idea to go into old bunkers with sneakers!

(The famous rock needle of Point du Hoc.)

We kept exploring the site for a while longer, but at some point we had enough. Taking a few pictures we made our way back to the car since we wanted to see one more site that day: The Battery Maisy. Had some water at the car and then drove the short way to the battery. The GPS uni once again prvoed to be a very valuable addition to our journey, we found the way thanks to it in record time.

(Overview of the Point du Hoc site.)

Battery Maisy

Less then half an hour later, we were at our final place for the day, Battery Maisy. For decades the site was vanished and buried under the soil and some even claimed it never existed. However some british guy bought the property where it was located and started digging the site out again, turning it into a tourist attraction. There is still a lot to do with the site, but so far what he accomplished with little help is quite a sight. Occasionally restauration is a bit "rustic", but it seems to be getting there. The owners do have a lot of charme and are quite friendly. It was a real pleasure chatting with them.

 
Größere Kartenansicht

Since the site is still largely unknown to many, you'll encounter few tourists here. While we were there, only 5 or 6 other tourists shoed up, which was quite nice for us. 

(Czech gun of the same type as it was used here during the invasion.)

It was very interesting to see how such a site looks just fter it has been dug out again, basically this was "archeology in progress". Really exciting! Way more down to earht (or actually in it) then the museums of course. During our visit, which spanned about an hour we saw a bunch of Regelbauten but also some more special buildings. Namely a radio bunker, the foundations of a radar site bunker (this was claimed by the owner) and a hospital. The eerie atmosphere of the site is dominated by havong to use trenches all the time to navigate throuogh it, since the walkways follwo the old trenches in design. To get from one bunker to the other you follow those old trenches, which is a bit confusing but gives a good impression, on how it must have been back then at the site. 

(On our way to a Regelbau bunker, notice the trench you have to walk through.)

(The Regelbau has a Tobruk bunker attached to it - there is still the black tar insulation and waterrepellent paint on the bunker.)

Quite interesting was that part of the site was set up underground, not just using the bunkers and trenches. The main ammo depot was dug in underground and was accessible through two longish tunnels. We saw something similar later in Azeville, but so far I had not seen such a thing in any WW2 installation since the Maginotline. 

(Inside the long tunnels to the Ammo depot. Power went out, so we relied onour flashlights, much to the pleasure of the owner who was happy to welcome well prepared tourists for once...)

Even a hospital had been set up at the site, however most of that is gone by now. Only some metal sheets of the roofs were left and the foundations. Quite surprising is the "radar bunker", that the owner claimos was about to be finished at the site before the invasion. I still think it looks as if they were jsut starting to build it, since only the foundation and some reinforcment can be seen. It was apparently supposed to guide AA and normal artillery. 

(Remains of the Radarbunker -  on the edges there are steel bars. Looks very unfinished.)

Next to the radar bunker was a minor hill which we climed to get a good view over the whle site. It is very difficult to get an idea, where you are without climbing up higher dure to the trench system. A unique and interesting way though to present such a site.

(A small overview over the site.)

We went towards the exit then, at the moment more of the site is being dug out so coming back in a few years might be interesting. There is still a third of the site buried in the soil. We were definitely happy to have seen this battery, even though there is not that much to see, it is a very good way to present it and it has a certain uniqueness to it, that made it worth the visit. Thumbs up.

(Picture of us on a landing craft, nice gesture that we were permitted on it and have our picture taken in it. No other museum allowed that!)

We said good-bye to the owners and went back to the camping ground next, stoppping for some supplies at the local supermarche. Following that we sat down in our chairs, exhausted from the day we spent. So we BBQed again, had a few chilled beers, and at a later hour we fought against the cold again by burning everything that we could spare in the fire pit. Didn't help very much though, so we went into the tent and wrapped us in the thermal blankets under and above our sleeping bags. We even managed to sleep quite a bit. 

Early in the morning natures call was a bit more pressing then usual for me, I was hoping that the BBQ was not at fault... maybe the small sausages of which I probably ate way too much. Regardless, I had no further problems afterwrds. So we took a warm shower and packed up the tent (which turned out to be too wet, so next time I need to bring a towel to dry it prior to packing up!), said good-bye to the camping site and paid our fee. Afterwards we headed out to St. mere Eglise to see the targets for our final day there. Follwing that we would have a long journey back ahead of us..

The last day of our tour came and we were en route to see St. Mere Eglise and two more batteries in the area before going back to Germany. First we went up north to the small town of  St. Mere Eglise, which we know mostly (besides from movies) from a level of Call of Duty. Errrrr.... yes. 

Early in the morning of the D-Day allied paratroopers, 14.000 Americans of the 82nd paratropper division landed in that are to support Operation Overlord in the back areas od th Utah beaches by taking the city and its surroundings. The taking over was indeed done by the 82nd, however a lot of 101st paratroopers took part in it as well due to them being spread out all over the place. 

 
Größere Kartenansicht

Most famous was the mishap pf John Steele, one of the praratroppers who got stuck on a church tower inthe town centre with his chute. Sinc ehe could not free himself he was stuck in the middle of a fire fight going on around the church. Seeing this church and a rather new paratropper museum wouuld be our main things to do in St. mere Eglise. In both cases we were not disappointed.

 
(The church tower with its regularly renewd parachute dangling from it.)

Following a not too long ride we made our way to St. Mere Eglise, parked our car on the lot in front of the church and had a look at it. Turned out, that there was not that much to see, we could take a picture of the parachute dangling down from the church, since inside a church service was in progress. The stroes surrounding the church lot were extremely touristy and we decided to just stroll around for a quick glance. Selling militray toys for kids and all kinds of expensive militaria for the "slightly older kids" didn't really appeal to us, so we didn't buy anything. We took a few more pictures but then settled on walking over to the museum, which was really closeby. And that museum was really great, very well done in setup, layout and exhibited items: We were thoroughly impressed. Unfortunatley our pictures don't do it justice, it was pretty hard to take pictures inside of it due to the size and scale of things. 

(US paratroopers glider plane in excellent condition.)

To preserve this glider in its surprisingly good condition, they recently build a huge dome structure and filled the side of it with nice little items from that era as well as informational tables and other stuff. Really well set up. 

(In sie of the glider, everything set up with lots of detail. Scary, how paperthin the walls of the glider were - a complete death trap.) 

We spent quite some time in the dome, checking out the glider and the rest of the exhibition. After that we went over to the other building, corssing the patio in front with a Sherman tank and some field guns. INteresting to see, but not really new. The central element on the second building is a compete C47 plane, dominating the whoe exhibition. Again the walls were filled with military and civilian gear and items from that era, but also infomration tables were spread out all over the place, leaving not many questions open. We really liked the setup and design of the museum, very well done. It was a bit sad that the C47 can not be seen from the inside, unlike the DC3 we saw on the first day, but in contrast this machine was well kept and looked as if it was still in flying condition. 

(Detailed scene around the plane.)

We criceld the plane, taking a lot of pictures. In my case in case I want to build a model plane according to a historic plane, just in case... my new hobby of flying RC planes came a bit through here. It was astonishing to see how many US veterans were present that day, as much as at Point du Hoc. Seemes like the paratroppers museum is one of the main attractions, that US tours go to. Maybe even some sort od standard trip they offer and that connects all those interesting places which are easy to access and free of charge in one big field trip. I'll look into that at some point. 

(Details of the plane.)

(The second building of the Museum we were really impressed by it.)

We hit the bathrooms leaving the museum in favor of the sometimes dubious ones we saw earlier (turned out they were alright here) and checked out the museum stroe on our way out. This was clearly geared towards the US vet crowd, selling "Support the Troops" T-Shirts and other some such devotinal articels that did not appeal to much to us. So we just left and tracked down some food nearby. We settled on the english Bistro a few houses down the road, which was our tourist rap of the day. Figuring out that at some point during a vacation you have to endure that kind of thing happening, we figured this would be an ok place to get bent... Food turned out to be OK, but 15 Euros for two rather medium sized sandwiches and small coffees? Oh well. We were hungry. And out of food/breakfast stuff, so we had to make do. 

A few minutes later we left and headed for the battery of Azeville, which turned out to be a great experience, seeing a rather well preserved battery and its bunkers.  

The semi final goal of our trip would be the battery of Azeville, reportedly in excellent condifion and recently restored to a pretty good degree. I had read beforehand that it was renovated and that its museum part was rather well done.  

Something we can completely agrre on. This battery was our favorite in regard to its presentation. The guns are not in place anymore, but the bunkers are in good shape and the rest of the battery is in a rather good condition as well. Well worth a visit.

 
Größere Kartenansicht

We were most impressed by the camouflage that is still painted to the bunkers. They were disguised as castle ruins of normandy! Complete with painted on balconys, hedges, trees and windows - even the sky and some clouds had been put on the bunkers. I have never before seen such a military Tromp l'oeuil. We began our tour in the first bunker which is nowadays sporting a visitors centre. Equipped with some MP3-players as audio guides, we then walked down into a subterranean tunnel. Those tunnels connect the bunkers with the rest iof the battery, as well as some Regelbauten. Azeville is a good example, on how the batterys at the Altantic wall would have looked like, once they would have been mostly finished. So we went our way to see the tunnels and smaller bunkers before seeing the big gun bunkers.

(Tunnel at Battery Azeville. In front is newly poured concrete, but the concrete in the back is original.)

The tunnel system was already quite interesting - I was reminded of the forts of Verdun, the Ostwall - Robert was also amazed by them. This was something much more complex then most of the other complexes we had seen on our trip so far. Presentationwise it was so well done, Azeville was our favorite of the batterys we had visited. Even though the guns are not there anymore, it is still very worth visiting it.

(Gunbunker with camouflage.)

It took us quite a while to check out the entire tunnel system beofre being able to see most (not all) of the gun bunkers. The first made a huge impression on us, we saw the tracks of a huge grenade going through the bunker that was fired from one of the US ships at the invasion. During the landing the ships were shelling the battery and one of them managed to hit the bunker directly. The grenade did not explode though, it went through the armor plate in front of the bunker, through the concrete wall between crews quarters and the gun embracement and out the crew quarters again to finally lodge itself into the ground somewhere inside the compound..  

(Gun embracement.)

Due to the enormous pressure and shockwave, this killed the whole crew instantly unfortunately. The grenade never blew up and was finally recovered a few years ago and is now on display nearby. This direct hit among the other infantry attacks on the battery forced its crew to give it up a few days after the invasion.  

(Hole in the bunker wall from the unexploded grenade.)

With the other bunkers we saw what was left of them and inside of them, but there was not too much new stuff to see. It got really repetative to us at this point. Presentation of the items though was really well done. 

(Plan of the battery.)

At the end of our trip, we went to see the foundations of the batterys casino and could listen to an interesting story on our audioguide. It mentioned aspecially how the civil population kept up with the bunkers and its occupants a well as some of the more dubious parts of soldiers life here. The audio guide mentioned that the local population was forced to work for the battery, but was well treated. And that "dancing artists" were brought in from Paris to entertain the german troops. Ah - yes. Quite fascinating story there, we did not hear anything like this at other parts of our trip.

A bit more then an hour in total were spent at the site, but the audio guide would offer twice the time to spend there provided one would want to hear all the parts and stories. We did not want to spend taht much time here though, since we still had the Marcouf battery on our plan. So we returned the audio gear, watched the short (really good) movie that the museum was playing in the first bunker (recommended to watch it) and then went our way to the Battery Marcouf-Crisbecq. Not too far away, but still another target to visit.

Teh naval artillery battery Crisbecq is a german gun battery that is located nearby Saint-Marcouf, only a few kilometres away from the beaches of Utah Beach.

The installation covers an area of about 4 ha, is elevated above the surroundings and had a perfect view to the sector of Saint Vaast la Hougue and to up to Pointe du Hoc. It wasconstructed at the beginning of 1942 by the Organisation Todt and was still under construction at the time of invasion. Its 21-cm Škoda-long barreled guns were able to cover a rather large area of rthe atlantic wall. Among the installations were also a few 155-mm guns, anti-aircraft artillery, grenade launchers and machinegun posts. It was in the 80km stretch of the invasion beach the strongest installation of its kind.

American troops of the 4th infantry division that landed at Utah Beach attacked the battery several times between 6. and 12. June 1944. The battery crew under their commanding office Walter Ohmsen was able to repel the attacks for several days, finally leaving the installation in the night of the 12th of june. Of its 406 defenders, only 78 survived.


Größere Kartenansicht

You can't always be lucky hen you go hunting for bunkers, and in this case that proved to be true. The  Battery of Crisbecq was not the best end to our bunker tour 2009. Still in awe from the great museum in Azeville and St mere Eglise, we arrived at Crsibecq. And what we expereinced here was a wild mixture of old and new stuff, museum parts, military surplus and scrap metal and even Ikea-furniture. No kidding. 

Seriously - a rollercoaster of an experience to see this battery. The site is by itslef pretty interesting and large. However the setup to visit is dubious at best in most cases. And not cheap. We began our tour with the handed out copied leaflet in something resembling german. Or dutch. It was good that I had prior knwoledge about the battery because the informational tables there were either not existant (for the most part), wrong or just plain off.  That was not so very good...

(Blown up gun bunker with gun imitation.)

The first bunker that we could actually enter, caused us much entertainment - we knew that some of the bunkers had wooden ceilings to protect from splinters. However nobody told us, this had looked like an Ikea catalogue picture... and the wooden beds were certainly never installed like that. They were metal and folding and... oh well. 

(Wooden paneling, not really authentic. Seriously, not really.)

The rest of the walking tour brought not much new stuff to see for us, we knew already from Azeville, Maisy and Merville, how the batterys were set up, how the bunkers between them looked like, and what in general is left of those batterys. So it would not be fair to say we didn't see anything new, but what we saw was more a military surplus collection disguised as a museum. Pretty much like that one bad museum we saw at the beginning of the second day. 

(Well kept Regelbau with obviously not authentic "camouflage" paint.)

Regarding the obvioulsy wrong reconstructions that were done - we thinkkt that the owner of the compund changed recently and that the new owner has its own ideas on how to attract new visitors by using more basic, cheaper and not really authentic methods on reconstructing the site further. Whcihc sucks for everyone who wants to see authentic things and not see a Disney-fied version of a gun battery. On the other hand there were some really exciting things to see, traces of the battle in 1944, when the gun battery was taken by US forces for example. So a visit might be worth it all things considered.  

(Entrance to a Regelbau, blown up by an explosion.)

To see the whole installation, it takes about an hour. Due to the lack of written tables or other information on the site, this can of course be done in much less time. On the plus side, 21 bunkers in total will take quite a while to check out, even though the number incluse tiny Tobruk bunkers as well.  

(Resting in front of a hospital bunker.)

(A field gun emplacement.)

Unique woth those round field gun emplacements is, that the big guns were first placed here, like in Maisy. But on the walls were written citaynames a codes for targeting the guns. Neat idea. We haven't seen that anywhere else. 

A little less then an hour later we were done checking out the site, taking a bunch of pictures and finally returning the coped note to the front desk. We then crossed the small street to check out the other big bunker that is outside the compound in the middle of a cow herd... The bunker was unfortunately completely blown up, so there was not much to see.

(The bunker outside of the main battery area.)

(Inside completely destroyed.)

And so as the very last bunker for our tour, we checked out the small observation bunker opposite the parking lot, that resembled the bunker in Longues-sur-Mer alot. 

(Small observation bunker outside the main battery opposite the parking lot.)

We went all around it and saw, that a third of it was broken due to a massive explosion in it. And that the bunkers entrances seemed to have been fenced over - however the left entrance was not really fenced off well, - so we squeezed through the hole and entered the bunker. It turned out to be much more interesting then the other bun kers we saw during the tour of the compound. It was all full of trash and brokoen glass and in general full of debris, but it was still pretty fascinating. 

(Normally fenced off to the public - the left barrier is not quite closed anymore...)

We took a few pictures while walking through the bunker using our flashlights. The lower level of the bunker is completely filled with soil and other parts of the bunker caved in, so we could not see all of it. 

(Inside the heavily destroyed Bunker.)

(Soil filled lower level.)

(Plan of the Bunker.)

This was a rather nice end of our tour, to see a not touristy open bunker like I prefer usually. Somewhat balancing out our dismal experience with Crisbecq battery. We went back to our car, had a cold coke and decided to finally head back home. We left the battery at 3PM - and until Bayeux our ride back was a breeze.

And then our luck ran out, we got stuck in a massive traffic jam in northern france. It took us a few hours to finally get going at more then walking speed! So our plan on arriving around midnight did not work out at all, instead we arrived at 2AM. But safe and in one piece, thats the most important part...

All in all it was a very interesting, yet taxing journey, luckily not really expensive considering what we managed to see during those days. Including all the entrance fees, gas, lodging and food and even buying new rubber boots, we spend 180 Euros per person only. If we had bought this normandy pass, we might have saved another 5-10 Euros, but... something always could be improved. .

Last update 12/18/2009