SAINT-LAURENT-SUR-MER, FRANCE — My dad has a Post-it stuck to the refrigerator, a handful of words and phrases written in his familiar scrawl:
Co 559 Rail Head
5th ESB
Attached to 16th Regiment
Left Flank
Omaha
I didn’t know about it at the time, but they’re clues to my grandfather’s , something he rarely talked about while he was alive.
All the same, there I was, in this tiny seaside hamlet in Normandy, just northwest of Bayeux’s picturesque town center and towering cathedral. Standing on the sandy beach and staring out into the deep blue of the English Channel, my eyes welled at the thought that had become my constant companion that cool autumn day.
My grandpa had been there, too.
I had finally arrived at the destination my week-long trip to France had been leading toward. I had reached Omaha Beach.
Today, thousands of tourists make pilgrimage every year to this historically significant swath of Atlantic coastline, roughly 50 miles of rocky cliffs and sandy beaches that played host to
, travelers still go to pay tribute to the brave American, British and Canadian troops who stormed the shore starting in the early-morning hours of . By the end of D-Day, ٳ.
Much of the wreckage is gone today, but what remains is intentional, sticking out among an otherwise bucolic setting — the sleepy seaside towns, narrow country roads and bountiful cideries.
Reminders at the beach
The morning mist not yet burned off, my husband and I started our day in Arromanches, pulling into the parking lot next to the small after breakfast.
It was clear right away this wasn’t your run-of-the-mill beach town. In the distance sat these hulking rectangular forms, oddly spaced and creating a rough semicircle breakwater for the beach.
A quick but worthwhile visit to the museum explained that they’re whatap left of Mulberry B, or Port Winston, the artificial harbor built by the British after D-Day to supply Allied troops during the Battle of Normandy yet to come. During the course of the campaign, some 2.5 million men, 500,000 vehicles and 4 million metric tons of supplies arrived via the temporary harbor, according to the .
The tide low, we wandered out on the wet sand, pulled as if by magnet to the barnacle-covered remnants that lay beached close to shore.
The giant carcasses — our guidebook told us they were floats that supported the harbor’s pontoon roads — were startling in their sheer size, towering above us as we peered into every crack and rusted hole.
Maybe even more startling was the fact that they were allowed to stay there undisturbed, an unsculpted monument to history. This was still a community beach: As we explored, a group of kids ran around, kicking a soccer ball among the wreckage.
A few miles west of Arromanches, we got our first taste of just what those Allied soldiers faced when they came ashore.
Following the signs marked “Batterie,” we soon found ourselves in a tiny parking lot connected to a ragged path. As we walked, four German casemates rose one after another, puncturing an otherwise pastoral scene, their thick concrete shells protecting rusted 150mm artillery guns — the only original German coastal artillery remaining anywhere along the Normandy coast.
Intimidating even seven decades later, at the time of the invasion, the Longues-sur-Mer guns could shoot shells as far as 22 kilometers, or more than 13 miles, according to .
Their strategic purpose made even sense as we veered down another footpath to the east — just 300 yards and we were standing in a low-slung bunker built on the edge of a cliff, its narrow opening overlooking the sea between Omaha and Gold beaches.
It wasn’t a stretch of the imagination to picture thousands of soldiers coming ashore in the surf below, easy prey for the terrorizing guns hidden above.
It was our next stop, though, that hit me like a shot to the gut.
Built on the site of the first U.S. cemetery established on European soil during World War II, the welcomes about 1 million visitors every year to 172.5 serene acres perched above Omaha Beach.
I have never been so glad to be wearing sunglasses.
I can’t even remember if it was sunny enough to warrant them, but they rarely left my face the whole time we were there, a convenient mask for my glistening eyes.
I had visited American military cemeteries before, with their rows and rows of white crosses and Stars of David achieving an aggressive kind of symmetry all their own.
But here, the 9,387 American soldiers laid to rest on this immaculate piece of French soil, the gravity of their sacrifice blanketed me, heavy and unshakable. No matter what I did, the tears wouldn’t stop coming.
As I wandered among the fields of headstones, pausing here and there to read the inscriptions, twin thoughts looped in my mind: My grandpa probably knew some of these people. My grandpa could have been one of these people.
Finally, I tracked down my husband, interrupting his photographic reverie.
“Can we go?” I asked.
I was spent.
Omaha
A quick seaside picnic in the back of our mite-sized Peugeot lifted my spirits a bit, in the way only good food can.
Camembert cheese and ham tucked into a freshly baked baguette, a sweet berry tart picked up at a bakery down the street from our hotel in Bayeux — these are the French meals I cherish.
Our bellies full, we continued onto another U.S. monument eight miles west of the cemetery, the .
The simple granite monument — commemorating the heroic U.S. Army Rangers who scaled the 100-foot cliffs to seize the heavily fortified German artillery positions atop the point strategically located between Omaha and Utah beaches — paled in comparison to the scarred landscape surrounding it.
Everywhere around us, deep, round bomb craters pocked the cliff top. It was like being on the moon — if the moon were covered in grass and littered with the remnants of German bunkers and gun emplacements.
Equally shocking was the flock of woolly sheep grazing, oblivious, fenced off among the craters.
I have never seen anything quite like it, a landscape forever marked by the ferocity of the Allied bombardment leading up to D-Day. Little has changed there since 1944, either, even curls of barbed wire left to rust in place.
With evening closing in, we ended our day at Omaha Beach.
The towns of Vierville-sur-Mer and Saint-Laurent-sur-Mer offer direct access to the now placid beach, the Czech hedgehogs and metal poles in historic photos replaced with a striking metal sculpture rising from the sand.
We gathered seashells and quietly strolled, filling our jacket pockets with the tiny treasures. I thought again about my grandpa and what this place had meant to his life and those of so many others in his generation and generations yet to come.
Meanwhile, dogs scampered happily around their owners and a group of young people sat near the rocks chatting. We left for a simple dinner at a hotel nearby.
Even here, the site of the most casualties on D-Day, where the past cannot be ignored, time doesn’t stand still.
Planning your trip
You’ll want to spend at least a full day exploring the American D-Day beaches, located along 50 miles of the Atlantic coastline just north of Bayeux in the French region of Normandy. A car is a must. For more tourist information, go to “Rick Steves’ France” is a good resource for useful tips for the area, too.
Musée du Débarquement (Place du 6 Juin, 14117 Arromanches; is worth a quick visit to learn about the creation of the Port Winston Artificial Harbor. Open daily 9 a.m.-7 p.m. May through August; 9 a.m.-6 p.m. September; check website for offseason hours; 8 Euros.
Batterie Allemande du Longues-sur-Mer (14400 Longues sur Mer; ) is home to the only original German artillery pieces remaining on the Normandy coast. Free. Guided tours available, check website for schedule.
Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial (14710 Colleville-sur-Mer; , is the most visited of all cemeteries operated by the American Battle Monuments Commission. Leave plenty of time to wander through the informative exhibits in the visitors center as well as the 172.5-acre grounds. Open daily 9 a.m.-6 p.m. April 15-Sept. 15, 9 a.m.-5 p.m. offseason; closed Dec. 25 and Jan. 1; free.
Nowhere does the fierceness of the D-Day fighting hit harder than at the Pointe du Hoc Ranger Monument (14450 Cricqueville-en-Bessin; ). U.S. Army Rangers scaled 100-foot cliffs to reach the top, now a lunaresque landscape of bomb craters and the remains of German fortifications. Open daily 9 a.m.-6 p.m. April 15-Sept. 15, 9 a.m.-5 p.m. offseason; free.
If you’re looking for a bite to eat near Omaha Beach, the restaurant at ôٱ辱Ծè (100 Rue de la 2ème infanterie US, 14710 St. Laurent sur Mer; la-sapiniere.fr) is a low-key, but worthwhile option serving up tasty seafood, omelettes, salads and more. The kir normand, a cocktail made with hard cider and crème de cassis liqueur, is a regional specialty.
