D-Day 70years later

A visual of the D-Day Landings

Bonjour tout le monde!

American Cemetery in Normandy

Today marks the 70th anniversary of the D-Day landing on the Normandy beaches.  Dubbed "Operation Overlord" by the Allied forces, over 9,000 men lost their lives that day.  In French, D-Day is le Jour-J, and marked the start of renewed Allied fighting against the Germans.   Many of our memories stop at June 6, but the Allies didn't enter Paris until August, 1944.  In between, the fighting and bombing continued between the two sides, leaving many towns, cities and villages in ruins.
Such was the case with the town of Caen, which lost many buildings that dated from the Middle Ages.  They rebuilt, then constructed the Caen Memorial Museum.  I have visited the museum at least three times, and each time I learn something new.  When you visit the museum, as you go through, you see original footage from the day, plus huge mechanical montages that show how the Allied forces worked hard to force the retreat of the Germans.  Now it is possible to go through a museum that has artifacts from the fighting that started in Normandy and ended in Paris two months later.
Here are some photos from one of our visits to the landing area of Omaha Beach, which included the Point du Hoc, where huge depressions in the land show what the entire region looked like during the war.

Omaha Beach

A part of the Cemetery memorial

If you make it  to the Normandy area, make sure that you see the museum in Caen, the Point du Hoc, and also the American Cemetery at Omaha Beach.

For more information on the Museum in Caen:
http://normandy.memorial-caen.com/

Photos of D-Day then and now:
http://golem13.fr/70-ans-liberation-de-paris/

Flags flying at the American Cemetery

Point du Hoc

Looking into one of the German bunkers.

I think this was a gun placement (a BIG gun)

the Monument of the Point du Hoc -
erosion has it now behind a fence to protect visitors