Just came back from my second trip to Normandy about a month ago. Except this time I added stops at Vimy, The Somme and Dieppe.
The preparations going on for the anniversary were incredible. The airborne museum at St Mere Eglise is undergoing a ton of construction, and the tourist trap stuff is out in full force.
I got even more out of my second visit. If you're into museums, the Battle of Normandy museum in Bayeux is excellent. I skipped it last time.
With the influence of Hollywood, most people don't look past the events of DDay. The most ignorant think that after DDay it was smooth sailing all the way to Germany. But the battle of Normandy saw some of the fiercest fighting of the war. Caen was a bitch to take, the bocage, St Lo, hedge row fighting, Falaise pocket and so on. There were some fascinating battles that took place. The patriot in me would be remiss to mention that the Canadians played a huge part in the breakout. Some people don't even know that Canadian paratroopers also landed on DDay.
Also interesting in how Utah beach is kind of the forgotten beach. It was only defended by roughly 75 Germans, and in contrast to everything going wrong on Omaha, almost everything went right on Utah. But also the success of the Utah landings were largely due in part to the work of the paratroopers who landed the night before, there was some fierce fighting that took place as a result of the missed drops. The paratroopers were supposed to drop in, link up and complete their objectives. Instead they scattered everywhere, in some cases landing in the middle of townsquares completely surrounded by Germans with no cover.
My god I could go on forever...
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