(Click on any picture to see full size.) With the early spring weather finally turning sunny for a few days it was time to plan a trip on the motorcycle. This trip was to be my first that would take several days and require the use of my camping gear. Coincident to the planning, a new member of Bike Club France forum had just made an exceptional offer to members i.e., that of free camping at his Classic Bike Camping site located in South Western France in a small town called Puyclavaud, which you won’t find on any map but essentially west of Limoges about 40 miles. John, the owner and lover of classic bikes, owns a beautiful big house in the country and about 4 acres of land (his back yard). John is located about 35 miles from Oradour-sur-Glane which was one of my planned travel locations so this seemed like a perfect time to make the trip south to visit the site.
Roy, my friend in Normandy, wanted to make the trip with me so I headed out to Roy’s house on Monday the 24th. The free camping days were offered for the 27th to 30th so we decided to do a little bit of local riding before we headed out for the camp site.
On Tuesday, May 25th, we headed to the coast to the town of Bayeux located about 7 km from the coast. It is an attractive town with a reasonably well-preserved centre dating back to Medieval times, and a renowned cathedral, the Cathedrale Notre Dame, dating in part from 1077. However the town actually dates back to the 1st century B.C. with Roman origins. The city was largely destroyed during the Viking Raids of the late 800s and later rebuilt in the 10th century. Besides the cathedral the town is most famous for the Bayeux tapestry, made to commemorate events in the Norman Conquest of England in1066. The tapestry was made by Reine Mathilde, wife of William the Conqueror, We did not see this on this visit nor did I take pictures but I will head back this summer to check it out. I had a nice regional lunch beside the Notre Dame Cathedral of Galettes filled with regional meats, mushrooms, apples and a typical Normandy cream sauce. Very tasty.
After Bayeux, we headed to Arromanches-sur-Bains on the coast of Normandy in the heart of the WWII D-Day landing area designated Gold Beach which was one of the British landing areas. At Arromanches-sur-Bains, located 100 meters above the ocean, you can look out and see what remains of the mobile metal and concrete retaining wall components that were floated into location by boats, filled with water and allowed to sink to create a protective harbor for offloading allied military supplies and materials.
Many of these protective wall sections used to create the “Mulberry harbors”, still exist off the Normandy coast and can be viewed from the cliffs.
Longues-sur-mer - German gun bunkers.
Many of these protective wall sections used to create the “Mulberry harbors”, still exist off the Normandy coast and can be viewed from the cliffs.
Longues-sur-mer - German gun bunkers.
After our brief stopover, we headed to Longues-sur-mer to visit WWII German Bunkers built in the first few months of 1944 by the Germans. These fortified bunkers house big guns (150-mm) pointed out to sea including a range-finder bunker to locate and help lock in on allied boats approaching the coast. The Germans suspected this area as a potential landing site so built these heavily fortified bunkers to try to stall any landing. It turned out that they were lucky enough to be positioned to fire on both Omaha Beach (American landing) and Gold Beach (British landing). The bunkers are so well fortified that they still remain in essential the same condition they were built in the 1940’s. The gun bunkers are pock marked where shells had hit them and the guns are a little rusted but still in place poised to fire as they were in the 1940s. In the last picture you can see the imprint of a German hob-nailed boot.
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