We were off by 8am today, on a three-hour drive to the coast (it was only about 100 miles to our first stop but only the last 60 miles was highway, slow and beautiful). It was a nice drive which took us through some small villages on narrow country roads as well as on a nice divided highway.
Our first stop was Le Mont Saint-Michel. This 1300 year old abby is situated on a small island about half a mile out in the bay. The island is home to the abby as well as its walls, and a small collection of shops, restaurants and even a couple of hotels cleverly disguised within the old stone buildings. Altogether, the island and its structures are massive and beautiful. It’s hard to imagine the labor that went into building it, especially without modern equipment for moving millions of pounds of rock and stone to the island..
For many centuries, the faithful made pilgrimages to the abby. Visitors still climb from the base of the island, up staircases and the encircling corridors of ageless stone, into the heart of the abby. We can certainly empathize with the emotions that the pilgrims must have experienced as they rose ever higher towards the heavens on that climb. We were delighted to witness a service in progress when we reached the sanctuary. We even got to hear the cloistered nuns singing. It was very moving. Here’s a short video:
On our way down from the abby, we stopped for coffee and crepes. The kids loved their first “real” French crepes, but they said they will still eat Kristi’s, even though they aren’t authentic enough. ;)
From there, we hopped back in the cars for another hour long drive north to Omaha Beach. This is one of the D-day landing sites. We walked out onto the beach and took pictures at one of the numerous memorials, then visited the Omaha Beach D-Day Museum. We were impressed by the thorough and well-constructed displays. The museum tour ended with a short video that was also quite good.
We then drove a short way north to another part of the beach where we explored some bunker remains and saw more memorials. The weather, which had been drizzly much of the day, cleared up and we enjoyed beautiful blue skies for the remainder of the afternoon.
Being right there, and walking on Omaha Beach, was quite moving.
On our two hour drive back “home” we stopped for a very un-French, but delicious and easy, dinner — Dominos pizza. 😃
A few more beach pics:
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