It was a long 2 hrs and 44 min ride from Rennes to Bayeux. I slept, woke up, slept, woke up, slept again and woke up countless times. I wonder how I would survive the 7hrs train ride to Grenoble on 17th June. I will definitely have to make use of that time to type my blog because I would have to catch up on the 5 days trip in Germany. Anyway, I reached Bayeux finally. Bayeux was the first town to be liberated after D Day. In fact, it was liberated on 7th June, D Plus One, and miraculously left undamaged. The first thing I did when I reached there was to find the tourism office. Along the way, there were lots of Americans and British. This is definitely a town where English is as common as French. Much more English was spoken than any other towns in France, even Paris. Almost all the shops and restaurants had British and/or American flag and sometimes Canadian.
When I reached the office, there were some Americans and British there asking for info and when they were done, the lady asked them their nationality. When it was my turn, I told her I am from SG. Special case. Because here, either the tourists were British or American, perhaps Canadians and Germans. But a Singaporean here is kind of like out of place. Anyway, I got the info I needed and went to the youth hostel. When I reached there, the door was opened but it was empty. I saw luggage and backpacks of the guests lying around in the hall. I could have just taken one and ran off. Then I decided to roam about and then return to the hostel.
I went to the British cemetery which had about 5000 soldiers buried. Majority was British, with close to 4000, while the rest were Canadians, Polish, Germans and some others. It was raining and the atmosphere was gloomy. As I walked on the soft grass, reading the words engraved on the tombs, my heart grew heavy. Most of the parting words were signed off as “love, Mum and Dad”. How sad it is for the parents to bury their sons. There were some British families there but not many. The cemetery was quiet and peaceful. Solemn I would say. In the middle of the cemetery was a monument with the words: Their name liveth for evermore.
On 6th June, the Allies launched an operation called “Overlord”. It was the first attempt to return to France soil and drove out the Germans. The largest combined force ever summoned (land, air and sea) crossed the English Channel to take the beach. 3 airborne divisions dropped behind the enemy line to prepare the assault. One of them was the famous 101st Airborne. The Americans were the first to capture the Normandy beaches (Omaha and Utah) while the Canadians and British took Juno and Sword (East of Omaha and Utah). 2 mobile harbours were dragged across the Channels and installed at Normandy. Bayeux was liberated the next day. Although the Allies had more troops, better equipment, it was not until 80 days later did they managed to push out from the beach front. The resistance from the German was strong. Finally, by the end of August, Normandy was liberated. There were 400,000 German casualties, 200,000 Allies casualties.
After paying my respect to the British soldiers who died for a just cause, I went back to the hostel. I thought of saving that 20 euros and sleep in the cemetery because the grass was so soft and the air was fresh. Luckily, I didn’t do that because that night, it was raining very heavily. I check in at the hostel and was shown my room. Inside the room there was a toilet with bathing facilities and 4 more beds (2 double-decks). One bed was occupied with the belongings of the guest on it. But he wasn’t around. The lady told me there was no key. So I took my valuables and locked my bag. This was the first time I stayed at a youth hostel and felt really unsafe. I think during the end tour, I would chain my bags to the bed using my laptop lock.
I went out and had my dinner at a Kebab restaurant. It was really easy to go around the town here because everyone spoke English. The waiters, the shop assistants, etc. With nothing much to do, I went back to the hostel and saw a few groups of Americans eating at the hostel’s restaurant. I don’t think they were related but somehow they just clicked together and were making lots of noise. I met my roommate, Kevin who was also an American. However, he didn’t join the rest. He studied in LA on history and was on some sort of exchange program in Seina, Italy. He came here purposely for D Day as he was a great fan of WWII. However, he was quite a stupid guy. He came on Saturday morning, went to the tourism office and didn’t go to any war museum. Then he walked from Bayeux to Omaha Beach. From the map, I guessed it must be 50km. He started walking in the morning and got back after 12 midnight. What an idiot. I told him there is a bus there and he said he didn’t know. I got the info from the tourism office. Obviously this guy was not smart enough to ask and just used brute force.
For the whole of today, he spent most of the time in the hostel. Kao. He is sure one boring guy. I told him I would be going to the war museum tomorrow morning and to the beach around noon. He said he had to go back to Paris in the afternoon. I told him to join me in the morning. He said when he arrived in Paris, he was robbed at the train station. He took out his handphone and was dialling some numbers when someone just ran past him and snatched away his phone. Some of the locals saw that and helped him filed a report at the police station. Now he had all his zippers of his bag locked and on top of that, he had the bag locked to his body. He said, “haha, now if anyone wants to rob me, he’ll have to drag me with him. Hahaha.” He really sounded quite dumb.
When I reached the office, there were some Americans and British there asking for info and when they were done, the lady asked them their nationality. When it was my turn, I told her I am from SG. Special case. Because here, either the tourists were British or American, perhaps Canadians and Germans. But a Singaporean here is kind of like out of place. Anyway, I got the info I needed and went to the youth hostel. When I reached there, the door was opened but it was empty. I saw luggage and backpacks of the guests lying around in the hall. I could have just taken one and ran off. Then I decided to roam about and then return to the hostel.
I went to the British cemetery which had about 5000 soldiers buried. Majority was British, with close to 4000, while the rest were Canadians, Polish, Germans and some others. It was raining and the atmosphere was gloomy. As I walked on the soft grass, reading the words engraved on the tombs, my heart grew heavy. Most of the parting words were signed off as “love, Mum and Dad”. How sad it is for the parents to bury their sons. There were some British families there but not many. The cemetery was quiet and peaceful. Solemn I would say. In the middle of the cemetery was a monument with the words: Their name liveth for evermore.
On 6th June, the Allies launched an operation called “Overlord”. It was the first attempt to return to France soil and drove out the Germans. The largest combined force ever summoned (land, air and sea) crossed the English Channel to take the beach. 3 airborne divisions dropped behind the enemy line to prepare the assault. One of them was the famous 101st Airborne. The Americans were the first to capture the Normandy beaches (Omaha and Utah) while the Canadians and British took Juno and Sword (East of Omaha and Utah). 2 mobile harbours were dragged across the Channels and installed at Normandy. Bayeux was liberated the next day. Although the Allies had more troops, better equipment, it was not until 80 days later did they managed to push out from the beach front. The resistance from the German was strong. Finally, by the end of August, Normandy was liberated. There were 400,000 German casualties, 200,000 Allies casualties.
After paying my respect to the British soldiers who died for a just cause, I went back to the hostel. I thought of saving that 20 euros and sleep in the cemetery because the grass was so soft and the air was fresh. Luckily, I didn’t do that because that night, it was raining very heavily. I check in at the hostel and was shown my room. Inside the room there was a toilet with bathing facilities and 4 more beds (2 double-decks). One bed was occupied with the belongings of the guest on it. But he wasn’t around. The lady told me there was no key. So I took my valuables and locked my bag. This was the first time I stayed at a youth hostel and felt really unsafe. I think during the end tour, I would chain my bags to the bed using my laptop lock.
I went out and had my dinner at a Kebab restaurant. It was really easy to go around the town here because everyone spoke English. The waiters, the shop assistants, etc. With nothing much to do, I went back to the hostel and saw a few groups of Americans eating at the hostel’s restaurant. I don’t think they were related but somehow they just clicked together and were making lots of noise. I met my roommate, Kevin who was also an American. However, he didn’t join the rest. He studied in LA on history and was on some sort of exchange program in Seina, Italy. He came here purposely for D Day as he was a great fan of WWII. However, he was quite a stupid guy. He came on Saturday morning, went to the tourism office and didn’t go to any war museum. Then he walked from Bayeux to Omaha Beach. From the map, I guessed it must be 50km. He started walking in the morning and got back after 12 midnight. What an idiot. I told him there is a bus there and he said he didn’t know. I got the info from the tourism office. Obviously this guy was not smart enough to ask and just used brute force.
For the whole of today, he spent most of the time in the hostel. Kao. He is sure one boring guy. I told him I would be going to the war museum tomorrow morning and to the beach around noon. He said he had to go back to Paris in the afternoon. I told him to join me in the morning. He said when he arrived in Paris, he was robbed at the train station. He took out his handphone and was dialling some numbers when someone just ran past him and snatched away his phone. Some of the locals saw that and helped him filed a report at the police station. Now he had all his zippers of his bag locked and on top of that, he had the bag locked to his body. He said, “haha, now if anyone wants to rob me, he’ll have to drag me with him. Hahaha.” He really sounded quite dumb.
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