This is an aerial view of the American
Cemetery at the D-Day beaches. There are a lot of headstones.
The British, Canadian, and Germany cemeteries are also along the D-Day
beaches, but are several miles apart.
This was one of the coldest and windiest days during our
trip. A few photos later, it started to hail, but the hail didn't
show up well in the photographs.
Ainsley loved to play in the sand at Omaha beach.
The stones were recently added to prevent soil erosion. In the photo
on the right, you can see there is a lot of beach between the ocean and
the top of the hill where the cemetery is located. There weren't
any safe areas for troops to take cover as they attacked.
The town of Arromanches lay in the center of the more
than 50 miles of D-Day beaches. The Americans, British, and Canadians
knew they needed a harbor for any invasion and knew the Germans would
rather destroy the German occupied ports in France than let anyone else
control them. The Americans and British built floating harbors,
but the British one in Arromanches is the only one to survive the a fierce
storm days after the invasion. It was a monumental undertaking that
was never done before and has not been done since. It involved sinking
a number of retired ships to create a breakwater for a calm harbor.
Arromanches beach at low tide.
The floating breakwaters called Phoenixes
on the horizon and the people on the beach are difficult to see, so
I enlarged parts of the photos shown below.
Here are the breakwaters on the horizon.
Large, hollow containers were floated across the English Channel,
linked end to end, and sunk on top of the sunken ships.
The shells of rusting bridge pontoons
sit on the beach. See the black and white photo above of the
floating bridge with ambulances on it.
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