NORMANDY TO DUNKIRK - August

We left the Loire Valley and drove north. The countryside is a picture with wildflowers in the fields and along the roadside and the sunflowers are almost ready to be harvested and the hay bales in the fields are being stacked.

We stopped in Segre to visit our friends Monique and Jean Claude went to a typical country restaurant for Cider and Galettes (Brittany crepes) These are really yummy and can be filled with all sorts of savoury things.

and spent some time at their farm in Basse Landes which has a wonderful old 15th century farm house and barn.

We visited Chateau de la Lorie, the chateau and gardens  are very symmetrical have lovely stone dogs on guard in place of the usual lions.

We left here and drove up to Saint Malo, a historical walled port and walked around the wall, the tide was out when we took this photo

Next stop Mont St Michel another picturesque sight.

This sign tells what time High Tide is to make sure vehicles aren't caught by the water.

We followed the coast north and came across the Port of Carteret where the ferry leaves for Jersey and Guernsey Islands. Thinking this would be fun we stayed overnight in the carpark with lots of other motorhomes to see if we could get tickets over the next day. It was fun talking to other travellers and early morning found we couldn’t get on the ferry so we continued on.

While driving through France we have spent many nights in the motorhome sites provided by the towns to encourage spending in the town. Some of the sites have 4 spaces others room for 20 motorhomes. We overnighted in this small town just near  this huge castle. On our walk around we spied the long drop toilet clinging to the wall. 

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We drove to Bayeux where the historic tapestry reminds me of the history lessons we had as children in Australia about the events of 1066. In 1952 most of the children in my class including me didn’t know where modern day England was.

D DAY LANDINGS

Our next stop was Port en Bessin as there was a good motorhome spot about 200 metres from the main town.

We walked down to the harbour and spent a few hours looking at the fishing boats and sipping coffee. We were surprised to see this boat alongside the harbour wall and had a chat with the owner who now lives in Paris.

The port is famous for Scallops and the shells lie tightly packed against the harbour walls where they are washed in with the tides. 

Port en Bessin was the harbour in the film 'The Longest day'  We are into Battlefields again, this time the 2^nd World War as we drive along the  Normandy beaches of Utah, Omaha, Gold, Juno and Sword.

We visited Pointe du Hoc with huge craters made on June 6 1944 

The nine screen circular cinema at Arromanche showing the film ‘Price of freedom’ which was a mix of archival film shot by war correspondents on D Day and present day film of the same locations in peace time was very moving.

The remnants of Mulberry Harbour built for the landing are still visible along the coast.

Finally we visited Pegasus bridge. The lifting mechanism is an amazing piece of machinery.

Now it is time to cross the Normandy bridge and drive north to Dunkirk and take the ferry to Dover.

As you can see from this photo not all overnight motorhome spots are ideal. Here we all parked along the street on a hill.

Dunkirk and we are packed in like sardines 

And soon we see the white cliffs of Dover and we are back in the UK.