Tuesday, June 24, 2014

Stge 3: Honfleur - Caen


Today was a day to ride, coast and stop. No need to rush. It was a fairly short day. The entire group left from the motel at about 9 AM but four of us quickly dropped behind when we stopped in town to see a wooden church was built by ship builder a long time ago. When entering the church, the vaulted ceiling looked like the hull of a boat turned upside down. The smell of the church was different that the stone churches that we had been in. No surprise, it had a rich smell of wood, very warm and inviting scent.

It was the time to head out along the ocean. We spent almost the entire day within sight of the ocean with the cool breeze washing over us as we biked along.

About 10:30 we stopped near the ocean for coffee and pastry and watched life go by. Got back on the bikes and weaved through town stopping at the white beaches and fish market, then continued ago the coast following the beaches as we went. About 12km from the end of the ride we found the rest of the group at the picnic stop. They had placed the stop at the site of the Pegasus Memorial. The Memorial is at a bridge that was featured in the movie "The Longest Day", where as one of the first actions of D-Day, a group of 90 British solders landed in 3 huge gliders and took the bridge from the Germans in the dead of night. The bridge needed to be taken intact to support the landings that were to occur later that day, June 6th 1944. We toured the Memorial that included a movie, the relocated bridge and a full size mock up of a glider.

As I said earlier, we were only about 12 miles from the destination, Caen. We took a bike path for several kilometers then through busy streets to our hotel in town.

 Brian







1 comment:

  1. Hi Bry! Barb and I are enjoying your pics! Keep rollin'! Have fun!

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