Part 2 - In Normandy

Now that we had arrived in Normandy, we could spend some time doing the sites. What suited us best was to work our way along the coast visiting the beaches and then use a more inland road for the return journey to our camp. We used this technique over a number of days as you can't do it justice in one day.

The last Panzer in Normandy

On the way down from Calais to Normandy you can take a side trip to the town of Vimoutiers (due south of Le Havre and level with Falaise), it is famous (in MV circles) for the single Panzer sitting by the side of the road on the outskirts of town. This vehicle is a Tiger I which had run out of petrol and been destroyed by its crew. It spent many years slowly sliding down a hillside until the owner of the land sold it to a scrap metal dealer. The mayor of the town only heard about this whilst the scrapies were in the process of cutting up the tank. They had already cut the turret into several pieces when he intervened.

The result was that the vehicle was aquired by the town and put on display after the cuts were welded back up. I last saw this vehicle in 1994 and it was wearing a very inaccurate and ugly paint scheme; in 1999 the paint job could best be described as horrendous!
But; at least they are making the effort to paint it and preserve it, which is a better fait than most war trophies around the world. If nothing else, the varying local interpretations of a German camoflage scheme has caused much comment over the years.

You don't realise just how BIG a Tiger is until you see one in the "flesh".

My camera played up so I can only show 2 photo's from 1999.

The first is a side shot and in this you really can't see anything much wrong with the vehicle. In fact, it has a large chunk of the belly missing (blocked by concrete so you can't get in) and the major engine hatches missing. Really, it is virtually unrestorable unless someone had an unlimited budget and facilities. This is mostly due to the effect of the demolition charge which has blown out the bottom of the sponsons and raised the deck several inches in places.

On the Tiger

This is a shot along the top of the hull with the turret on the right. This area should be flat, not bulged and cracked.

On to Normandy

Then on to our campsite just outside of Bayeux at a place called Martragny. There are quite a number of "camping grounds/caravan parks" in this area; who goes where, usually runs along club and nationality lines, not because of any prejudice but more a case of bulk bookings.

We met up with some German friends, the Mehlhorns, who I have been swapping emails with for the past few years. Andreas is a Kettenkrad enthusiast whose ambition is to one day drive his Kettenkrad to Normandy and Beltring - when the restoration is finished.

So here we were in France, not being able to speak more than about 10 words of french until Andreas and Regina arrived; she is currently learning french. So, our interpreter was a German who had to spend most of her time speaking English to a couple of Australians. All the while, her french teacher thought she was getting lots of practise in the french language - she did learn quite a few new English/Australian words and concepts though.

Andreas suffered a bit of a culture shock at this point and now refers to my visit as "Europe bunker tour holiday", I don't think he quite came to terms with my tendency to crawl into, climb over or visit, virtually every bunker I saw. Us Aussies are relatively bunkerless.

Arromanche (4/6/99 and on)

First port of call was the "Batterie Longues sur Mer", the only part of the Atlantic Wall in Normandy that still has its guns. The last time (1994) when I was here it rained and I got soaked. The same thing happened again, despite us having watched the weather and trying to time things so this didn't happen again. Even the weather is historically accurate.

What you see here is one of the gun emplacements of that standard German pattern. To give some scale my wife Fran, Regina and Andreas are standing on top.

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One of what I believe to be the 155mm guns. Fran and myself to give scale. Note that at this point we are dry.

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An inside view of the gun.

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This is the view from seaward, (but not sea level!) of 2 of the emplacements! At this point we are nearly at the observation bunker, note the deteriorating weather.

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This is the observation bunker. It is still possible to climb up into it and stand there and look out and visualise what those on guard duty must have felt when they saw the invasion armada laid out before them. Shortly after we climbed in it started raining so that was the end of the photo's; by the way, the observation bunker is the further most point from the car park.

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We have now moved further along the coast and this view shows some of the "Mulberry Harbour" still in place in the sea after 50 years.

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One of the surviving "caissons"; these are basically a hollow concrete pontoon which were towed across the channel in order to form an artificial dock and harbour. We had arrived at the wrong time tide wise so a good look at the Caisson had to wait till later.

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There seemed to be something happening up on the esplanade so upon investigating we found 2 x "Diamond T" tank transporter with there correct Rodgers trailers. On them were a "Grizzly" (Canadian version of the Sherman) and an M5 Stuart.

I believe the Stuart belongs to a bloke called Pip Binukum (spelling?) from the New Forest area of England. It is in very good condition.

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The Grizzly was not being co-operative and the crew could not get it to start; they said it had a stuck "de-gaser" which I am told is part of the carburetor system and is essential on large petrol engines in order to stop them without anything exciting, like a fire, happening. Eventually they got the problem sorted out and unloaded it for display. My Stuart did not have one of these devices so it was all news to me!

Note the English pattern tracks on the Grizzly.

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Nearby were a collection of trucks; this one appears to be the wrecker version of a "Coffee Pot Scamell".

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After this we headed along the coast and came to Asnelles, where there were a few vehicles running up and down the beach. Amongst them was this "High Speed Tractor".

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Not far away we came on this bunker, it is suffering from beach erosion as are many of the ones we saw. We even found one small machine gun bunker on Omaha beach that was lying on its side. It is then that you can see how hurridly they were constructed and that the foundations are not at all deep. I was told that even the largest gun emplacements suffered from this problem and that lots were put out of action by near misses from ship guns tilting them rather than by a destructive hit.

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At Graye-Sur-Mer (on the back face of the dune) there is an AVRE Churchill (Engineer's bunker buster version) which is a monument. Whilst we were there a unit of the Royal Engineers were replacing rusted out panels and giving it a coat of paint and generally sprucing things up. They were not long back from Kosovo and told me that normally they visit the vehicle every 5 years and attend to it.

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We had heard about a new attraction featuring a German "Wurzburg" Radar. This is at Douvre and is a nicely cared for site which includes a bunker complex (not all of it is accesible). The control box on the radar is bare but the owners have hopes of aquiring the necesary parts to complete it. Whilst there we ran into an English collector called Tim Bell who cautioned us about being too adventursome. He related how a couple of years back in the "Falaise Gap" area he and some friends sort permission from a farmer to poke around in a forest area and was it safe? Yes, said the farmer, no problem. They had only been in there about 15 minutes when one of Tim's friends drew his attention to a strange object he had found. Tim recognised it as a German "S-Mine", it appeared to be quite intact and still armed; that cut short their exploration!

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This is a detail shot of one of the machine gun positions of a bunker at Douvre. These were built to take an MG-42 on a "scarf" style revolving mount (always missing these days). The gunner stood on a concrete landing inside with the ground being level with his lowest rib area.

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Now for the inside view looking out. In the bottom right of the photo you can see a dark area that appears to be a loop hole (there is a correct French name for this feature which I have forgotten) which would overlook the sunken entrance door to the bunker.

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For a bit of variety(!) we decided to have a look around some of the other camping grounds. At one of them we found a Dutch MV club; just then an M20 pulled up which the owner (Carel Ten Horn) had driven down from the Netherlands.

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What you are looking at here are the protectoscope holders on the hatches of the M20, they are the same as the M8 Greyhound ones I need? Anyone know of any?

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5/6/99 In search of the Ste-Mer-Eglise Flea Market.

This is where things got really silly! We had been told of a militaria flea market at the above town (of paratrooper stuck on the church steeple fame) so off we went to have a look and perhaps get some bargains? After coming to the conclusion that we had been given a bum steer we spoted a Jeep with 5 blokes in it so decided to ask them. Fran's enquiry was answered in a whole heap of German, the only word we recognised being "German". After bursting out laughing, Regina took over and was told that they were heading for the flea market but it was actually in another town, called Montébourg and if we wanted to follow them that would be okay.
So, off we went, tailing an American WW2 Jeep, crewed by East Germans dressed as American G.I.'s, in Normandy, heading for a militaria flea market: it can't get much sillier than that!

In the picture you get to see half the flea market (it was indoors); the other half you don't get to see as my camera decided to play up again.

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What we found to be the most annoying aspect of the whole D-Day event is the lack of info available as to what is happening. You can readily obtain the time table for wreath layings and official ceremonies; but as to what each MV club has organised seems to be a mystery known only to the members of each particular club. The only way to find out is to ask a collector who happens to be at any of the tourist sites and to do this repeatedly. This is all very odd considering that the clubs all meet and co-ordinate with each other prior to the event.

To continue, click = France 99 part 3 

 

 

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