Bayeux & Le Mont St Michel

Le Mont St Michel One of the many lovely buildings in Bayeux The Monastery housing the Bayeux tapestry. Another of the great sights around the town. Cathedral Notre-Dame - Bayeux One of the many beautiful houses in France!

9th Sept 08 – Bayeux

We headed off for Bayeux via a Hymer dealer whereby we hoped to get our habitation door fixed! (Every time we try to get in or out we have to do it with a special technique – which may appear to some as if we are breaking in…….luckily we haven’t been challenged on this). Anyway, finally got to the dealer, which didn’t look like a dealer……to be told, they had closed down in June! A pity Hymer can’t manage to keep their website upto date – why am I not surprised! We decided to motor on to Bayeux & re-evaluate the situation once we arrived. Bayeux is a beautiful place http://www.bayeux-tourism.com/ENG/index.html, our site was in the centre of town on a ‘regular’ town centre pay & display car park although it was free for us & there was water & waste disposal facilities available. We set off for a meander around the town & of course to see the tapestry……WOW, wow, wow, the tapestry is huge & was very impressive, definitely worth the €15.40 we paid to see it! We saw some lovely sights, buildings, streams, waterwheels & of course shops!! We decided to go to see one of the sights of the D-Day landings Arromanches the following day & thought we may stay another night in Bayeux.

10th Sept 08 – Bayeux & Le Mont St Michel

After the worst nights sleep we have had here, we decided we would not spend another night in Bayeux – predominantly because we had been woken numerous times throughout the night by rowdy people vandalising the recycling bins, amongst other things. This proved very disturbing & made me especially feel a little vulnerable, although there were a number of other motor homes too. I had read about a market which was on in Bayeux today, so we took an early stroll down to peruse their wares. It was an eclectic mix of food & anything else from leather goods to toy wooden trains. We came across a great fish stall & stood around watching them gut the fish mesmerised by their expertise. We noticed they had a huge crate of what looked like scallops, so we decided to buy 1kg for €3 – Mal was a little unsure as we didn’t know what to do with them! No worries we’ll consult Mr Internet. After lunch Mal couldn’t wait to have a go with the scallops, so as he started to get the little suckers from their shells, I challenged the internet to tell me what to do with them. But before that Mal thought we should check out the French word for scallops, it was not the same as what we had bought! After much deliberation we decided they could be babies as they ended in ecoles, so we did a translation on google & am pleased to say we were right. It took a while to de-shell them, I then proceeded to de-stomach them (not something I relished) – I did a great job, we decided to leave the de-sanding until later. We headed off to Arromanches the site of the D-Day landings

http://www.france-for-visitors.com/normandy/d-day-beaches/arromanches.html it was an awesome place! The beach is absolutely stunning in a weird kind of way because you can still see the remnants of the port. The Allies knew they would need a port in order to keep their forces adequately supplied, but after the fiasco of the Dieppe raid on August 19th 1942 (Operation Jubilee), it was obvious to one & all that German defences were too good for them to capture a working port. For this reason, the decision was taken to build two prefabricated harbours from sections towed across the channel. Although work on Mulberry A at Omaha Beach was abandoned after it was destroyed by the violent storm of June 19th-21st, Mulberry B at Arromanches, nicknamed Port Winston, went on to play an undisputed role in the advance of Allied troops in Normandy. We decided the museum was worth €16 & had about an hour in there. We mounted our bikes & rode back to the MH for the next leg of the journey to Le Mont St Michel. We arrived in Le Mont St Michel at around 5pm & we were pretty tired & so decided to get on & have something to eat. This place is awesome our spot for the night was right at the base of Le Mont St Michel – the view was breathtaking. http://www.lemontsaintmichel.info/ There were no hotels in such an enviable position as us – how lucky we felt!