IUHPFL Saint-Brieuc 2019: Normandy

Dear family & friends,

On Friday and Saturday, we went on our second excursion: Normandy.

We left Saint-Brieuc at 7:30am on Friday and headed directly to the Mont Saint-Michel, 1.5 hours away. The Mont Saint-Michel is a tiny 8th-century island-village with a large abbey sitting at its top. It has a population of about 50. The Mont Saint-Michel is mostly famous for its inaccessibility come high tide. Its tide is one of the most impressive in the world. At high tide, the water completely surrounds the island and covers the only access road. When the tide is at its lowest, the sea is barely visible on the horizon as the water withdraws about 7 miles (12km) away. This phenomenal tide movement is the result of the extreme flatness of the land. When the water comes back, it does so at the speed of a galloping horse! When we arrived at the Mont Saint-Michel in the morning, the water was so far away that we could not see it. Unfortunately, the 3 hours that we spent there were not enough time to witness its coming back.

After picnicking at the Mont Saint-Michel, we drove to Bayeux, a town that is home to a beautiful cathedral, as well as to the famous Bayeux Tapestry. The Bayeux Tapestry is an embroidered cloth that’s 230-feet long and only 20-inches high. It was made in the 1070’s, almost a thousand years ago! It depicts the events leading up to the Norman conquest of England by William the Conqueror. It consists of some 50 scenes that explain the story of the conquest. For that reason, the tapestry is often referred to as the oldest known comic book. All the students got an audio guide. They all went with kids’ French and understood (almost) everything! The audio guide explained each scene as the students were moving along the 230 feet of tapestry which was displayed behind glass in a dark room (so that the light wouldn’t damage it). Pictures were forbidden. The picture of the Tapestry that you will see on this blog was found on Google. I wanted to include it so you could see what it looks like. On the second floor there was a museum with many interesting things (a model vessel, an electronic and interactive version of the tapestry, a movie theater, etc.) to learn more about what happened between the kingdom of France and the kingdom of England during the 11th century. At the Tapestry museum, Madelyn ran into her History teacher and a classmate from Indiana! She didn't even know they were in Europe. It was completely random and unexpected! When she heard her friend scream "Oh my GOD!" (in English), she was so surprised –almost to tears, but went on to say "Je ne peux pas parler anglais" (I'm not allowed to speak English). Awesome job while under emotional shock, Madelyn! ;) We ran into her History teacher and classmate *again* the following day at the Caen Memorial, and I was able to get a picture of her with her teacher as well!

Finally, after a full day of visits and emotions, we went to the small village of Bernières-sur-Mer where we spent the night. We arrived around 7pm, had dinner shortly after and all of the students ended their day at the beach right around the corner, with a late-night swim for some! We quickly came back to the hostel in time to watch the soccer game (France vs US), which was part of the Women Soccer World Cup! The US won 2-1, and is now going to play the semi-final!

Our second day started with a visit to the Mémorial de Caen. The Caen Memorial is a museum dedicated to the history of violence and intensive, outstanding conflict in the 20th century, particularly World War II, but also the Cold War. The museum was officially opened on June 6 1988 (the 44th anniversary of D-Day) by the French President François Mitterrand. It holds many artifacts from all three wars, as well as testimonies (video & audio), photographs, interactive screens to learn more about History, etc.

After our visit to the Caen Memorial, we drove to the American Military Cemetery, which stands on top of a hill overlooking Omaha Beach. We first went down to Omaha Beach to pay homage to the American soldiers who died on this beach. Omaha Beach is one of the many beaches that were part of the D-Day landings that took place on June 6 1944. Those landings were the most vital part of the greater Operation Overlord to liberate France and more generally Europe from years of German military occupation. The Allies had divided the 60-mile coastal stretch chosen for the invasion in Normandy into five sectors, code-named Sword, Juno, Gold, Omaha, and Utah. British forces landed at Sword and Gold, while Canadians landed at Juno. American forces landed at Omaha and Utah. Our visit at Omaha was very solemn. The students seemed well-aware of and well-informed about what happened there. On June 6 1944 alone, 3,686 American soldiers died on Omaha Beach. A lot of them were roughly the same age as our students. In the pictures you will see, I included one famous black-and-white picture taken that day during the landing at Omaha. Right on top of the cliff that overlooks the beach lays the American Military Cemetery where about 10,000 American soldiers who died throughout the two-month long battle are buried.

Our trip to Normandy ended with a 3-hour long drive back to Saint-Brieuc during which we all watched the movie Save Private Ryan. This Spielberg movie starts and ends in the (more or less) modern-day American Military Cemetery in Normandy that we visited, and also shows the landing at Omaha for very long minutes. It tells the true story of a handful of American soldiers moving inland to find Private Ryan, whose three brothers had already been killed in the war (and who are all buried at the cemetery we visited). Shortly after D-Day, the US government ordered the rescue of the last of the brothers, in order to avoid a mother's utter and complete devastation.

Charlène

Le Mont Saint-Michel