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WITH
BRITTANY FERRIES 
On
the
Trail
of The
holiday invasion
(A Tale of Two Tapestries)
Britain
is well served with ferries to Continental Europe and if
you are heading south to the sun and
want to avoid the traffic
and the heavily populated are around Paris, it is well worth
looking to the west and using Brittany ferries out of
Portsmouth.
Shortly
after driving our car on board we found ourselves at an elegant
foyer and being directed to our cabin. It was a comfortable
affair with larger windows that I expected.
This was a good thing because as our ship, The Normandie headed
out out to sea there was really a lot to take in.
You are immediately reminded that Portsmouth is
steeped in naval history and you sail past ships that range from
today's battle fleet to ancient craft that you can visit
at The Historic Naval Dockyard.
As
we passed (fairly quickly) the aircraft carrier HMS Ark Royal.
I was struck by its size, it was smaller than I expected and
I marveled at the skill and courage of the people who landed
planes on it.
D-day
Museum
If
you plan to travel via Portsmouth, try to get there early and
explore some of the things that are on offer.
It
was difficult to fit everything in, but attracted by flags and a
large tank outside we
visited the D-day Museum.
It deals with the history of the Normandy landings in World War
Two and has for it’s main attraction a very large tapestry of the
invasion. Wearing headphones you walk around the thirty four
panels that tell the story of ‘Operation
Overlord.’
All is peaceful now on the leafy bye ways of Normandy, but if
you saw film
"Saving Private Ryan" you will have a clear image of
the battles that took place there during World War Two when in
June 1944 a hundred and thirty thousand men
and seven thousand ships crossed the channel.
The
Overlord Embroidery which tells the story of the Allied invasion,
just as 900 years earlier the story of William the Conqueror's
invasion of England was told in the Bayeux Tapestry.
The Overlord Embroidery was designed by Sandra Lawrence and made
by 20 women from the Royal School of Needlework over a period of
5 years. 
Each
panel in the Embroidery is 8 feet long by 3 feet high and
together they tell the complete story of the D-Day operation,
from the planning and preparation of the invasion to victory in
the Battle of Normandy in August 1944. A 30 minute sound track
with a variety of voices dramatises the scene. As
you look at the needlework,
your imagination really brings it to life.
You begin to sense the tension that must have existed as the
invasion force gathered a massive momentum.
You examine detail such as the midget submarine shining a green
light out to sea to guide the invasion fleet in and other panels
that feature the troops landing in Normandy and moving inland
for the battle of Caen. I
t was the last British battle fought in Europe, and the first
for two hundred years.
FAIR
BLOW THE WINDS FOR FRANCE
We sailed out at three in the afternoon and below
decks in the giant car ferry some four hundred cars lay in wait
for their part in the annual holiday invasion.
Caen
has a hundred churches and they all seemed to be ringing their
bells when we arrived. Back
in World War II the Germans resisted the capture of Caen for a
considerable time and much of the city was destroyed in the
heavy fighting.
In spite of that action we managed
to find some houses with medieval beams and winding alleyways
before joining the traffic
and tour buses that poured into the little town of Bayeux.
It is just seventeen miles down the road and is of course.
famous for the Bayeux
tapestry. and that portrays a much earlier
cross Channel invasion, ‘The Norman Conquest.’
I found it absolutely
fascinating. You follow it round with a sound wand and pick
up a repeating commentary.
“The Norman
archers, formidable marksmen,
fire indirectly on to the enemy troops....”
This interpretation really makes sense of it
all, so you must
make sure that you hire the listening device. There is such
great detail, on one side the Saxons in a square formation
brandishing javelins and axes and on the other you see
horses and knights both in chain mail.
There are swords and battle axes and here and there the
odd head being lopped off, not to mention the chap with the
arrow in his eye. Little boys will love it!
There different
routes recommended by the Tourist Office to cover the D-Day
Landings and the Battle of Normandy.
We followed one which took
us though Port en Bessin, Saint Laurent, Aromanches, Langrune-sur-mer and
after looking out upon “Sword” beach where the British
landings took place we drove south for our holiday.
This
part of rural France was certainly peacful but if we had hoped
to leave thoughts of war behind,
it was not to be.
We passed many
signs for war graves and entering a small town we had to pull
into the side to let the local brass band pass by. Children and
adults played with equal vigour. Trumpets and cymbals seemed to
dominate as they produced
a sound that was uniquely French.
It was the 8th
of May, but it wasn’t until we rounded a corner at Villeres
Bocage and saw the furling of a flag and fresh flowers on
the war memorial that realised that it was Armistice Day in
France.
We motored on down the D36 to
Conde sur Noireau
where we found a roadside café for coffee and
croissant in the sun, then we motored on through quiet hamlets
and paused at a place where a bell sounded over flat
countryside. There was no one there, not a thing stirred it was
almost eerie. This was in marked contrast with the bustle of the
local town of Mayenne
on Market day.
Later
we climbed up through a leafy lane to a little village. I
n the middle of a square a dog was a sleep in the sun and
elderly men with medals pinned to their Sunday suits moved
towards the local bar.
We followed them in and almost immediately sensed a coolness in
their attitude, we had in fact arrived at the end of the
Armistice Sunday service and they had mistaken us for Germans,
but the atmosphere immediately switched from cold to warm when they found we
were Scots.
I
tried to order some drinks but the local Mayor insisted on
paying and then started to recall his good times in Glasgow.
We would, I am sure, have been there for quite a long time
but his little grandson came in to tell him his Sunday lunch was
waiting, now for us to be late for the meal of the week would be
bad enough but for a French man, “c’est formidable!”
Report by Allan Rogers 
FACT
FILE
Brittany
Ferries:
www.brittanyferries.com
Tel: 08705 360360 or 0990 360 360
D-Day Museum Portsmouth.
http://www.ddaymuseum.co.uk/
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