Bayeux is full of Americans!

When we planned our weekend city break in Bayeux we hadn’t realised it was going to clash with the 79^th Anniversary of D Day Celebrations. After weeks of hardly hearing anything other than a French accent it is strange to hear American accents everywhere.

We are parked up in the municipal campsite just off the périphérique, opposite the Aldi if you know it? It is only a twenty minute saunter along a very pretty river-side path that takes you right into the town centre.

There was only one thing on Wendy’s mind and that was lunch! We finally found a place that lived up to her expectations and dined on seared scallops that were so good we finished the meal off with a pair of café gourmands that were also delicious. Still giddy from the rush of sugar (or it might have been the wine) we jumped on to the tourist train for a tour of the city centre to help us get our bearings.

Bayeux has a very impressive cathedral and lots of medieval buildings. It is probably as good if not better than Honfleur as it is on a grander scale.

Sunday morning we went on a walking tour of Bayeux with an official guide. We (Wendy, Bryn and I) were pleased to find that we were the only folk on the trip. Christéle turned out to be an excellent guide and seemed to enjoy being able to talk just with the two of us. She spoke good English, had a great knowledge of the history and architecture of Bayeux and we found out quite a lot about her divorce to her English ex-husband and how her children were doing. Two hours flew by. My most memorable nugget of information was that the Bayeux ring road our campsite is on was carved out by British bulldozers in the days shortly after D Day. The tiny streets were to small for the army’s vehicles and Montgomery had turned the town into a vast medical centre for the casualties of the Battle of Normandy, so they needed easy access. 

That’s it for the history though; as I have been told my blogs are sounding more and more like history essays, and at least one daughter only looks at the photos!

So I can’t tell you about… 

• The orphans’ hatch behind the convent door,
• How De Gaulle’s speech and actions in BX (the historic monogram for Bayeux) a fortnight after D Day prevented France being treated as an occupied country by the allies, like Belgium and the Netherlands were,
• The stages of building and rebuilding of the cathedral.
• That Bayeux was relatively unscathed during the war as there was only a garrison of twenty or so administrators there or that the only shots fired by the pen-pushers could be seen on a wall opposite their building before they surrendered, or
• The story that the allied bombers sent to attack the town prior to the invasion were blown off course by Bayeux’s legendary wind.

In the afternoon we went to see the Bayeux Tapestry, (really an embroidery so I’m told) – but I can’t tell you any more about that, because that’s history too. It is very impressive though and amazing that it has survived for 1000 years relatively unscathed.

And so to Frogs.

Bayeux is full of frogs!

Yes, frogs, no real frogs, les grenouilles. Just over the road from the campsite there are a couple of ponds and a marshy bit of ground by the river. They are full of frogs and they croak. Loudly! Ribbit or other phonetic ways of portraying their sound don’t do it justice; either to their melodies or the volume. You can hear them at night in the van and they are still going strong in the morning when Bryn goes for a walk. They drive Bryn potty and have become the first amphibians on his prey list

Bayeux Campsite, with its facilities, location, and good looks has smashed its way into our Top 3 sites of this trip. They are now (in no particular order) Bayeux, Clécy and Étretat.