First of all, credit must go to Tom Friar for organising, for the second year, the trip to the Normandy D. Day beaches. All us foot soldiers were organised with military precision and provided with maps, documents and a booklet explaining the plan of action for every day. I arrived at the Pied Bull shortly after 10.00 to find BMW Ray and 80 year old D.Day veteran Tony already waiting. Bob Colvin, Tom Friar, Stainless Bob and his wife Margaret, Tom and Gwen, Paul Stroud, Aussie Liz and Chris Biggs, soon joined us. After a short delay Dave Clark joined us and the traditional group photos were taken.
Off to Portsmouth, uneventful ride via M25 and A3 we arrive at Portsmouth soon loading up onto the P&O Cherbourg Express Catamaran. This is one fast ship but we have time to sample some ale along with some nosh from the food outlets and then, suddenly we are in France! As usual, the motorway part of the trip to our lodgings was easy, but when we got onto the French D roads, things became more uncertain. In traffic, the group split up, Stainless Bob's Bonneville decided to dump petrol over the engine via a sticky float and half of us stopped to wait for things to settle down.
When our group restarted we eventually found our way to St Aubin sur mer, our destination, but where was the campsite? A quick chat with some passing English holiday makers soon had us in the campsite, the group reformed and off to the bar, "Operation Get There" complete! Our accommodation was three six-berth mobile homes on a large campsite with good shops and facilities, ample space for the thirteen of us, a position that came in handy later in the week.
After a good night's kip and early morning trip to the shops for croissants and coffee, breakfast complete we set off for Gold beach where we chatted to a French beach hut owner. Tony got to sit in a WW2 jeep just like the ones he used to drive 60 years ago when the Sherwood Foresters landed at Gold Beach. Some war re-enactment blokes, who were just visiting the beach, were only too pleased to let Tony have a sit in the jeep and remember when. Then it was off to Arromanches for lunch, we took some photos of the Mulberry Harbour and veterans Tom and Tony got enticed into a café to share their war stories with the BBC. Tom accepted a drink from the BBC then said farewell, Tony stayed and his interview appeared on the BBC. Then it was off via a route dictated by numerous Gendarmes, (who were determined to send you the wrong way), to the gun battery at Longues sur mer, Paul got detached from the group (not lost) but joined us in the car park just as we were about to call Interpol. Back to St Aubin sur mer, food and more beer, the pattern was becoming established.
Friday 4th June, we set off in good heart heading for Falaise but, after a number of stops, it became clear that we were in danger of missing our "lunch" appointment at Caen. So we skipped Falaise and headed for Caen where it became apparent that Tom Friar had planned something special.
We pulled up outside this enormous park full of guards and official looking people on the edge of Caen. Tom checked at the gate that this was the right place and we were directed to park our bikes on the large paved area outside the gates. Walking in via the huge wrought iron gates we learned that the park and buildings formed the Abbaye-aux-Dames, completed in 1066 by a bloke called William the Bastard later, after a battle at Hastings, changed to William the Conqueror.
Slowly, after interrogation of Tom Friar, it turned out that this was to be the site of a ceremony for the presentation of medals to veterans of D-Day, including Tom the elder and Tony! We thought we would stay and watch after having ridden so far. There were speeches in both French and English by important looking people and the medals, inscribed with each veteran's name and wartime serial number, were presented by local schoolchildren. Loads of photographs later and we made our way back to the bikes where another little group seemed perplexed by Veterans Tom and Tony putting on bike gear over their smart blazers and riding off! Another meal another night's kip back at St Aubin-sur-Mer and suddenly it was 5th June and we headed for the US Beaches Utah and Omaha.
The traffic on 5th June was very heavy, what with the French Police blocking off all the roads that we wanted to drive down and those that were in use being full of WW2 tanks, jeeps, weird vehicles and lorries, getting anywhere was becoming difficult. Getting places was especially difficult for Tom and me on our sidecar outfits, accordingly, Tom and I, together with Stainless Bob and Margaret on a Meriden Bonneville, decided not to go on the little roads to the beaches but just visit St Mere-Eglise, which was just off the N13 motorway. This proved to be a good idea until we got to about 10 miles from St Mere-Eglise when all traffic ground to a halt. Well, we sat in the traffic jam for ages and then this load of speed cops and police cars with sirens going and lights flashing came carving through the traffic.
Thinking this was a good way to beat the traffic I steamed off after the flashing lights closely followed by Tom and soon we were at St Mere-Eglise where Stainless and Margaret were waiting for us with their Bonnie. We stood and watched as a mass of aircraft dropped paratroops over the nearby fields, very impressive! Bob Colvin now appeared and informed us that we would have had no chance of keeping up with the solo bikes and visiting Utah beach as the roads were jammed solid, apparently the others had been directed to the other end of the village and would join us later.
St Mere-Eglise is the site of one of the American parachute dropping zones and made famous by the D-Day film "The Longest Day" where an American paratrooper is trapped, hanging from the church tower. An effigy of the paratrooper John Steel hangs from the church tower today. We spend some time in St Mere-Eglise; the church has a magnificent stained glass window, dedicated to the paratroopers, over the entrance doorway. We took more photos, met up with the others and ate overpriced sausage rolls and chips, French cuisine? Pah!
Just as we arrived in separate groups, we returned to St Aubin-sur-mer in separate groups, again, our group of two sidecars and a Bonnie sticking to the main roads away from the coast and the solo group braving the congestion of the beach roads. We all arrived back eventually, our group travelling via Caen, the solo group travelling via Pointe du Hoc and Paul via some friendly French people after running out of petrol. When Paul asked the friendly local French people as to whether they had seen a group of bikes with two sidecar outfits: he was told "Ah yes, two Triumph Sidecars, they looked like father and son!" More beer, food, then back to Pegasus Bridge for us non-veterans to witness the midnight celebrations of the glider landings.
The liberation of France began just after midnight on the morning of 6th June 1944 when the gliders carrying airborne troops cast off their towropes, the first glider landed at 00.16. Anyway 60 years later and just after midnight there kicked off the most spectacular firework display I've ever seen, and it went on for a full half hour.
Among all the people celebrating on the bridge we bumped into a bloke by the name of Barry Parr, son of Wally Parr, one of the Glider troops who took the bridge 60 years previously. Barry demonstrated how his dad had kept the German tanks and gunboats at bay by using the German anti-aircraft gun mounted at the Eastern end of Pegasus Bridge. Barry and his brother were visiting the bridge with their dad but had not been able to arrange accommodation. Over a few drinks it was soon agreed that they could kip the night with us and after a few more beers, Barry hopped into my sidecar and his brother, wearing a borrowed helmet got a pillion ride back to the campsite. Barry took photos all the way back and said it was the most scary thing he had ever done, it must have been the beer. Anyway, next day or just later on, we returned to Pegasus Bridge. Security was really tight and we were turned away from the main road to Pegasus Bridge and stopped by armed gendarmes when we turned off at the next exit to approach down the side roads. For the first time, our papers, stating that we were genuine English Bikers, were checked by the gendarmes and we were allowed to proceed. We parked the bikes up near Pegasus Bridge and walked back to where we had spent the previous night.
Our friends from last year, the ex-paratroopers John Hunter and Jimmy were at the Grondee café and we sank a few more beers and baguettes. Tom and Tony were in their element and were pressed by many of the serving British paratroops at the bridge for tales of D-Day. After a while most of us drifted off to the Pegasus Bridge museum and then to Ranville Cemetery, where one of Tom's old wartime comrades is buried. It was a hot day and as we walked up the hill towards the Ranville church and cemetery, Ray noticed a piper in army uniform at the top of the hill. Ray spoke to him and advised him that Tom was following us up the hill and as Tom was a veteran of D-Day and was in a Scottish regiment, it would be nice if he could play for Tom and Gwen.
The French piper drew himself up to his full height and said, "It is my obligation, my duty to play for the veterans". With that he cranked up the bagpipes and slowly marched down the hill towards Tom and Gwen playing "Flower of Scotland". Tom and Gwen were slowly climbing the hill but when they got within about 10 feet of the piper, they stopped, and waited for him to finish. We all stopped, the traffic stopped, transfixed at the scene and then the piper finished playing, Tom shook his hand and the spell was broken. We continued to Ranville cemetery.
There was loads of security at Ranville, loads of gendarmes, snipers on the church tower and lots of well built men in dark glasses wandering about, a bit excessive to deal with a few bikers I thought, but you can't be too careful...
Any road up, we were wandering around the cemetery, Tom had found his friend Bobby Greenslade's grave and was paying his respects when this very well dressed woman in a big hat comes up to me and says "your friend at the grave, was he at D-Day?" I say yes, he was in the Devonshire Regiment. Next thing, along comes this tall well dressed bloke in a slightly smaller hat, he introduces himself to Tom as General Wellesley, the commander of the Devon and Dorset Regiment, and, as the regiment had amalgamated with the Devonshire Regiment some years previously, was in charge of all the Devonshire graves. His aide-de-camp and secretary, both in full dress uniform, accompanied General Wellesley. When chatting to Tom, he mentioned that he was at the cemetery as one of various important people who where there to meet the German Chancellor but he had a bit of spare time and, if Tom wanted, he would show us other Devonshire Regiment graves in the cemetery, Tom agreed!
So it came to pass that, under the watchful eyes of gendarmes, police, snipers and men in dark glasses we were shown around Ranville cemetery by a General and his entourage. We left the cemetery just as the German Chancellor arrived; one of the motorcycle outriders was holding a pistol as he rode past! We were also told, at the cemetery, that each soldiers grave was the responsibility of a child in one of the local primary schools and the children helped to maintain the graves in their pristine state. We made our way back to Pegasus Bridge where we found Tony still telling tales to the young paras and still knocking back the beers. We joined Tony for a few more beers and then it was time to go back to our caravans.
Our last day, 7th June and again we decided to divide our forces into solo and sidecar groups, Bob and Margaret on their Meriden Bonnie and Paul on his Virago chose to stick with the sidecars as they preferred the more sedate pace. So it was a steady ride back to Cherbourg where the solo group went site seeing and our group went for a meal at a little French bar/café. We successfully rendezvoused at the port and after quickly passing through passport control, we were back on the ferry to Portsmouth, a most memorable holiday concluded, no major breakdowns, no falling out and loads of magic moments.