On The Coast Of Somewhere Beautiful

Today I made my way to the coast to see Mont St. Michel and the American Cemetery. I learned that Mont St. Michel was built on the legend that St. Michel appeared in a bishop's dream. The bishop played it off, but his next dream was the same except this time St. Michel burned a spot on the bishop's head so that he would realize it wasn't just a random dream. On the way to there, we passed through the area where the Battle of Hedgerows took place. I was taken by surprise when I was told that there were more casualities here than there were on the actual beach invasion because the hedges were so thick due to the fact that in the middle ages when people began to populate la Normandie area, they would cut down the forest but leave parts of the forest up and replant whatever they cut down in that area so that way it would be a natural fence around the area they wanted. But because so much time had passed the hedges grew so thick and it made the Allies vulnerable to attacks when they tried to cross through them. With the focus back on Mont St. Michel, I found out that Mont St. Michel is an active monastery although I didn't get to see any monks during my visit. There are three parts of Mont St. Michel: The Abbey, the Village, and the Fortress. Mont St. Michel has a population of 33! Pretty cool.
After traveling to Mont St. Michel, I made my way to the American Cemetery today which was amazing. I couldn't believe how huge it was. I knew there were a lot of graves..but never that many. It felt like it was never going to end. So it was a nice quiet visit there. I made my way down to the beaches of Utah and Omaha and it was crazy to just think that at one point there were thousands of men running and fighting their way up the sandy beaches and dunes which are obviously all grown out now. But on this specific trip I was timed so I only had an hour to do all of this which meant that I was working the power walk up and down the walkways and beaches, but it was well worth it. I learned that Bayeux was sparred because of the priest of the town was a Resistant who had a relationship with the Allies and he told them that there were no Germans in the town. Most cities around Caen [Pronounced: Con. which is the largest city of Normandy region] were bombed but rebuilt after the war. When they were rebuilt they used a "white stone" quarry that start in BC from Caen and has been used to rebuild these cities as well as William the Conquerer's fortress and the Tower of London [otherwise known as the White Tower]. An interesting note: St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York City was actually built using the white stone from Caen, however with the amount of pollution in NY, it's no longer white.