Caen - William the Conqueror’s city

Thursday - *Remembering Gisèlle and Johan Wolzak (Wal’s father) birthdays today* After breakfast the suitcases were closed and with back breaking effort brought down the stairs to the lounge. Today only Marie-The, Sylvie and I go to mum to take her out to lunch in Quistreham to “Le Roulis” restaurant. The place had a limited menu which included several Ukrainian dishes which we all tried. Not the best choice because it’s all very heavy food and didn’t sit comfortably. After mum was taken home, we returned to Sannerville, collected our luggage and were taken to hotel “Des Quatrans” for our two-night sojourn. For dinner we had sparkling water and a gin and tonic down at the bar with two bowls of peanuts. Not a substantial meal but sufficient for today. Our room was compact, but we managed, and had an early night. Caen is a beautiful historic city with much lovely architecture which escaped the Allied indiscriminate bombing and destruction during WW2.

Ouistreham has been a trading port since the Middle Ages. The harbour is now a part of "Port de Caen-Ouistreham". Since the beginning of the 20th century, it has been a bathing beach on the "Riva Bella". On 6 June 1944, No. 4 Commando landed at Ouistreham (codenamed Sword) and fought their way to Pegasus Bridge, with the 177 Free French of the No. 10 (Inter-Allied) Commando given the honour of spearheading the advance. The assault on Ouistreham was featured in the movie The Longest Day, although the film location for Ouistreham was at the nearby village of Port-en-Bessin.
A "Roman camp" (Catillon or Castillon) was located on the left bank of the Orne near Bénouville. It has been leveled, only a small part of the northwest rampart remains. In reality, modern archeology excludes the hypothesis that it is a Roman camp, at least not from the High Empire, archaeologists having never unveiled a Roman camp dating from this period in the North from Gaul, apart from Arlaines at Ressons-le-Long (Aisne), and probably not from the Lower Empire either. The expression Roman Camp or Caesar's Camp generally applies to works dating from the Iron Age or the Middle Ages.Read more