Normandy

Le Havre

As I mentioned yesterday, we changed our excursion to D-Day Beaches due to concerns of what we actually would be able to see in Paris with Bastille Day festivities and President Trump's visit.

The morning started out with a visit to the Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial. About 73,000 US soldiers landed on D-Day, along with British and Canadians about 83,000, in total about 300,000 took part in D-Day land and sea operations. The D in D day, simply stands for Day and then they counted such as D Day 1, 2, 3, etc. It was amazing,  moving, humbling, and many more adjectives to be here today. The American cemetery is run by and cared for by the United States and I am grateful for France allowing the US this sacred soil where so many young people gave the ultimate sacrifice, their lives. As my mom land dad said it, Freedom is not free and thankfully we have so many service members willing to serve to keep our freedom.

General Eisenhower was in charge of everything. 

Ages of those killed ranged from 17-61 with the average age 23. If I understood it correctly, family members were able to choose to have their loved one buried in this cemetery or they could have their loved ones flown home. I think they said about 40% of those US killed in this area are laid to rest here. I did find several from PA and many who were killed on Day 1.

We also went to Omaha Beach and to pay tribute to those killed.

We went to see about a 1,000 year old tapestry which depicted the history of Norman conquest of England and also Notre Dame cathedral...in Bayeux not Paris. We also had a nice pizza lunch and Bryan got to ride a train around Bayeux.

We have just left port headed for Southampton 

and then home (after a 1 day stay in London. So...Cherrio until the next McCarthy adventure! Thanks Mrs. Mortel for doing all the arrangements!

Last At Sea Day

Today was our last full cruising day and it was sunny which allowed Bryan and Erin to enjoy the pool. Ok, for those of you like us who were not thinking, tomorrow is Bastille Day and President Trump will be "lunching" at the Eiffel Tower. Unfortunately, Paris will be party central so will be very difficult to navigate, so we have decided to forgo what would have been about a 3 + hour bus ride into Paris (some streets are closed tomorrow for parades and the heightened security with President Trump) and take a trip to The Beaches of Normandy. So we will celebrate Bastille Day at the US involvement of WW II seeing Omaha Beach, Pointe du Hoc, the American Cemetery, and the Caen Memorial.
Tonight Erin and I went to a Murder Mystery Dinner. What fun, neither of us got the murder correct, but we had fun anyway. I have attached a few pictures of the Murder Mystery fun.

Day 6 Hamburg, Germany

Hamburg is Germany's  🇩🇪 2nd largest city, Berlin is the largest. Hamburg is industrial with a large percentage of residents working in the air bus business. A little over one million live in this port city.The G20 Summit was held here this past weekend. 

Our excursion today was to visit the Miniature Train Museum. With a bus tour of Hamburg. Unfortunately it was a rainy day 😢so I didn't get the best pictures. 

As with every port we have visited, major construction is taking place. Our tour director told us the souvenir from Hamburg would be a bottle of beer and an infectious disease....we are coming home with neither of those! One of the disappointing parts of all of our excursions so far is there has been very little time for souvenir shopping even though we are in the ports for a good part of the day but the city centers aren't within walking distance of where we dock.

 

The school summer vacation here is only 6 weeks, but they do have 4 2 week vacations throughout the year. 

Bryan loves the statues

On Friday we will be in Paris, on Bastille Day! Unfortunately our bus into Paris could take about 3 hours so we will most likely only be able to do a river cruise while there.

Day 5 At Sea

Today was another sea day as we travel south towards Hamburg 🇩🇪 Germany. Started out as a promising day, but turned cloudy, windy, and cool so...no pool. 😩 Although, I will admit, I took Bryan to the hot tub, he braved the pool, but not me. Progressive Trivia day 2, we started out the day in 10th, not bad considering there were 58 teams. We won't know until Thursday where we stand going into the final day, but I don't hold out much hope we will win the coveted key chain...but, it's not over till it's over !
Thought I would try something I used on a previous blog...guess who's food is who's. I will give you a clue, 2 people x 2 had the same meal and I had 2 meals (oops, couldn't decide on 1 so the waiter made me get both!) . So here it is., match the meal with the McCarthy. The person who emails me with the most correct answers by July 18th will win a valuable troll magnet from Oslo. In case of ties, a tiebreaker...oh, who am I kidding, I have more than 1 magnet!

Chicken Marsala

Tiger Prawns with garlic butter

Chicken tenders and 🍟 

Lasagna 

Eggplant Parmigiana 

Oslo

Today, we set out to explore this capital city. This was the first, not so nice weather day, it is about 62, cloudy, and some intermittent showers. We went on a 2-3 hour bus ride around this city. Norway has been independent since around 1905 and is known for being the city where the Nobel Peace Prize is awarded.

We got to see the ski jump site Holmenkollbakken, wow...they do some ziplining right now, but we didn't have the time on our tour to do this...rats,  but I did get some pretty impressive pictures (I think).

Bryan loves trolls!

The Ice Bar was -6 Celsius...cold. I have never seen anything like it.