Today began just like yesterday ended – on the Blue Ridge Parkway. I know that there are better ways to start your day, but I think this has to be one of the best ways that you can do alone. It literally put a smile on my face that lasted for a long time. After about an hour on the Blue Ridge Parkway my stomach was chewin on my backbone so I got off the Parkway hoping to scare up some breakfast somewhere. I headed for Bedford, VA and along the road I saw a sign for the D-Day National Memorial. It’s right there in Bedford and one of the people I talked to at breakfast said it was not to be missed; SO – belly full of biscuits and off I go. There is a fee but it’s only $10 ($8 if you’re prior military – no proof necessary). I don’t really have time for a guided tour but I’ll take a look around and get back out on the road. So, I stuck my admission sticker (it said I was a veteran) to my chest and rode up to the memorial.
I pulled up to the gift shop where some people were sitting out on the covered porch. As it always does, the bike and trailer drew a lot of attention. I was just going to go in the gift shop, take a look around then head over to the memorial. An older man wearing a baseball cap adorned with many small pins of the ribbons he earned stood up and saluted me & thanked me for my service. I coughed and said that I was in the luxury condo version of the “service” during peace time and thanked him for his service. Then we started talking…… He ended up being my tour guide almost an hour later and I never did get into the gift shop. This guy was amazing, his father was there on the beach at Normandy so he had so much personal knowledge to share – I wish I’d recorded everything he said. He kinda stuck to the script when he was talking about the memorial but if someone asked him a question you could see him start to smile, take a deep breath, and start the answer with a little more thrown in for good measure; he was just bursting with information. I was very happy that I took the time to go on the tour. A kid that was in the same KOA campground with me last night showed up and was just going to take a look around then go and I encouraged him to take the time and do the tour – I hope he took my advise. Here are several of the pictures I took.
The metal star in the water is called a hedgehog and was designed to rip open anything that got too close. Solider lying dead on the beach is one of the Bedford Boys. The window slits represent the machine gun bunkers.
One of the biggest surprises was that the landing boats like you see in the background made out of granite were actually made out of 3/4 inch plywood!!
Medic going up the beach with a solider, note the cross on his helmet and lack of a weapon
Climbing the cliffs up to the machine gun positions.
Over the Wall
L-3 observation aircraft – the cloth covering didn’t offer much protection but it also continued to fly quite nicely even if it had a few holes in it.
General Eisenhower with a depiction of the assault map overhead. This sculpture is so detailed that you can read the writing on his class ring.
The Final Tribute
I have a couple plans for today and tomorrow and they involve getting a little ways down the road so the two and a half hours I spent at the D-Day Memorial put me up on the slab for the rest of the day. No big deal – my time at the memorial was worth a little slab time and I had such a great day yesterday and this morning – eating miles on the slab didn’t bother me at all.
I believe Bedford VA lost more home town boy’s in WW2 than any other place, per population…