October 31, 2002

Strasbourg’s prime location in the geographical heart of Europe, coupled with the superb rail system that transverses the continent, makes travel to several nations quite feasible for a Centre student with long weekends and a Eurail pass. At this point in the semester, I have made it to four countries, with at least another six on the docket. The downside to this luxury is that during a four-month stay in France, it is easy to spend your travel time in other nations and leave without seeing the best the Frogs have to offer. To prevent this, I set out to visit as much of France in one weekend as was humanly possible.

My trek to the Western part of the country began with the essential American pilgrimage to Normandy and the sites of D-Day. We stayed in the small town of Bayeux and before leaving for the coast took time to view the world famous Bayeux Tapestry, a 70 meter, 1000 year old woven cartoon telling the story of William the Conqueror’s accession to the English throne. After this, we killed thirty spare minutes with a stop at the 13,643rd cathedral of the trip (all complete with heavy scaffolding), this one sufficiently massive and ornate for a pontiff yet placed uncomfortably in a hamlet barely meriting a stoplight.

An afternoon bus tour took our group of North Americans to many of the important sites from D-Day and World War II’s decisive Battle of Normandy. I walked along Omaha Beach, trying my best to put myself in the shoes of one grandfather who landed on that very strip of blood-stained sand and another who spent most of the war to the east inside of a German POW camp. Both were roughly my age at the time and traveled to many of the same European locations I am visiting, albeit under very different circumstances, bringing the blessing of my educational opportunities—and life in general—fully into focus.