Driving along the Normandy coast to Arromanches

La Marine Hotel reminds me of the Michigan house I grew up in — white brick with a mansard roof. Except that we are surrounded here in the small village of Arromanches by the Atlantic Ocean and famous World War Two battlefields. My childhood home was 1930’s “French eclectic” architecture, popular with soldiers returning from Europe after the First World War.

Arromanches is pretty, with a tight cluster of buildings by a wide expanse of sand leading to the English Channel. We lucked out with a corner room offering spectacular window views of “port Winston” (as in Winston Churchill) the artificial arrival harbor created for the d-day landing.

We walked up the bluff to a 360 theater for a sobering 20 minute film about the D-Day offensive by American, English, and Canadian that began here on June 6, 1944, 80 years ago. About 100,000 people died during the Normandy campaign. That alone is sobering but there is added poignancy given this months US election, and rise of a right-wing, potentially isolationist government that doesn’t seem to value the alliance that fought back the Nazis.

Driving along a two-lane road along the coast, we passed some stunning mansions just east of Honfleur but the resort towns of trouville and Deauville seemed overbuilt and lacking the charm of Honfleur. (Granted, we didn’t stop to explore or find the charming old bits.) The seaside town of Houlgate was more low-key and inviting so we walked through the center ville and along the beach promenade past tall eccentric brick homes, stopping at a cheerful restaurant for hot chocolate and popping into the covered market to gawk at the prepared foods, cheeses, and foie gras selection.

Houlgate