Skip to main content

Normandy Trip - Intro - Honfluer

We started our trip to Normandy on 08 June 2012 and we spent a total of three days learning about the Normandy Beach landings during World War II.  Besides the beach landings, Normandy is also famous for it's apple products, namely calvados, which is an apple brandy.   I love all things apples, so just being in an apple producing region is a plus in my book!

Our first stop in France was in the maritime town of Honfluer, which is famous for being the starting point of Jacques Cartier and Samuel de Champlain, who set sail in 1605 for the New World and eventually discovered Quebec.

Honfluer is beautiful and quaint town that sits off the English Channel and the day that we visited, it was warm with a slight breeze.  Some of the sights that we visited were the an old Salt House, the old prison and the Church of Sainte Catherine.

Now, Saint Catherine's Church was just amazing!  The church, built between the 15th and 16th centuries, is now surround by modern shops and cobbled streets.  As a Sailor, I was drawn to this church built out of wood for it's uniqueness.  The church was built by shipwrights and it's the largest wooden church in France that also houses it's own separate bell-tower.  The church was quaint and there were some beautiful art work and stained-glass windows.

After seeings some of the sites, we decided that we had enough time to grab some lunch, so as we were looking around for food, we were still taking pictures.  I found on the sidewalk a barrel that had cidre writing on it and I took a picture. Came to find out, that it was a "street sign" for a wonderful little restaurant named La Cidrerie.  

This place was amazing!  It had the most wonderful food and cidre!

We started off with ordering their local cidre "from the barrel."  It was not like English, Irish or American cider (Paulner's, Strongbow or Woodchuck), in that it left almost a hint of apple brandy on the tip of the tongue after drinking it.  It was good in it's own way, but I still prefer the English or Irish cidres.   After looking through the menu, we decided to try some good breakfast-type food. 


Sean and I both picked an egg, ham and cheese griddle, shown below.  It was so delicious!!!  Even though this was considered a "griddle," it was not overly fried and the ham was so juicy and flavorful!  While the plate looked big, the wrap was light and fluffly and you did not feel too full after eating it.  So, since we saw some yummy desserts, we decided to try some of their crepes.

Sean ordered a sugar crepe and and I ordered a crepe with strawberry jam!

Sorry to say that I didn't wait to take a picture of my dessert before starting to eat it, but I remembered just in time to take a photo of Sean's dessert.

Doesn't it look "oh-so-yummy"??

If you ever find yourself in Honfleur, my husband and I highly recommend La Cidrerie.


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Normandy Trip - Arromanches

Our next stop was at Arromanches-les-Bains .   Arromanches is a quaint little town sitting on the banks of the English Channel.  The architecture of the town was amazing and the village was absolutely beautiful. We eventually made it through the narrow streets to arrive at the Arromanches D-Day Museum . Here we took a guided tour of the museum and learned that Arromanches was actually the center of the Normandy D-Day landings and was assigned the code name Gold Beach .  There were a total of five designated beached used on 6 June 1944 and each one was associated with British, American or Canadian military forces. Gold Beach was a British designated beach and units of the British 50th Infantry Division assault the beach and took it from German Troops on D-Day. Since Allied forces were not able to land at any of the other ports due to the German-occupied Europe along the Western European Coast during World War II. As a result, United Kingdom's Prime Minister Wins...

Normandy Trip - La Cambe Germany Military Cemetery

La Cambe Visitor Center After we woke up and had breakfast in the hotel, we headed towards the German Military Cemetery of La Cambe near Bayeux. La Cambe is home to 1, 222 fallen soldiers, who fell between D-Day and Aug. 20, 1944, though there are more remains being found today. The average age of the men buried here were between 18 and 20 years old. The cemetery was well-hidden from the main highway, but there were "Freedom Trees" that were planted on the road leading up to the cemetery. The rows of tress are called the Garden of Peace .                 Entrance way into La Cambe. The cemetery had a nice visitor center, where it showcased some of the original wooden crosses. As we walked up to the entrance way that lead us to the cemetery, we noticed the stone wall, and the tall and thin entrance way.  Overall, cemetery was beautiful, but it was also very somber due to the black headstones that told you that there were at...