A 'Rosie the Riveter' group is setting up
Sainte-Mère-Élgise and Saint-Côme-du-Mont, Normandy, France - 3rd June 2026
After a brief stop at Cherbourg Airport, where a group of Rosie the Riveters are preparing for the day ahead, we head over to Sainte Mère Élgise, where we end up parked right next to Camp Geronimo - a recreation encampment featuring all sorts of mostly-US military vehicles, including numerous Sherman tanks. After a look around that, we head into the town proper, where most of the party ends up in the café, whilst Nosher and Clive separately roam around town. As it happens, there's some sort of commemoration ceremony going on and the town is a bit of a circus, with a confusing mixture of real service personnel and re-enactors all mingling around. After that, we head out to Saint-Côme-du-Mont and the D-Day Experience museum, where somewhat improbably we even do the C-47/Dakota simulator, despite having flown across the Channel in the real thing just a couple of days before. Finally, Robert, Paul, David and Nosher are out at the Brasserie Le Commerce restaurant for a nice dinner and some very pleasant Ambrée beer.
next album: Quettehou, Sainte-Marie-du-Mont and the D-Day Museum, Utah Beach - 4th June 2026
previous album: Pegasus Bridge, the British Memorial, and Arromanches, Normandy - 2nd June 2026
Rosies the Riveter in Cherbourg Airport
The Montana ANG Hercules takes off
A 1930's-style staff car of some sort
A line of Willys jeeps by the Airborne Museum
Lots of Sherman tanks in a row
Robert roams around
A Sherman rotary engine on a crane
Some military vehicle owners
Somebody pokes their tank
A four-star general's staff car
Paul walks past some military dudes
An unusually-coloured half-track
People mess around with a giant searchlight
Sherman tanks, each with a different muzzle
Sainte Mère Élgise's famous parachutist
The café bar Au Domino
Inside the church of St. Mary
Impressive 1960s stained glass, with parachutists
Another stained-glass window from 1969
An aisle and side-chapel in St. Mère Église
It's raining in the town
It could almost be the 1940s again
Some dude is dressed up as a Spiv or something
Wrong war: Colonel Kilgore out of Apocalypse Now
A pile of French road signs
The Abbey Road of St. Mère Église
An ivy-covered house called Klondike
A paratrooper on a roof
Re-enactors in the Au Domino café
A sculpture with the dates of French resistance
Active US servicepeople take a salute
Small boys in GI helmets
More military types look on
The 82nd Airborne bizarrely start singing
Various flag bearers
Rows of the 92nd Airborne
The Rosie Riveters have turned up again
82nd Airbone in dress uniforms
The milling throngs in St. Mère Église
Clive watches from the pavement
The 82nd Airbone marches off
The flag bearers hang around
A side-drummer is on the phone
General Lee Marvin meets and greets
The Rosie group poses for a photo
St. Mère Église is a bit of a zoo
The general poses for another photo
There's a very nice staff car back in the car park
A car is hauled away for 'camping' in the car park
We actually do a C-47 simulation
The end of the Dakota simulation
A reconstruction of a real-life café
More impressive recreations
A colourised photo of wartime St. Mère Église
The reconstruction is quite lifelike
Paul looks at memorabilia in Dead Man's Corner
The famous Dead Man's Corner
More Willys jeeps parked up by the side of the road
A jeep has a crate of Coca-Cola bottles on the front
We get held up by a tipped-over HGV
The Essex 'Last of the Summer Wine' in La Commerce
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A 'Rosie the Riveter' group is setting up
A 'Rosie the Riveter' group is setting up
Rosies the Riveter in Cherbourg Airport
The Montana ANG Hercules takes off
A 1930's-style staff car of some sort
A line of Willys jeeps by the Airborne Museum
Lots of Sherman tanks in a row
Robert roams around
A Sherman rotary engine on a crane
Some military vehicle owners
Somebody pokes their tank
A four-star general's staff car
Paul walks past some military dudes
An unusually-coloured half-track
People mess around with a giant searchlight
Sherman tanks, each with a different muzzle
Sainte Mère Élgise's famous parachutist
The café bar Au Domino
Inside the church of St. Mary
Impressive 1960s stained glass, with parachutists
Another stained-glass window from 1969
An aisle and side-chapel in St. Mère Église
It's raining in the town
It could almost be the 1940s again
Some dude is dressed up as a Spiv or something
Wrong war: Colonel Kilgore out of Apocalypse Now
A pile of French road signs
The Abbey Road of St. Mère Église
An ivy-covered house called Klondike
A paratrooper on a roof
Re-enactors in the Au Domino café
A sculpture with the dates of French resistance
Active US servicepeople take a salute
Small boys in GI helmets
More military types look on
The 82nd Airborne bizarrely start singing
Various flag bearers
Rows of the 92nd Airborne
The Rosie Riveters have turned up again
82nd Airbone in dress uniforms
The milling throngs in St. Mère Église
Clive watches from the pavement
The 82nd Airbone marches off
The flag bearers hang around
A side-drummer is on the phone
General Lee Marvin meets and greets
The Rosie group poses for a photo
St. Mère Église is a bit of a zoo
The general poses for another photo
There's a very nice staff car back in the car park
A car is hauled away for 'camping' in the car park
We actually do a C-47 simulation
The end of the Dakota simulation
A reconstruction of a real-life café
More impressive recreations
A colourised photo of wartime St. Mère Église
The reconstruction is quite lifelike
Paul looks at memorabilia in Dead Man's Corner
The famous Dead Man's Corner
More Willys jeeps parked up by the side of the road
A jeep has a crate of Coca-Cola bottles on the front
We get held up by a tipped-over HGV
The Essex 'Last of the Summer Wine' in La Commerce