To look out to sea here or at the nearby Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial in Colleville-sur-Mer, and picture the scene at dawn on Jis breathtaking: 5,000 landing ships and assault craft assembled in the largest armada in history lined up across the horizon. 1st and 29th divisions landed, saw some of the day's bloodiest fighting and worst casualties. This was one of the invasion's five famous landing areas spread over 50 miles (80 kilometers) of coast where 160,000 U.S., British and Canadian troops came ashore on D-Day. We spent the night after our jump in Saint-Laurent-sur-Mer, a tiny village in Omaha Beach. President Barack Obama, French president Francois Hollande and Britain's Queen Elizabeth II will gather to remember the more than 9,000 Allied soldiers killed or wounded that day. The commemorations culminate June 6 in Ouistreham, where U.S. Local officials estimate that the invasion anniversary will attract several hundred thousand tourists to Normandy this summer. The thrill of taking off from the cliff top and swooping over the beaches, imagining how it appeared on D-Day, made the 10-minute flight an unforgettable highlight of three days in Normandy. An expert pilot with years of experience leading paragliding excursions to places as far afield as Nepal and Morocco, Bellessort has offered tandem paragliding flights here since 2002. Just a few miles from Omaha Beach, Claude Bellessort runs Elementair, a paragliding school in Port-en-Bessin. We'd crisscross the picturesque rural region from the famous cheese-making town of Pont l'Eveque in the east to the isolated Gatteville Lighthouse near the rugged granite-hewn village of Barfleur in the west. military cemetery at Omaha Beach years before, a trip that's still a must for many Americans visiting France.īut this time we wanted to explore farther afield. My wife and I had come to Normandy ahead of the 70th anniversary of the D-Day landings to explore the region's rich history, cuisine and culture. Eisenhower, but via text message from our paragliding instructor. "I feel like I got to jump with my grandpa," Schaefer said afterward.Unlike the paratroopers of the 101st and 82nd Airborne divisions who jumped into Normandy at the start of D-Day 70 years ago, our orders came not from General Dwight D.
Ehmet, had with him when he fought as an artilleryman in France. Army's Green Berets who served in Afghanistan, carried whiskey, cigars and the dog tag and wallet his grandfather, George J. Robert Schaefer, a retired lieutenant colonel with the U.S.
Many spectators wore war-era uniforms, and music of the time played over loudspeakers. Other parachutists jumped with World War II souvenirs, some carrying items their grandfathers took into battle. Still buff and sprightly, and having prepared for six months with a physical trainer, Rice swooped down with an American flag fluttering beneath him and landed to a wave of applause from the crowd of thousands that gathered to watch the aerial display. His jump on Wednesday was an altogether different story. "I got my left armpit caught in the lower left-hand corner of the door so I swung out, came back and hit the side of the aircraft, swung out again and came back, and I just tried to straighten my arm out and I got free," he told The Associated Press in an interview. He called the 1944 jump "the worst jump I ever had." Army's 101st Airborne Division on that momentous day 75 years ago, landing safely despite catching himself on the exit and a bullet striking his parachute. VIDEO: What Sainte-Mere-Eglise, Utah Beach and other D-Day invasion landmarks in Normandy look like today Their landing zone Wednesday was fields of wildflowers outside Carentan, one of the targets of the airborne forces that were dropped in darkness on perilous missions to take strategic objectives and disrupt German defenses so that the greatest amphibious invasion in history, on the D-Day beaches, would have a greater chance of success. The clouds of jumpers, with round 'chutes akin to those used by D-Day soldiers, were honoring the thousands of paratroopers who leapt into gunfire and death 75 years ago. "It went perfect, perfect jump," Rice said after catching his breath. "I represent a whole generation," Rice said.Įngines throbbing, C-47 transport planes dropped string after string of parachutists, a couple of hundred in all - including Rice, who jumped strapped to a partner, not alone and laden with weapons as he did on June 6, 1944.
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