The campsite opens straight onto Sword Beach, at the eastern end of the British sector. From here the five beaches of 6 June 1944 fan out: Juno ten minutes away, Arromanches thirty-five, Omaha and the Pointe du Hoc in under an hour.
On 6 June 1944, 150,000 men landed along eighty kilometres of Normandy coast, between Ouistreham and the Bay of the Veys. Luc-sur-Mer sits at the heart of that story: the village belongs to the Sword Beach sector, right beside the junction point between the British and Canadian troops. La Capricieuse, a five-star Yelloh Village campsite, makes the ideal base camp for the beaches, the museums and the cemeteries: cottages, a heated water park, a restaurant on site and the sea at the end of the lane.
Omaha Beach and the American cemetery at Colleville are fifty minutes away, the Pointe du Hoc an hour: the American sectors call for a full day of their own.
Two days are not too many: one for the British and Canadian sectors, close at hand, one for the American sector west of Bayeux.
Museums should be booked online during the school holidays. Around 6 June the coast roads and car parks are saturated: allow plenty of time, or set off early in the morning.
The beach at the end of the lane is a beach of 6 June 1944: the Sword sector stretched from Lion-sur-Mer to Ouistreham. Captain Kieffer’s French commandos landed here at first light; by that evening the British had joined the paratroopers at Bénouville. People swim here today as they would anywhere else — the history simply lies underfoot.
Ten minutes from the campsite, the beach where fourteen thousand Canadians came ashore. The Juno Beach Centre tells their story, from leaving Halifax to the liberation of the Bessin villages. The visit carries on along the beach, where bunkers and a Cross of Lorraine remain, then into the oyster harbour.
Thirty-five minutes’ drive to one of the greatest engineering feats of the war: in a matter of days the Allies assembled a harbour the size of Dover’s off this shore. The Phoenix caissons still break the surface of the bay. The finest view is from the cliff east of the town.
Four casemates set on the cliff between Omaha and Gold — and, above all, the only original guns still in place anywhere along the coast. The site is free to visit, out in the wind with the sea below: more often than not, it is the children’s favourite stop.
Nine thousand three hundred and eighty-seven crosses and Stars of David lined up facing the sea, above the deadliest beach of 6 June. The American cemetery at Colleville-sur-Mer is free to visit; its visitor centre retraces the lives of those who rest there.
A thirty-metre cliff scaled with rope ladders by Colonel Rudder’s Rangers on the morning of 6 June. The plateau, pitted with bomb craters and torn-open blockhouses, has been left exactly as it was in 1944. An hour’s drive from the campsite, and a landscape you do not forget.
Photo credits: Myrabella, BienheureuxAnonyme, Dr Wilson, Florian Pépellin, Jebulon, Gzen92, Kev22, Dobroš, Zairon, Dr Bob Hall — Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA / CC0).
Photo: Kev22 · CC BY-SA 4.0During the night of 5 to 6 June, at 00:16, three gliders landed fifty metres from the bridge at Bénouville: the first operation of D-Day began there, before a single ship had arrived. The original bridge is now displayed at the memorial, beside the Café Gondrée, the first house in France to be liberated. A quarter of an hour from the campsite, and perfect at the end of the day.
Five-star cottages, a heated water park and the beach fifty metres away, in Luc-sur-Mer.
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