I have been all over WWI and WWII battlefields in Europe. I have walked around Waterloo. I have visited Vauban's fortresses. I have stood on the bridge over the Muese River in Sedan that the Germans used in 1940 to invade France. I have been to Vimy Ridge, Arras, Verdun, and the Muese-Argonne. In Normandy, I have been to Caen, Bayuex, Ouistreham, Orne River Bridge, Gold, Sword, Juno, Utah, Omaha, St. Mere Eglise, the 82nd and 101st drop zones.

I will never forget one morning venturing off on my own. I walked down a pathway. The hedgerows were 20-ft high and probably just as thick. I wondered how our troops could have fought through these hedgerows. I immediately understood how it could all but eliminate advantages in armor and air power. I came into a little opening and there in front of me was an old cathedral and graveyard. It was in ruins, mostly likely from medieval period. I was probably trespassing on someone's property. I walked through the ruins and looked at the likely 1000 year old headstones. It was a little surreal.

Later that morning we went to Omaha Beach. That photo posted below is the best representation of what the bluffs are like. They are 100-ft straight up. The short sea wall is about 100 yards from the waterline at low tide and it is about another 100 yards from the sea wall to the foot of the bluffs. Just looking at it you get this feeling that those boys landing on the beach in 1st and 29th IDs accomplished the impossible. It is awe-inspiring to stand at the waterline and look across the sand and the sea wall to the bluffs and then up the bluffs. Once you get up the bluffs — which now you can only do by switchbacks — the American cemetery is waiting for you.

Normandy is amazing. The sacrifice that hallowed its ground makes it even more so.