NORMANDY NEVER FORGETS VISIT TO D-DAY SITES GIVES PROFOUND SENSE OF U.S. SACRIFICE.

Byline: Story and photos by Eric Noland Travel Editor

BAYEUX, France - How could the weather change so radically so quickly?

Just a few minutes ago, at the American Cemetery in Normandy, the sun was glinting brightly off the white crosses and Stars of David that stretch into an appalling infinity. Wildflowers were waving near the edge of the bluff. The chirps of birds were audible. The setting was one of great peace and tranquillity.

And now, just a few miles away, just a few minutes later, it was as if the sky had furrowed its brow in rage. On a stretch of French coastline once known as the Dog Green and Charlie sectors of Omaha Beach, a biting rain was coming in sideways, the wind was ripping across the bluff, the sea was rough. It was as if, once again, any living thing was being defied to approach this beach in any state of ease.

This was April last year in Normandy, site of one of the most indefatigable displays of bravery, sacrifice and achievement in U.S. military history. On June 6, 1944, American forces, along with servicemen from Great Britain, Canada and other allies, gained a toehold on a European continent almost entirely controlled by Germany's Nazis - at considerable cost. But the landing along the coast of northwest France initiated a relentless push east that would end with the fall of a tyrannical regime.

No wonder so many people from across the generations are drawn to the scene. Interest has climbed noticeably over the last two years, after baby boomers and their children were given a glimpse of the chaos and horror of that assault in the first 25 minutes of Steven Spielberg's 1998 film ``Saving Private Ryan.''

Martha Sell, chief of operations for the American Battle Monuments Commission, which administers America's overseas military cemeteries, says the American Cemetery at Colleville-sur-Mer saw a 16 percent jump in visitation from 1997 to last year, from 1.27 million to 1.48 million.

Although many veterans of the conflict have decried some of the movie's Hollywood-like departures from reality, they seem to welcome the heightened sense of awareness it brought about.

``A lot of us felt that the movie was worth being told,'' said Thomas Herring of Charlotte, N.C., national secretary for the Ranger Battalions Association of World War II. ``If people got the idea that things were that bad, then it served a purpose.''

Herring was a 19-year-old corporal when he hit the beach just after dawn on June 6. ``People ask me if that (the movie) was what it was like. I say, 'Multiply it by five and you'll have it about right.' ''

The area can be toured in a wide variety of ways today. At Normandy's official tourist Web site (www.normandy-tourism.org), five tour companies are listed, offering guided excursions that range in duration from one to five days.

If you're inclined to explore on your own with a rental car, the region lies about 170 miles northwest of Paris. But even if you can only free up enough time for a day trip via train from Paris, that's still sufficient for a visit (although an overnight stay would probably be ideal).

Rail service runs regularly from Paris' Gare St.-Lazare to Bayeux, and the pleasant ride through the Normandy countryside takes just over two hours. At the Bayeux train station, the taxi drivers know this drill well. Ours understood only a few words of English - and seemed to struggle even more with our fractured French - but he handed us an English-language flier that gave us a number of options for visiting the D-Day sites.

We opted for a two-hour excursion that would include the American Cemetery, a stretch of Omaha Beach and the ruined fortifications of Pointe du Hoc for 390 francs. With the tip we ultimately tacked on, it seemed a bargain at about $70. The driver whisked us to each of the three sites, pointed to his watch to indicate when he'd be back for us, then would disappear for a discreet interval.

Brace your heart for the first stop. Our driver pulled into a parking area near the Visitors Building of the American Cemetery, and dropped us off next to a thick, tall stand of shrubbery. We walked around its edge - and nearly fainted. Stretching out in front of us was a sea of white crosses and Stars of David. All are positioned in neat rows on a flat, grassy expanse, literally as far as you can see.

There are 9,387 grave markers here, with 1,557 more names on a semicircular wall in the Garden of the Missing. All of these deaths occurred over the 49-day period of the Normandy campaign.

You walk among the markers in a daze, immersed in the sense of sacrifice, realizing that families and sweethearts mourned for each name. A father and son are buried here. And 38 pairs of brothers.

Remains couldn't always be identified, and it's particularly wrenching the first time you encounter a cross with this inscription: ``Here rests in honored glory a comrade in arms known but to God.'' There are 307 of those.

A lot of families visit here, but you don't encounter any horseplay on the grounds. Or even raised voices.

We had been silent for many minutes when it was time to rendezvous with our cab. Apparently accustomed to the effect the American Cemetery has on its visitors, the driver spoke not a word as he turned the wheel toward Vierville.

Visitors are dropped off at this stretch of Omaha Beach - the extreme western edge - because of its convenience. Below the bluff at the American Cemetery, we had spotted signs warning walkers away; wild boars roam the area, it said.

So at Vierville, we climbed out of the cab - and into that piercing rainstorm and relentless wind. As I ducked my head into this onslaught while climbing a path up the bluff, I couldn't help but think about those soldiers making the same ascent 56 years ago. They were bending into a rain of mayhem and death.

Military historian Stephen E. Ambrose, in his exhaustive work ``D- Day'' (Simon & Shuster; $17), characterized the German defenses at Omaha as a ``triple crossfire.'' The German commander for the region, Erwin Rommel, had configured the fortifications meticulously and devilishly, with pillboxes facing not out to sea but diagonally down on the beach. A GI trying to cross the 165 yards of tidal flat, Ambrose wrote, encountered machine gun and artillery fire from the sides, small-arms fire from the front, and mortars being lobbed down from the top of the bluff.

In the first hour of the assault, the chances of being killed or wounded at Omaha or Juno beaches has been gauged at one in two.

Peering over the top of the bluff, you can gain a profound sense of the advantage of high ground in combat. Far below, that narrow strip of beach appears so tiny and defenseless. Essentially, it was.

We got another sense of the defenders' point of view at our third and final stop, Pointe du Hoc. Eerily, it has been left in much the same condition the Allies found it when they overran it during the invasion - no small thanks to the Rangers who scaled the precipitous, 100-foot cliff with rocket-fired ropes and rope ladders.

All around, covering an area of 30 acres, are giant shell holes, now overgrown with green grass and yellow wildflowers. The landscape is strewn with great concrete chunks of blown-apart bunkers, stretches of barbed wire, and twisted, rusted riots of reinforcing steel.

Some of the bunkers and an observation post are in surprisingly good shape, considering the air and naval bombardment they endured. Kids climb over them, frolic in them. Tourists pose for photos in the gun emplacements, peering out through the slits.

Rommel was manic about the mixing of concrete for his fortifications. In some cases, he ordered walls built to a thickness of nearly 7 feet. The bunkers here were dug 23 feet into the earth, with reinforced tunnels - and even rail lines so that ammunition could be transported by handcarts. Atop the concrete he had workers pile dirt and sod.

The Rangers took this ground and then beat back German counterattacks at an extreme cost, and the French erected a monument here (and later turned the land over to the United States) in their honor. According to Ambrose, more than 200 Rangers mounted this particular assault. By the end of the battle, only 50 were still capable of fighting.

Herring, of the Ranger Battalion Association, said he gets a common inquiry these days. After the death of a D-Day veteran, he'll receive a call or an e-mail from a son, daughter or nephew, asking for details of the man's service in the Normandy invasion.

``They'll say, 'Our father passed on, and in all the years, he never talked about it,' '' Herring said. ``There are some (veterans) to this day who can't talk about it.''

One who agreed to was William Campbell of Bakersfield. He plans to be at the Queen Mary in Long Beach on Tuesday for a western chapter reunion of World War II Rangers. ``We were fighting for a cause, basically,'' he said, ``because we wanted to overthrow tyranny.''

A sense of the mission and its accomplishment probably won't fade away, even though the D-Day soldiers are beginning to. In their late teens or early 20s then, many are in their mid-70s now. Herring says his organization puts out a national newsletter twice a year, and ``each time, we have 40 to 60 people who have died since the last one.''

But their legacy endures at the American Cemetery and at Pointe du Hoc and at Arromanches and at any number of sites and memorials in the area of the Normandy landing beaches. Also, apparently, it endures in nearby Bayeux, the first town liberated in the campaign.

After our cab returned us to the train station, we hunted down a small cafe in search of some refreshment and sandwiches for the ride back.

Veterans who pass by this establishment on a visit might be heartened by a large sign, written in English, that the proprietor has hanging in the window. More than half a century after the event, it reads: ``Welcome to our liberators.''

IF YOU GO

GETTING THERE: The Normandy D-Day sites are about 170 miles northwest of Paris. Take the Autoroute de l'Ouest (the A-13, a toll highway) from Paris to Caen, then take highway N-13 to Bayeux. The train is an excellent way to get around France (as is the case for most of Europe). Generally, three or four trains leave each morning from Paris' Gare St.-Lazare for Bayeux, with several return options available in the late afternoon and evening. It's most cost effective to buy some sort of France Railpass from a travel agent before you leave the U.S. (depending on how much rail travel you plan on doing), but if you buy this trip at the last minute in France, expect to pay $58 round trip for second class, $84 for first class. Web: www.sncf.fr and voyages.sncf.fr (click on the British flag icon to get information in English).

TOURS: The region's official Web site, www.normandy-tourism.org, lists five companies that conduct D-Day tours. The two most interesting options appear to be Bus Fly Tours (www.busfly.com) and Tours International (www.tours-international.co.uk). An official for the American Battle Monuments Commission said the organization has gotten good reports on two other tours. One is directed by a University of Texas professor: Division of Continuing Education, University of Texas, Attn.: Thomas M. Hatfield, P.O. Box 7879, Austin, Texas, 78713. The other, if you're planning ahead to next year, is the Beaches to the Bulge Tour, which traces the route of the U.S. forces across Europe. It is conducted each June by Eurostar. Phone: [phone]. Web: www.eurostartours.com. If you choose to wing a one-day tour of D-Day sites, flag or call for a cab at the Bayeux train station.

CAPTION(S):

4 photos, box

Photo:

(1 -- color) The American Cemetery in Normandy, France, tends to provide a somber experience for visitors of all ages. Here, there are nearly 10,000 grave markers.

Eric Noland/Travel Editor (2 -- color) Omaha Beach is peaceful today, but Allied soldiers landing in 1944 endured a withering barrage from German defenders atop the steep bluff

(3) Pointe du Hoc has been preserved much as it was at the conclusion of an assault by U.S. Army Rangers.

(4) A sense of the value of high ground can be gained at Pointe du Hoc. The gun slits of bunkers afford sweeping views of the English Channel far below.

Box: IF YOU GO (see text)