Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial
Route du Cimetiere Americain, Collville-sur-Mer, Normandy
Located above Omaha Beach, just outside Bayeaux, the Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial is a moving site. The cemetery is the final resting place of more than 9,000 soldiers, the vast majority of whom lost their lives fighting the D-Day battles of Normandy. Other World War II heroes are buried here as well.
Visit the cemetary to see the grid of thousands of graves that mark the soldiers’ final resting places. After paying your respects, you can walk to the reflecting pool and the chapel, which have maps that detail the events of D-Day.
After visiting the memorial, head to the edge of the bluffs to look out over Omaha Beach to see the narrow strip of sand where the soldiers landed. The nearby visitor center displays items the soldiers carried with them—from ammunition to good luck charms—as well as first-hand accounts recorded by veterans.
The cemetery and memorial are free to visit.
This land is considered US soil and was ceded to the Americans after the war.
Please remember that this is a memorial site and dress (and act) accordingly.
The museum is wheelchair-friendly.
Due to the large number of visitors who come to this site every year, you must apply in advance if you want to do a special tour or hold a wreath-laying ceremony.
The Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial is located in Colleville-sur-Mer, about a 30-minute drive from Bayeaux and roughly a 3-hour drive from Paris. You can reach Bayeux from Paris by train (from Gare Saint-Lazare), then take a taxi or tour bus to the memorial. Travel by rail takes about 3 hours.
The memorial is open every day, all year round, from morning to evening, with slightly extended hours from April 15 to September 15. Come early in the day to avoid crowds. Normandy’s peak tourist season is in July and August, during school holidays. The site is also crowded around the anniversary of the D-Day landing (June 6th), when the site hosts numerous memorial ceremonies.
Omaha Beach has been featured in numerous movies and documentaries about D-Day. After paying your respects at the American cemetery, head down to the beach to follow in the footsteps of the Allied soldiers who landed here. You can also take a guided tour of the five D-Day beaches—code named Omaha, Utah, Gold, Juno, and Sword. Many tours include other nearby battlefields, such as Pointe du Hoc and Pegasus Bridge.
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