A good nights sleep got me back on schedule and I was up at 5:00am FRA time ready to go! Unfortunately they didn’t start serving breakfast until 6:30am . . . but what a breakfast it was!

Just the bread table was amazing!

Time for the ‘full Irish’!

We all met in the lobby at 8:45am to meet Leana who got us herded onto the bus for our 3 hour ride to Bayeau, that stretched into 4 hours. Our transportation woes continued, (bumpy plane ride, Jim getting stranded on the metro platform and now trouble with the van/bus.

About an hour into the ride our driver, Bernard, pulled into a gas station off the interstate and the van died. Not able to get it started he sought out someone to give the bus a jump. Being a diesel engine it took some coaxing but it finally started.

Here is John thinking . . . if they only were using CNG!

Then it became apparent the electric front door would not close. Burned out circuit breaker? We couldn’t tell. He spoke French and we spoke English and never the two shall meet! Finally he took one of the jumper cables and ‘tied’ the door shut, then enter the bus from the non-electric emergency door in the back.

Our ride continued with a freeze blowing in the door which actually felt pretty good because the air conditioning marginally worked. We were told there would be a stop at 1.5 hour into the ride and finally we pulled into another rest stop. Interesting he kept pointing out a unit that looked like a radio in the dash that had lots of numbers on the display. I couldn’t figure out what it was but Luk told me later it was a device that calculates how much the driver has driven. Very strict chauffeur licensing laws in FRA and the reason he pulled into the second gas station was not to give us a break but for him to take his mandatory half hour break after having driven a certain number of hours/miles.

While we were waiting, our man John, of many resources, broke out a picnic lunch he had just happened to have brought along and shared it with all.

We finally arrive in Bayeau and met up with our guides Luc and Adele. Ends up many of our members that were on last years mcs trip to the Bordeaux region had Adele as one of their guides!

Adele took us on a quick walking tour of the town and then it was time for a late lunch.

Local scenes.

A late afternoon energy fix!

Couldn’t make it to church today so had a Religious instead!

Our home for the night . . . nice!

We assembled at 4:00pm for bike fittings and a 7 mile shakedown ride.

Our steads for the week. New this year because the Normandy trip is new!

Sights along the way.

Next showers, resting and a group dinner at 7:00pm/ Yippee . . .more eating!!!

We met in the lobby of the hotel for our Welcoming vino, snacks and meeting. Introductions and the wine flowed freely. Soon it was on to our meal held right at the restaurant.

Great food more wine and fine conversation.

Most got this yummy little treat but a few went ‘more healthy’ and orderd . . .

Time for bed and on the road to Omaha Beach tomorrow for the whole group and an additional bus trip for some to Utah Beach.