Proud to Be Canadian at Juno Beach

October 24

Charlotte:

When we got up, we walked to the car rental place and rented a car so we could go to Juno Beach.

First we went to the museum. Outside, there were statues and walls with plaques for people or groups that donated money to make the museum. We found Barrie and Hamilton right away.

Inside, we got a family pass so we could play a fun family game on touchscreens inside the museum. We saw a movie about the soldiers’ minds as they were travelling to Juno Beach. It was cool to learn about how the Canadians helped in a big way.

On the floor there was a wooden puzzle piece of France and the floor was Canada and it showed how France could fit inside Ontario. We read some things on the wall about Canadians before and at the time of the war.

Each room had little symbols showing which things would be on the quiz. The quiz was interesting because we had to answer questions about what we learned from the museum.

When we were done with the museum, we were going to go on a tour to see the Germans’ secret bunkers and the beach. The tour guide was nice (and Canadian – they hire all Canadians for 7 months at a time to work there).

First, she showed us the first bunker that the Germans built. She said that this bunker wasn’t that well built and that instead of concrete they used cinder blocks and had wood beams.

The second bunker was better built then the first one because it has smaller windows and it was made to protect them instead of just hanging out and observing. It was smaller though.

After that, the tour guide took us to the beach. It was the beach where the soldiers landed and had to fight against the Nazi troops. They had to dodge barbed wire and landmines all along the beach.

Nowadays, it is a very nice beach. Sam and I found pretty sea shells, but we had to leave them there.

Sam

While on the beach we learned that Juno beach connected 4 small coastal towns and when we left the museum,we went to two of the other towns.

In one of the towns there is a house called the Canada house, because most people think it was the first house they freed from the Germans.

After, we went to a nearby restaurant called Côte Sablé, to have supper. We had some galettes (savory crepes / thin pancakes) with ham and cheese, Mom had hers with ham, cheese, mushrooms, and an egg, and Dad got some moules frites (fries with mussels) in a traditional Normandy cider sauce and Mom got a cider to drink. For dessert, Mom had a tarte normande (kind of an apple pie with caramel sauce) and I had some ice cream.