Prologue: Dunkirk, etc.

 PROLOGUE: DUNKIRK, ETC.

Operation Dynamo 1940

As Baby Boomers [thus gaffers, an English term for old blokes], my 2 traveling colleagues and I grew up in the immediate aftermath of WWII, referred to as "The Good War," by author Studs Turkel and others. A great many of the influences on our generation as kids -- movies, TV shows (once TV's became commonplace), comic books, nonfiction and fiction books, model airplanes, toy soldiers, etc. -- centered around WWII. We knew the key battles, the names of leaders and heroes, as well as those of airplanes and naval ships, of both the Allies and the Axis powers. Many of our fathers and uncles had served overseas, and some men in our towns had brought home war brides from England, France, Italy, and Germany. It seems quite logical that the sites of key WWII battles and museums which commemorate them are places that would end up on our bucket lists.

At the top of my bucket list was Normandy, and I was fortunate to have been able to take a trip and a 2-day guided tour to see most of the D-Day landing beaches in the fall of 2024. As a lifelong student and the son of educators before becoming one myself, I learned the educational value of travel and of doing homework to familiarize myself with the stories of battles and battlefields -- the where, when, why, who, and how. It was in doing exactly that in preparation for my trip to Normandy that I began to fully understand the importance of Operation Dynamo and Dunkirk on D-Day and the Allies' attempts to retake Fortress Europe from the Germans. While Roosevelt and Stalin (as well as DeGaulle, of course) were bucking and snorting, "Hey, y'all let's go kick those Nazis out of France!" and the rest of Europe, Churchill took a Corso-esque "not so fast, my friend" approach. He had come within a gnat's eyelash and a few apparently providential miracles of losing his entire army in the first month of the shooting war. He preferred some tune-up fights or nonconference games in North Africa and Italy, and the U.S. and USSR eventually but begrudgingly deferred. 85 years years later I was officially intrigued by Dunkirk and Operation Dynamo.

Having checked Normandy off the top spot on my bucket list, Dunkirk moved steadily up the rankings. As a boy I had read books and seen old movies and documentaries on the Little Ships and "the Miracle of Dunkirk," and much later the powerful 2017 Christopher Nolan Academy Award-winning movie Dunkirk, though confusing on first watch, further piqued my interest. Then came the readings in preparation for my 2024 trip to Normandy and the D-Day beaches. I had to see  Dunkirk ... had to "be there."

Although my wife of over 50 years and I have enjoyed traveling together, back problems have made it difficult for her to travel long distances, e.g., transoceanic, and frankly she doesn't share my passion for WWII or other military history. Some stereotypes are spot on; she grew up with Barbies and Betsy Wetsy, not playing "Army" and building model Flying Tigers, Spitfires, Messerschmitts and Zeros. So it became clear that if I was going to see Dunkirk, I'd have to do it alone or find one or more friends to accompany me. While as an only child I have had decades of practice at being one of my best friends, traveling alone at my age (77) had little appeal. Fortunately I had some especially close friends among my 100+ fraternity brothers from college with whom I have maintained strong ties with whom I share an interest in military history. I invited my fraternity Big Brother, a retired USAF colonel and engineer who grew up on the Miss. Gulf Coast and had been my advisor and mentor in planning my trip to Normandy. This friend, who is known to friends and fraternity brothers as Frog, also was interested in a trip to Dunkirk. Great!

Should we ask another one or two to travel with us?  We settled on 1 more -- an easier fit for sharing taxis and Ubers, as we knew we'd do often on the trip. I had a couple of ideas, and an excellent option fell into our laps. At an annual fraternity gathering of our era, Jerry, one of my pledge brothers with whom I was initiated and who lives an  active life, has a great sense of humor, and is fun to be around, randomly mentioned that having the time and resources to travel, he was looking for some good trips and traveling companions. I asked if he would have any interest in Dunkirk and some other WWII sites, and he enthusiastically replied, "Well, hell yes!" So we had our third. Then what?

As an Eagle Scout who has typically tried to live by the Boy Scout motto of "Be prepared," and the son and nephew of men whom I had watched plan long, memorable educational sightseeing trips to the Western then Eastern states in the U.S. (about 40 states in all), I'm a borderline O.C. planner. I grabbed the reins and dived full bore into Al Gore's Internet, Netflix and Prime documentaries, some books on Dunkirk, and the Rick Steves travel books on France and England. Three things emerged as givens: 1) To properly do Dunkirk we should see Dover, where in tunnels in Dover Castle, Admiral Ramsey and his staff planned and organised [in homage had to use the British spelling] Operation Dynamo. 2) We'd take the ferry across to France, traveling essentially the same route as the Little Ships and British naval ships of Operation Dynamo did. 3) Since all 3 of our traveling group were leaving wives at home, and we are well into our 70's, we would squeeze all we could into the trip without collapsing in a screaming heap, but didn't want to be gone more than about 10 days.

With frequent email and text consultations our trio, who named ourselves (for alliterative purposes only) the Dunkirk Jerks, we began to plan. For trips to Italy and France in the previous 5 years my wife Susan and I had used Maria, a AAA agent, who had been most helpful. We decided that we too would use her for the kinds of things travel agents can best do, although the sights and timing would be ours. Maria agreed, and off we went. Dover to Dunkirk was the centerpiece, but we would fly into London, see WWII sites there, go to Dover and see the myriad WWII sites there, take the ferry across to Calais (because that's where they went from Dover), travel by train or Uber to Dunkirk, organise an in-depth guided tour there, and fly home through Paris (closer, equal costs, and different food and sights) to fly back home ... and we could do it in 11 days, counting a day flying over and a day flying back. When? The weather seemed ideal (pleasant hi/lo temps typical/y 60ish/50ish F., little rain) in late April/early May. Manageable crowds then too. Another key consideration was being able to see some of the wrecks of sunken ships at Dunkirk, so would the tides be favorable for doing so during reasonable times in that time frame (i.e., low tides in mid to late mornings or early afternoons)?  Yes!  Low tides in mid-morning at Dunkirk the first week in May. Book it, Dano! Oh, and by the way, we'd like to squeeze in a day in Portsmouth to put the finishing touches on our previous D-Day trips since Portsmouth was the port city of Ike's HQ for Operation Overlord and more or less Ground Zero for that world-changing operation. We would squeeze that side trip in too.

Now we had intrepid travelers, kitchen passes from all 3 wives, the rough draft of the itinerary, a general time frame, and a travel pro to help us color mostly inside the lines. We would ... 

• Fly into London Heathrow, sightsee in London for 1 1/2 days.
• Take the train to Portsmouth and sightsee there for about half a day. 
• Train back through London to Dover, sightsee 1 1/2 days there.
• Ferry to Calais then Uber to Dunkirk, sightsee almost 2 full days there (with the centerpiece being a 6 1/2 hrs. guided tour). 
• Train to Paris, sightsee 1 1/2 days there.
• Fly home ... all within 11 days.

And just like that ... our creature had life!!