Bastogne is very tourist oriented and seems to focus almost exclusively on those few days around Christmas of 1944 when the allies fought desperately to hold the line in the "Battle of the Bulge," taking place in the Ardennes. The main square is named “Plac McAuliffe” after the American General that answered the German request for surrender with the famous response “Nuts!” There is even a café on the square named “le Nuts” and a Sherman tank displayed at a corner of the square that still shows battle damage from the Battle of the Bulge.
(Click on the Images to Enlarge)
Hotel Collin. We stayed at the Hotel Collin, right on the
main square. This
hotel was reasonably priced and very nice. It only has 15 rooms, so the
gentleman at the desk was the owner, Monsieur Collin, and service was very personal.
Breakfast at the Collin Hotel was among the best we had during the whole
European trip.
Mémorial
du Mardasson. The memorial is on the edge of town and has a fairly
extensive, but tourist friendly, Battle of the Bulge museum adjacent to it.
American Memorial
on the Bizory
– Foy road.. With a long-standing personal
interest in the Battle of the Bulge, a name that sticks with me is a
of village called Foy. I wanted to see Foy, so we took our little car and set
out from the Mémorial
du Mardasson
. At a cross-roads a few kilometers away, we headed down the Bizory – Foy road
and after a little distance, we saw a memorial along the side of the road, and stopped to see
what it was about. About chest high, the memorial was well cared for with clean
Belgian and American flags blowing in the soft breeze. The plaque stated that
this monument was dedicated to the fallen soldiers of Company E, 506th
Regiment of the 101st Airborne – the boys of “Band of Brothers.” The
memorial was to a particular battle and we later were able to reference a print copy
of “Band of Brothers” and remember its depiction in the HBO mini-series. The
land looked familiar, the woods were reminiscent of how they were depicted in the film, which
helped us to visualize what occurred at this out-of-the-way location in the winter
of 1944. Looking at these pastoral scenes in 2005, it was hard to imagine the
horror that had preceded us so many years before.
Panther Tank in Houffalize. The German
side of the battle is remembered as well. The city of Houffalize was
decimated in the battle, and on rebuilding, the city installed a Panther tank in
a nice little park right next to the main street. This Panther has seen
better days, but is a reminder of the struggle that occurred more than half a
century ago.