“I am very sorry,” the owner of the hotel says in her honey-dripped French accent. “But you must leave.” She explains that another couple has booked our room for the next two nights. While she would love to give us preference, the other couple is paying more. “I am sure there is a vacancy elsewhere,” she says and smiles.

We heft our backpacks and wander into the little square somewhere in the middle of Caen, a city in the Lower Normandy region of France, about 3 hours northwest of Paris. After a long train ride yesterday, we’d anticipated some recovery time from sightseeing and travel before visiting Normandy, but now our first priority is finding another place for the night. Steve offers to search the area with me while the other two remain behind.

There’s another hotel across the square, next to a restaurant where we ate the previous night. The restaurant owner had spoken no English, but when I ordered in French we were brought a flavorsome meal of chicken and pastries. When I went to pay for our meals, she asked me if I was British. I said we were American. Her eyes widened. “We don’t have many Americans who eat here,” she said. “Most go to McDonald’s.”

The hotel we now face is unremarkable except for one thin – a banner draped across the window with the message, “We Love Americans!”

“I can almost read the sarcasm,” Steve says. “But we may as well check it out.”

When we enter the lobby, we find a man who looks like walrus chatting up a young woman. Stepping up to them, I say, “Pardon.”

The man turns to us and his eyebrows dance across his forehead. “You look for room?” he says in English. I can see sweat stains under his arms as he gesticulates. “I have room. Many room. You come with me.”

Before we can respond, the man grabs a key from the wall and staggers upstairs. “Come, come!” he says without waiting to see if we’re following. He leads us to the second floor and stops at a door opposite the stairwell. After unlocking the door, he pushes it open and waves us inside.

To call the room cramped would be to call the Atlantic Ocean wet. Paint peels from the walls and litters the floor. The single bed looks like it would collapse if a fly landed on it. And there’s an odor that lingers in the air, uncomfortably similar to the smells that follow our host.

When Steve looks to me, I shake my head. “The room we were in last night was much better than this.” To the man, I say, “Is this your best available?”

“Oui,” he says, his head bobbing up and down. “This room. Good room.”

“Non,” I try again in French. “Do you have any rooms that aren’t falling apart?”

“This room,” he answers in English. “You like room? You take room, oui?”

“Come on,” I say to Steve. “I’m sure we can find someplace better than this.” As we pass by the man, whose eyes are about to fall out of his head, I say, “Merci.”

“What’s the matter?” he says as he follows us down the stairs. “You want a different room? I get you different room.”

“No, that’s okay,” I say without looking back. “Thanks anyway.”

“How about a cigar? You want Monica Lewinsky and a cigar? I get you Monica Lewinsky and a cigar.”

As we leave the building, Steve says, “Did you smell alcohol on his breath?”

“I smelled a lot more than that,” I say. “Come on, let’s try the next street.”

Ten minutes later along la Rue de Bernieres, we find Hotel Astrid. The façade is charming, the lobby decorated with crisp white paint and strategically placed throw rugs and paintings. A woman half my height and twice my age greets us. She speaks not a word of English, but by speaking in French I learn that she has a room large enough for the four of us at half the price we paid at the first hotel. She offers information about what to do in Caen and how to get to the beaches with the air of a doting grandmother. We return to our friends and inform them we’ve found our place to stay.

Later that day we return to the square. There is no train that runs to the Normandy beaches, and Barb informs us that the Lonely Planet says a taxi is the best way to get there. She carries the Lonely Planet like a bible and invokes its name at every opportunity. If the Lonely Planet says that we must stand on our heads at the base of L’arc de Triomphe at 2 pm while whistling the French anthem, then by golly, we have to stand on our heads at the base of L’arc de Triomphe at 2 pm while whistling the French anthem.

So rather than look for a tour bus, she attempts to negotiate with a white-haired man about hiring a taxi. Unfortunately, his English is limited, and there is another group of Americans trying to compete for the same taxi. Another man with a thin moustache and a few tufts of gray hair sticking out from a woolen cap paces nearby, dragging on a cigarette. The debate escalates to the point where even the Americans don’t seem to understand each other.

In French I ask if it’s possible to arrange a tour of the beaches or not. The man in the cap snaps his head in our direction, tosses the cigarette to the ground, and crushes it with his heel. He steps over to the white-haired man and whispers in his ear. The white-haired man nods. The man in the cap points to a taxi and says to me, “Allons-y.” Let’s go.

We follow him to the car and he opens the back door. I start to climb in but he puts his hand out and gives me a pointed look. The rest of our group gets in the car and he shuts the door. Then he opens the passenger door and motions me inside. Once we’re fastened in and on our way, he says in a well-rehearsed tone, “The Nazi Empire had control over France until June 6, 1944, when over 150,000 troops crossed the English Channel to storm the beaches of Normandy.”

He stops talking and casts me another look. He jerks his chin over his shoulder, indicating the group in the back seat. It takes me a moment to understand his gesture and then, to the best of my ability, I start translating. He launches into a monologue about the beaches and the invasion that continues until we near the entrance to Omaha Beach, at which point he stops and comments that they didn’t have that many tourists until the Stephen Spielberg film came out, but since then the crowds have been overwhelming.

As we wander through the American Cemetery rain drizzles down on us. The weather has scared away most of the tourists. It seems appropriate to watch the raindrops pummel into the beach, imagining the soldiers diving for cover and fighting to drive back the Nazi forces. Our driver is a specter trailing behind us, lighting a cigarette now and then until we finish our sightseeing.

On our return we stop at the Caen Memorial Peace Museum, filled with mannequins wearing original military uniforms and suspended replicas of fighter planes. We watch a twenty minute presentation on D-Day before returning to the hotel. When we pay the driver, he shakes my hand and bows. He hands me his card and tells me to call him if we need further assistance.

That night, I’m ready to see what Caen has to offer for night life, but the others want to sleep. “We have a lot of sightseeing tomorrow,” Barb says. “We need to go to bed early.”

“But we’re on vacation,” I insist. “We’re supposed to enjoy ourselves. And we can sleep on the train.”

“The Lonely Planet says that’s not a good idea.”

Only Steve agrees to go with me. We wander around nearby Quai Vendeuvre until we stumble upon a mural. A mustachioed man raises beer mugs with both hands while a crowd dances and cheers around him. “Mr. Oliver’s” reads the caption at the bottom.

Inside we discover an Irish pub, complete with redwood furniture and Guinness posters. A band at the far wall plays a shanty in French, and the crowd loves it. We approach the bar. The bartender turns around and flashes a toothy smile. His face is identical to that on the mural outside

“Bienvenue,” Mr. Oliver says. Welcome. “Is this your first time here?”

“Oui.”

“Since you’re new, I’ll give you 50 per cent off your first drink.” He leans over the bar. “So where are you from?”

“Les Etats-Unis,” I say. The United States.

Mr. Oliver’s eyes light up as if we’d told him we were crown princes of England. “Really?” he says. “Stay right there.” He reaches over the bar and pulls down books and a roll of parchment. Returning, he unrolls the parchment. It’s a map of the Normandy beaches.

“Now here,” he says as he points to a spot on the left side of the map. “Here is Omaha Beach, where on June 6, 1944 over 150,000 troops came to fight back the Nazis.” He continues to point out different spots and flips through a book entitled, “1944.” We don’t have the heart to tell him that we’ve already heard most of the story, or that he’s forgotten to serve us our beers.

The next day as we head to the train station, we pass by the square. The banner hangs like a wet rag, obscuring the “Love” in “We Love Americans.” I smile to myself. The people of Caen do love Americans – gratitude reflects in the eyes of those old enough to remember. But to recognize it, one has to push aside preconceptions and take the time to communicate.

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