Not every travel experience is about whooping it up. Not every essential, bucket-list destination has to be fun. Uplifting, yes. Transformational, too. The Juno Beach Centre in Normandy, where the Canadians landed on DDay in 1944, is that kind of place.

Many of us who have thought of how our lives might be different if pivotal moments in world history had gone another way, or had relatives fight and even die in battle, or are moved by the sacrifices of previous generations, make plans to visit war memorials and battlefield sites.

Visitors have many reasons to be there, and just as many different reactions.

BestTrip went to the Juno Beach Centre to ask other visitors to compare their expectations of their visit with the reality of actually standing on the site of a monumental moment in Canada's story.