"The sadness is almost too much because there is no one," said local guide Adeline James.

Locals all along the Normandy peninsula come out year after year to show their gratitude for soldiers from the US, Britain, Canada and elsewhere who liberated them from Adolf Hitler's Nazi forces.

Some 160,000 soldiers made the perilous crossing from England on the morning of June 6, 1944, storming dunes that were heavily defended by German troops. The Allies succeeded, but left thousands of comrades behind.

This year will stand in stark contrast to 2019 commemorations, which saw US President Donald Trump join his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron at the American cemetery overlooking Omaha Beach.

Tens of thousands came from across the globe to pay their respects to the dead and laud the survivors. The acrid smell of wartime-era jeep exhaust fumes and the rumble of old tanks filled the air. The tiny roads were clogged for hours.

This year, a sense of desolation hangs across the region.

"Last year this place was full with jeeps, trucks, people dressed up as soldiers," said Eric Angely, who sat on a seawall, dressed in a World War II uniform after taking his restored US Army jeep out for a ride. "This year, there is nothing. It's just me now, my dog and my jeep."

AP