Hello everyone, I have a group interested in traveling to France and visiting the following locations: Paris, Village of Camembert, Saint Malo, Langeais and back to Paris. They are torn between leaving on October 17- 25 or April 23- May 1. Which time of year would you recommend?
I haven't checked day-by-day weather stats for recent years (which I would certainly recommend; use wunderground.com, choosing History, then Monthly), but the spring timeframe will give you much longer days. That is very important to me, but to some it's not an issue at all.
7 full days in France to see Paris and 3 other locations?
Spring time, if for no other reason than longer daylight hours. You will need every minute of it.
May rain a lot more in April though. I’ve spent many April’s there, the last time it rained pretty much all day, every day.
The precipitation-summary chart on this webpage shows that September is the driest month of the year and May is the wettest, but there's little difference in the number of days on which it rains. Decisions, decisions.
Is this a trip for this year? ( I hope not as you're pretty late in the planning.) May first is a holiday always but this year it falls on Tuesday which means many sites and village shops will be closed on Monday too. Before you make serious plans, check the websites of places you plan to visit. Weather wise a toss up at best. Both times can be wet and miserable or lovely.
If the choice was May or September, I'd definitely go in September. Along the coast tends to be rainy outside of summer months but September is really nice. In April or late October, I'd expect wet and windy weather. Not sure one would be warmer or better than the other?