D Day Beaches , Mount St Michel, and Bayeux Itinerary tips

I don't know about skip the lines options but I do recommend doing a full day guided tour of D-Day beaches if that is on your list. Don't try to see/absorb it all on your own. The sites are far flung.
We used Bayeux shuttle and were very pleased with them. Others recommend Overlord tours.

http://www.bayeuxshuttle.com

Don't miss Bayeux tapestry

If you’re going to Honfleur, about 30 minutes north is the white-cliff beach town of Etretat, which has an unusual garden overlooking some amazing scenery. Just Google Etretat cliffs and you’ll see what I mean. I haven’t been there yet (going in June), but this is the kind of attraction I like: some awesome scenery, an old town filled with little stores & restaurants, and not too far to drive. If we like it, we can spend a whole afternoon; if we don’t, we can drive down part of the Route du Cidre.

A lot of this depends on what it is you want to see in the area. Decide what you want to see, and map it out day to day. Major things to see in Normandy can be roughly divided into:

• Battle of Normandy/WWII sights

• Mont-Saint-Michelle (far Southwest Normandy)

• Honfluer/Étretat (Northern Normandy)

Although there are many more things and areas to see in Normandy, these tend to be the ones tourists gravitate towards.

If you want to visit WWII sites, you are ideally situated. None of those attractions, or anything else I can think of, are benefited by any sort of "skip-the-line" tickets in this region. Decide whether a tour is the sort of thing you want.
For battle of Normandy sights, many people will recommend a tour. I have never used one, but I know quite a bit of the history behind these battles, so "self-guided" has worked great for me. If you want to do self-guided, do your homework ahead of time to make sure you know more about what you are looking at. Regardless, since you will be there for several days, even if you take a tour, you will have many hours/days to make your way around the area before/afterwards. Normandy lends itself well to just driving between sights. The pace is slow, the sights are far flung from one another, and there isn't any public transport to speak of. I often find the drive between sights to be as memorable as the sights themselves.

I'm a big fan of the Bayeux Cathedral and Tapestry. I think our Normandy visit would have benefited from one of the guided tours like Overlord. Mont-St-Michel will be very crowded at midday, you may enjoy your visit more if you can spend the night on or near the Mont, so you can be there in the evening and the next morning.

There's an excellent WWII museum in Caen called the Peace Memorial, but it takes quite awhile to see and may not be a good use of your limited time. The WWII museum in Bayeux is also supposed to be good, but focused more on the D-Day events.

We enjoyed a few hours in Honfleur, especially the harborfront and the double-nave church. Rouen is also a good destination, with the cathedral Monet painted (beaucoup times), an old courtyard where plague victims were buried (long ago, don't worry), and a lot of half-timbered streets.

We did a similar itinerary 2 years ago but split our stays into 2 nights in Bayeux and one night at MSM. We had rented a car in Lille amd drove south to Bayeux stopping in Etretat on the way to see the cliffs. We arrived in Bayeux for dinner and had time to explore the cathedral. The next day, we took a half day Overlord tour which was just scratching the surface of D day sites but was a great introduction to the area for me. It’s so humbling to think of the sacrifices made by those brave soldiers. We made it back to Bayeeux to see the tapestry that afternoon. We checked out of our hotel the next day and drove south to St Malo for a few hours before going to MSM. We spent the evening and the next morning at MSM avoiding the tourist hordes. We were able to buy out tickets to the abbey online in advance so that’s a timesaver there. I do recommend you make a reservation for dinner that evening if you want to eat on MSM. We didn’t and luckily had some snacks to eat or we would’ve starved. Amyways there’s so much to see in Normandy and we even had a little taste of Brittany in St Malo. We skipped Honfleur and Rouen to go to Etretat because we figured those towns are easier to reach as daytrips out of Paris that we can do next time. Hope my itinerary helps in your planning!

In 2015, I drove a rental car from Rouen to Bayeux on July 13 and spent the nights of July 13 & 14 in Bayeux, which I thoroughly enjoyed. Based on other’s comments since then and my experience returning the car to Rouen, Caen seems to be a better place to rent a car and start the trip.

I had time to tour the cathedral and walk around the city a bit. On the 14th, I toured several D-Day battlefields on my own. It was an easy drive and I enjoyed it. Not being part of a tour meant I could linger at places that piqued my interest. I started with the beaches at Arromanches which featured an artificial harbor, then toured the Longues-sur-Mer Battery and the museums and cemetery at Omaha Beach.

On the 15th, I visited the Bayeux Tapestry in the morning and then the Pointe Du Hoc D Day Monument area. From there, I drove to Mont St. Michael which I toured in the evening when it’s less crowded. I spent the night there, and then drove back to Rouen the next day.

I felt as if I had enough time to enjoy each place I visited although I would have enjoyed more time in Normandy to visit other beaches and museums. Bayeux is a great place to stay and is very convenient to the D-Day beaches. It has a fun street market on some mornings as well.

Whether you drive and tour the beaches on your own or sign up for a tour depends on how much flexibility you want versus efficiency and outside expertise. I’ve heard a number of good things about the suggested tours, so they are a good option. For my trip, I wanted the ability to linger where I preferred. The displays and museums are very informative without a guide, but the guides can offer more insights.

Enjoy your trip.

Raymond