French Travel Opinion

If food is the way you like to get "close to the culture," Lyon wins. It has the reputation as the food capital of France. It also is much more of a place where average French people go about their daily lives than the 3 sights you mentioned in Normandy, which are very much tourist hot spots. BUT I visited both areas (on tours with Tauck), and I would be much sorrier to have missed Mont St. Michel and Giverny than Lyon. They are tourist hot spots for a reason!

Count your trip in nights.
Every time you change hotels, you use up valuable time.

Normandy or Lyon 2 days sightseeing
night 1 arrival, pretty much a lost day if arriving from overseas
night 2 D-Day tour,
night 3 Mont Saint Michel

night 4 travel to Paris 3.5 days total sightseeing
night 5 Paris day trip to Giverny
night 6 Paris
night 7 Paris

night 8 travel to Champagne 2.5 sightseeing
night 9 Champagne
night 10 Champagne or sleep at an CDG airport hotel

Lyon has a reputation for fine cuisine but also what we call cuisine lyonnaise, which is a bit different and not to everyone's liking. We went to a few restaurants, all with tourists. Some of the food is hearty, some more refined. I liked it.
Here's the wiki https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyonnaise_cuisine

Totally agree with mjh-travel……Been to both and seeing Mont St Michel rise up out of the water is beautiful……also seeing Normandy, the American cemetery is something I will never forget. We saw Lyon for the first time 3 months ago……loved it but it is a great city full of busy life and people……ate some great food…..but would never have wanted to miss Normandy and MSM.

jherrholz,
Elizabeth gives you excellent advice regarding your time in France and time spent changing locations. She knows where of she speaks.
Re where to go, I agree with mjh and Jane in choosing Normandy over Lyon. Be aware that there is no direct train from Giverny to/from Bayeux or Caen. You will have to go back to Paris or route through Rouen. If you are driving, then Giverny is "on the Way" to wherever you stay to see the DDay beach sights.

Lyon is a vibrant, beautiful major French city. There is plenty to do as a tourist, but not the level of over-touristed major attractions that you find in Paris. In my experience, the city itself is more of the attraction. Great food, busy cafes, and many different neighborhoods to explore.

However, Normandy has great aspects as well. I think a stop in Rouen to see the cathedral captured so many times by Monet, and the Joan of Arc chapel, is worthwhile. I found the history of the Normans to be compelling. Bayeux is a nice, friendly, smaller city, very welcoming to American tourists and a good home base for visiting the D-Day sites. (Note that the Bayeux Tapestry is currently in London.) You can bike through the countryside and appreciate the obstacles provided by the hedgerows during WWII.

However, if you want the most immersive in French culture, I think that Lyon wins out. I loved Normandy, but particularly close to the D-Day sites I felt it was primarily catering to American tourists. Whereas Lyon was a great place to pretend to be French for a few days and enjoy living.

I like both but if you haven't been to MSM, well that is IMHO a once in a lifetime must.

Note 4 nights is 3 days; 3 nights is 2 days. And days you change locations are largely lost. Less is more.

As a former resident of Lyon for several years, and as a current resident of Normandie for several years, I would say the choice would come down to your preferences.

Are you more of a city person or a small town/rural person? If city: Lyon. If not: Normandie.

Are you interested in history? Normandie offers history from pre-Roman times with scattered menhirs, not many of which are easy to access (unlike Bretagne), to limited examples of Roman times (such as Vieux-la-Romaine SW of Caen), to the time of William the Conqueror in several sites, to medieval sites like Mont-Saint-Michel and several abbayes in varying states of disrepair, to WWII sites that are well known to many American travelers. Caen offers an example of post-WWII reconstruction and is an interesting contrast with, for example, Saint-Lô which was essentially destroyed by Allied and German bombardment.

Lyon was the capital of Gallic France in Roman times. There is an excellent Gallo-Roman museum, several Roman ruins, and an almost unbroken string of structures documenting the evolution of France over the millennia. It's a fascinating place that, after living there for several years, I still felt I was missing out on details when I moved north.

Both areas have fine cuisine. Lyon, in general, has better restaurants. Personally, I don't prefer the meat and offal heavy bouchons, but some tourists like to seek them out. However, Lyon has many other excellent restaurants, well-lubricated with wine from Bourgogne and the Rhône. There are lots of resources available to you to identify good restaurants in Lyon.

Normandie is better at seafood. One can get terriic shellfish and finfish, with the shellfish in particular being some of the best in France. However, May is off-season for mussels (moules) which, in Normandie, are some of the sweetest and best mussels in the world. Inexpensive too: we buy ours from a vendor in Hauteville-sur-Mer who charges 3,50€ for a kilogram of mussels. And they are very good mussels.

If you asked my opinion, and reading your question again, I would opt for Lyon. It's easier to access (a convenient and fast train ride from Paris) and, unless you are dying to see Normandie, would provide you several days of interesting sightseeing and experiences.

I like Lyon; not so much for the food, but the excellent Beau Arts museum and the flea market. Frankly I never found any place to eat there that was so excellent I'd go back just for a meal. But it's way the heck and gone from Normandy. Consider Rouen; a city I prefer to Lyon, and where I have had meals worth going back for. And as for Champagne, visit the AMBC monument at Chateau Thierry, and then drive the D3 to Epernay. That's the local equivalent of Silverado Trail in Napa Valley. You'll find excellent little vintners and wines you've never seen before, and it's local. Shop Grand Frais in Pierry for local cheeses, sausages, and wines.

Another thought: Is this your once in a lifetime trip to France? If you are hoping to go again in a year or two or more, I'd say keep Lyon for a future trip. When we went in June, we honestly enjoyed Bescancon and Vienne on our way to several nights in Lyon as much or more than that city itself. Dijon would be another great add-on to a trip with Lyon and there are so many additional interesting places in the general area. Normandy seems like it would fit better than Lyon on a trip with a Paris focus.

Normandy and Rhône-Alpes are quite different. Personally, Norman and Breizh foods are my least favorite in all of France, and although visiting the WWII beaches was incredibly emotional and meaningful, the countryside itself is not especially compelling. But Mont Saint Michel is a definite trip, and others will provide better recommendations for Normandy.

Lyon is at the center of traditional French haut cuisine, and the city also has many important architectural and historical sites. It also allows easy day trips to Avignon and Beaune, or even possibly Geneva in a long day.

I'm really not quite sure what Rick means by traveling close to the culture. Maybe someone will clue me in.

Steves with his groundbreaking book decades ago Europe through the Back Door helped middle class hesitant American tourists rethink travel -- from tour groups, to travel agents who book people in industrial hotels and sign them up for costly local tours.

He advocated making your own arrangements, eating off the beaten path, staying in small B&Bs or local low cost hotels and just generally traveling close to the ground. I was attracted to his books because long before his touting sort of ruined the Cinque Terre we had discovered and walked the trail -- one of our best travel experiences. We saw no other Americans and the only other hikers we encountered were a class of Italian 14 year olds and their beleaguered young teacher and on arriving in Monterosso at the end of the day long hike, a half dozen German hikers disembarking from the train. And then his show on Assisi -- there he was. picnicking in the small out of the way viewpoint we had discovered to picnic ourselves -- ie. he seemed to be our kind of traveler.

He has helped people get out of the groove of costly tours where Americans tell each other stories about how dangerous (Paris, Rome, this small town we are in) is and generally don't experience much of the local. travel the way Europeans do. Of course he now does his own tours, so go figure -- but I assume he incorporates this close to the ground principle in his own products.

He makes terrible hotel recommendations in my experience of 3 of his recs years ago -- havent used them since -- and excellent advice about packing, planning and finding good local experiences. A major force in improving international travel for American travelers with limited time and knowledge of international travel.