Paris, Brittany, Normandy: public transit and rental car mix

I've no advice regarding car or transport but I just spent 2 weeks in May on a tour in Brittany and Normandy. I didn't go to Brest as the tour started in Quimper which I really enjoyed. The tour company routed the group by plane from Paris to Brest. I just took the train to Quimper and it was easy as I had been in Paris for a week before. When I booked my tickets 1st class was only a bit more than 2nd class so I went for that. I was glad as the seats were a bit bigger and my particular train (on a Friday in May) was jammed.

I think my favorite stop might have been Saint-Malo where we stayed for 3 nights. One day was a day trip to Cancale (oysters) and MSM, the other a day in Saint-Malo. I could have used another day there as I didn't get everything in that I wanted to see. I loved watching the tide swing - and being able to see the paths out to the small islets appear, then disappear. Very interesting. If you are tired of seafood by the time you get here and like curry, I ate at a very good curry place in the walls/Intra-Muros of Saint-Malo - Le Penjab.

We stopped for an afternoon in Dinan - didn't love it but it there were a bunch of school groups on tour there and that added to congestion. I would have liked to walk down to the harbor but did not have enough time.

If you are staying in Brest, you might want to try to see the very charming small village of Locranon. I also loved Pointe du Raz, the more-or-less western-most point of France. The sign in the local grocery store indicated it was the last store before North America, lol.

I have to tell you I had no real expectations of Brittany but I loved it! Awesome and interesting history and culture, very nice people.

Are you spending time in Paris at the beginning of your trip or at the end? Either way, you do not want to drive in Paris. You have two choices, either pick a car up at CDG after visiting Paris, or take the train to a city outside Paris and pick the car up there. Two things to consider: 1. It is not recommended to drive immediately upon arrival after a long flight, so doing Paris first is the best way to start. 2. Your best chance of getting an automatic is at CDG - they are harder to come by at train stations in smaller locations. Picking up the car at CDG - and dropping it off - is relatively easy.

My approach is to train immediately from Paris to a place that rents automatic transmission cars, sightsee there for a couple of days, then get into the driving. My go to is the tgv line to Tours. Use Autoeurope and test out some places. My current trip went like this

Flew into Cdg
Tgv to Tours (2 hours)
Pick up rental
25 minute drive to Amboise
2 nights in Amboise
Drive 4 hours to Dinan
4 nights in Dinan
Drive 2 hours to southern Brittany
2 nights southern Brittany
And then on to the Dordogne

You need a car in Brittany
The driving is easy in Brittany

Also, listen to the driving in France podcast episode on www.joinusinfrance.com. It is the best summary of what you will encounter.

Thank you for the suggestions so far. Based on the input, I am thinking of flying into Paris for 2 days before taking the train to Rennes. I would then stay in Rennes for 1 or 2 days and while leaving the city rent a car to tour the rest of Brittany and Normandy. I might drop the car at Caen return by train to Paris.

If it were me: I'd take the train from Paris to Brest (about a four hour ride), rent a car there and start working your way back. Your last stop is Normandy Beaches so I'd drop the car in Caen and train back into Paris from there.

Public transit won't work very well in Brittany and Normandie. It might be possible but you would lose a lot of (IMO too much) time to connections and limited options between stops. I'd go for a car. I personally prefer a diesel with a manual transmission, the gas mileage is incredible. If you prefer one, you probably have to specifically request an automatic when you reserve.

My favorite stops in Brittany, that you haven't already mentioned, were Locronan, Auray, Vannes and Carnac. You could go through the south side of the Penninsula, then head north through Dinan to your other stops. I was in this area last September and it was cool but really nice. I'd plan for a little cooler and wetter as you get into October.

The last time I checked, you can reserve an automatic in rennes but not Brest.

I've rented a car at the Rennes train station and it is very convenient--right there next to the exit. But be aware that the train station is under renovation this year and it's quite jammed and can be confusing. By the way, the French rail system upgraded the tracks between Le Mans and Rennes, so now the TGV only take 1.5 hours from Rennes to Paris. Here's the article from Le Figaro:
http://www.lefigaro.fr/societes/2017/07/01/20005-20170701ARTFIG00012-deux-nouvelles-lignes-tgv-mises-en-service-dimanche.php

We are back from our trip and thought it would be helpful for others to report our success with the car rental based on advice received in this forum. We rented a car in Rennes and returned it to CDG in Paris. We spent the first two nights in Paris and then took the train to Rennes to spend another 2 nights before picking up the rental car. Getting an automatic was easy in Rennes.
A few benefits of this plan:

• over jet lag before driving
• It seamed easier and more convenient to use public transit and taxis/ride sharing servies for the first part of our trip anyway.
• There was definitely less traffic for my first time behind the wheel in France when leaving Rennes than there would have been around Paris.
• By the time I was driving towards Paris to return the car at the airport, I was much more comfortable driving on French roads.

A few other observations:

• The rental agent was pleased that I had an international driver's permit.
• We bought SIM cards at the airport for our smart phones. Using Google Maps work out great most of the time for navigation.
• The few times we did not have a data single to plot a new course, navigation by the French road signs worked well to set off in the general direction before we had a data single. In fact a few times we navigated purely by the French road signs. We just had to know what cities/towns were in the direction we wanted to go.
• For French road sign navigation, it is useful to know "autre directions" (other directions), "toutes directions" (al directions), "centre" (center, as in city center). To find the major tourist area of a town, follow signs for "centre" and then "office de tourisme" or major attraction.
• When going around the traffice circles/roundabouts, I found it became an easier experience once I started using my turn signals to inform other drivers of my intent. I used the right signal entering a circle if I was going to take the first exit. Otherwise I used the left turn signal while driving around a circle and switched to the right signal as I approached my exit.
• France could post more signs indicating the speed limit you are supposed to be driving instead of the speed you are not supposed to be driving or no sign at all.

Some other hints: Many car rental agencies in Europe close for a two-hour lunch. Make sure you transcribe your pick-up location's hours into your itinerary, so you don't book a train that arrives there at, say, 12:10PM. Even the big rental companies have a very poor record (Opinion) of DELIVERING the automatic transmission that was reserved. On my last trip, they offered only an immense American family van, which I did not want to take into medieval streets and small stalls of city parking garages. So I took a subcompact with a standard transmission. (I owned a standard for 15 or more years ... )

We rent a car for only 1/4 of our days in Europe, at the most. But you definitely want a car for Normandy and Brittany. The highway driving is easy enough. But parking can be annoying, and every one of your attractions will take 15-25 minutes to get to from the highway. We had a few very rural French roads (we went to some public estate gardens in the countryside) that were less than two lanes wide, like in England. I'm not trying to scare you, it's not that hard.

We rented in St. Pierre des Corps (for Tours), starting in the Loire, and drove clockwise through Brittany and Normandy, returning the car in Paris. That was, as stated by others, a bad idea. I suggest you use the search box at top center to read some other posts on car rental in France, so you learn about toll booths, credit cards, unattended gas stations, speed cameras, and so on.

You also have to vet your accommodations for parking. For example, we chose a particular tiny, old-fashioned hotel in Dinard (Reine Hortense) because they provided private parking nearby. (They had fold-up stanchions in each space of a big lot, with a padlock you had to open to release the stanchion.) It actually was a pretty hotel, with views of St. Malo and the beach. It felt like a place James Bond might have hidden away with one of his lovers! But we needed the 240 volt box-fan we had bought earlier in the trip.

I am not recommending that you stay in Dinard, ESPECIALLY, OUT OF SEASON. But parking OUTSIDE the walls in St. Malo is a chore and a half. Worse, we were there during a yachting event, and the St. Malo marina is beside the vast (but not empty) parking lot.

I can share the way I approached it. I took a direct train to Rouen, walked the center then picked up a rental car (yes the place closes for a two hour lunch, I had a choice to rent it first then walk or return after they reopened). My stops included Etretat, Bayeux, MSM, Cancale, St. Malo, Dinan, Fort La Latte, Saint Thegonnec, Locronan, Auray, Vannes (then drove to Loire Valley). When I got to Loire, I turned in the car and picked up a bicycle, then took a train back into Paris.

Glad you had a good experience, travelfar. I just stumbled onto this thread but, fwiw, I would have advised exactly what you did. I like driving in general, and in France outside the biggest cities. Definitely the best way to visit places like Brittany and Normandy.

We don't have a smartphone so we bring our portable GPS on trips, having downloaded a Europe map via AAA for about $70. It works fine except that the lady mispronounces a lot of French place names, sometimes hilariously. Just more entertainment for the road!