We are travelling to Paris and Normandy for our 25th anniversary trip in mid October. We will land in CDG, rent a car and head for Giverny, and then have 4 nights to spend in Normandy. Would like to visit Honfleur, one day visiting beaches, MSM, and St. Malo. How should I break up nights? Would hate to only spend 1 night in each location, so thinking first night in Honfleur, and 3 nights in Bayeaux? Then we head to Paris for 4 nights. Would love suggestions for a driving itinerary without too many hotel changes. Thank you!
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I HATE backtracking and wasted time in the car even more than I hate one nighters in hotels. And St. Malo to Bayeux is about 2 hours. But it depends on how long you want to stay in each area. Bayeux has the tapestry, Cathedral and WW2 Museum. The beaches can be a week long visit, depending on how much time you want to spend in visitors centers and the level of your WW2 interest. This is what I would do:
Day 1 (1st night): Honfleur
Day 2: morning in Honfleur, afternoon in Bayeux (depending on how much you were able to see of Honfleur the night before). Over night Bayeux (2nd night).
Day 3: beaches - overnight in Bayeux (3rd night)
Day 4: early drive to MSM. Morning in MSM, afternoon in St. Malo. Overnight in St. Malo or Dinan. OR, you could do St. Malo in the morning and backtrack (grrrr) to MSM for the late afternoon and spend the night on MSM (or one of the hotels just outside for the night views)
Day 5: Return car to Rennes (or closest train station) and head back to Paris.
Have a great time.
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We had 5 nights a couple of years ago at the end of October for Normandy from Paris. We had done Giverny form Paris so didn't do that. I would caution about traveling very far after an overnight flight if you are flying from the US.
We spent one night at Mont St. Michel; two nights in Bayeux and did the Tapestry (WOW) that afternoon and and Overlord tour of the beaches on the full day (we could have driven but hadn't done the homework to make that work -- if you plan, there is plenty of parking and you can do this yourself easily -- perhaps Pointe du Hoc, Omaha and the American cemetery); and we finished with two nights in Honfleur using the full day (the weather was ify) to visit Etretat which I highly recommend. We took the train to and from Caen -- with a car, you might visit Rouen on the trip back or do Etretat that morning and head back.
Here are some of our snapshots:
https://janettravels.wordpress.com/category/normandy/