Renting car in Bayeux or Caen

First off, good for you for renting a car. i can't imagine going to this area without a vehicle. However, not only are there more options in Caen, but the two cities are a very short drive apart. If you must rent in Bayeux, there is only one place of which I am aware, and of which I have used. It was a Hertz office (franchise?) located at a gas station on the periphery road. It isn't easily walkable from the train station, so you would likely need a taxi from there. And Bayeux isn't the type of town large enough to have taxis lined up just waiting for people getting off the train. One time when I did rent there, the attendant drove me to the train station when I dropped the car off, but this was many years ago—so no guarantee. Hell, I'm not even sure they still rent cars there. Do yourself a favor and just rent in Caen (where there are more trains arriving) and drive the 20–30 minutes to Bayeux. There are also some good WWII sites you could stop at on the way such as the Radar Museum, and the Canadian Cemetery.

wow, that was quick, t hank you. So, to clarify, i will be in Bayeux for a few days without a car. I can take the train to Caen, do i need to prepurchase that ticket or can I just buy at station? I tend to prepurchase train tickets when I'm in europe, this is just such a short trip I wonder if I need to. thank you

No need to pre-purchase that particular ticket. The route is a TER - a regional train. The ticket prices are not subject to dynamic pricing and won't sell out.

I literally stood in the Bayeux station and purchased a ticket to Caen via the SNCF app as the train approached. Reversed the process out of Caen for my return.

I looked into the Hertz supposedly in Bayeux prior to a trip last fall, 2024. My research indicated that it had been closed - I could be wrong, or the current situation in soon to be spring 2025 may be different. Just passing on my findings.

A warning I've gleaned from earlier posts on this forum: Many French car-rental agencies close for lunch, are closed on Sunday and may close early on Saturday. Folks renting in Caen have had those experiences, so check rental very carefully.

I like to buy tickets for regional trains just before I travel to retain flexibility, but it is prudent to have the SNCF app on your phone just in case you walk into the train station and find a line of 4 people at the ticket machine. Sometimes I buy the ticket from my hotel room right before heading to the station, while I have good Wi-Fi connectivity.

The trip from Caen to Paris is different. It's not a fixed-price regional train. You can potentially save considerable money by buying that ticket well ahead of time. You can play around with the SNCF Connect website to see what you'd pay today for a ticket traveling today or tomorrow vs. the cost of a ticket to travel a month from now or in May.

SNCF Connect

That website is odd; it asks for your destination before it asks for your origin.

Oops - I missed that there were two questions regarding purchase of train tickets.

Acraven is certainly correct - the route between Paris and Caen (or Bayeux) is a distance train. As suggested in the above post - buy early for money savings.

Between Bayeux and Caen - regional TER train. You can buy anytime before boarding, unlikely to be a price savings. (occasionally a special promotion)