Transportation from Paris to Normandy

I did it last summer. It's very important to choose a base city or town that has good transportation links to the other places you think you'd like to see. It turns out that Caen is convenient for seeing a lot of the coastal towns by either train or bus, at least as far east as Honfleur. Bayeux isn't far from Caen, but it's not as good base if you want to see more than those two spots, because first you must get to Caen, then you have to link up with your onward transportation, which pushes a lot of places out of day-trip range for me.

However, most of the D-Day tours seem to leave from Bayeux, and of course you have the tapestry, the cathedral, and a good WW II museums there. To see the D-Day beaches, we commonly recommend a tour even to those who have cars, because you'll learn a lot more and cover a lot more ground with a professional driver/guide. My full-day Overlord Tour cost 100 euros. As a tourist, I am beyond cheap, but that was very, very much worth it.

Caen has by far the largest WW II museum in that area and a few remaining historical monuments, but most of the city's core was obliterated by Allied bombers.

If Mont St. Michel is on your radar (I didn't go there), it may help to know that the Churchill Hotel in Bayeux runs some buses there. I think there may be one-day tours leaving from Bayeux or Caen as well.

Have you come up with a tentative list of what you want to do and where you want to go in Normandy? Where will you be before Normandy? After Normandy? If you will be approaching from Paris, the train is simple enough. It will take no more than 2-1/2 hours to get to Bayeux or Caen. I saw one morning train to Caen that was 1 hr. 50 minutes. The train fare will be less if you buy the tickets really early, but that will lock you into a specific date and time.

If you're going to either Caen or Bayeux, the easiest way to get there is travel by train. You'll depart from Gare Saint-Lazare, which is one of the six large stations in Paris. As the previous reply indicated, Bayeux is a good home base if you're planning to take a D-Day tour.

To echo the above go and stay in Bayeux. it is a nice little town.
I took my own tour from there of the D-Day Beaches and American Cemetery using the public bus with some other tourists in the know.

If you take the train to Bayeux, you can take the all day tour of the American (or British/Canadian) beaches from there and the Hotel Churchill also does an all day van trip to Mont St. Michel. They don't require you to be a guest of the hotel, but it does fill up so book early if you decide to do this. I haven't done this in Normandy but have used 'Tours by Locals' other places and you might see if they offer any tours that would work for you. If you get tickets early enough they are 15 Euro one way from Paris to Bayeux by train.

If you take the train to Bayeux and then rely on public transportation, consider taking a taxi one-way to Omaha Beach and the bus the other way. Buses run very infrequently, so taking a taxi, while expensive, will save you precious time. Be aware that the path from the American cemetery to the beach below is closed for security reasons, so there may be a lot of walking to connect the two. As for Mont St-Michel, in addition to the Hotel Churchill bus, there is also a company called Bayeux Shuttle that runs buses to the Mont. Bon voyage!

I would not recommend trying to use public transportation to move around the D-Day sights. It will be frustrating time-wise, you will see comparatively little for the time expended and you will not have the benefit of a trained guide. This is a situation in which a tour makes a great deal of sense. I'd go so far as to say that you should skip the whole deal (sticking just to the very good museums in Caen and Bayeux) if you for some reason are not prepared to take a tour.

We also took the train from Paris to Caen. Rented a car in Caen and drove to Bayeux. We toured the D Day site with Overlord tours one full day which was incredible. We rented a car because we went to Mont St Michel our last full day then returned to Paris to catch our early morning flight. It was more cost efficient to drive to MSM then straight back to Paris then to catch a tour to MSM from Bayeux, return to Bayeux and then catch the train back to Paris. Our hotel had car parking at no charge. We really enjoyed the opportunity to see the countryside at our pace and stop when we wanted to.