Husband & I will be in france early September. Arriving Paris Friday AM and staying until Monday. Taking TGV to St Malo visiting relatives and touring. We are leaving St Malo on Thursday and I'm having trouble deciding what to do with the balance of our trip. We fly out of CDG on Sunday. My choices are return to Paris (we've been there before on our honeymoon) or rent a car drive to honfleur on Thursday, stay in honfleur Thursday & Friday. Drop off the car in Rouen on Saturday stay Sat night in Rouen and take TGV direct to CDG on Sunday. Any thoughts?
Posted by
Pensacola
9110 posts
Honfleur is my favorite town in Normandy, but two days is way too much.
Poke from St Malo by stopping to see the dol-de-bretagne (standing stone on the south side of the town by the same name) and swinging up to see the tapestry at Bayeux. Three hours of driving and another three for stops would make it about right for a nice day. That would get you in by mid to late afternoon which is plenty. (The best grub is not down by the old port -- find the square just to the north, then walk beside the Corsair restaurant on a little street until it dead ends on another street with a slew of great places to eat.)
Spend one night in Honfluer and two in Rouen. Either enroute or on a day excursion (forty-five minutes each way OR it adds and hour to the one-hour Honfleur - Rouen drive) get down to Les Andelys. On a hill south of town is Chateau Gaillard. It's mostly a pile of ruins, but has a terrific view of the loops in the Seine and is the only castle that Richard I built in France although he lived there most of his life.
All the above assumes that you have no interest in the WW II stuff.
Posted by
OP
Rockland
6 posts
Thanks for the advice. Will take a leisurely drive down to Honfleur and stay two nights in Rouen