navigational aids

Others will disagree with me, but I would say, follow the road signs. They will never steer you wrong and they will direct you to every hotel, restaurant and cultural site.

There are two. One is an old fashioned Michelin road map of the area you will visit, bought on the internet. The second is a GPS with preloaded maps of Europe. We saved to favorites the addresses of our B&B and hotels and places we wanted to visit across Normandy and Brittany, like museums or WWII cemeteries. We learned to use the GPS before we left the US. Sometimes the GPS will want you to leave a main highway and take a back road because it may be a few kilometers shorter. You will need the map to prevent that from happening.
As we departed the hard to find rental car lot in Caen, we touched the car icon on the screen to mark the entrance, then labeled it as well. On our return at rush hour in a driving rainstorm, the GPS led us right to the car lot entrance, and we would have been lost without it. For a place with no real street address, like a cemetery or a rural B&B, use Google Earth to find it, then note the latitude and longitude at the bottom left of the Google image and save that precise degrees, minutes, and seconds into the GPS and label it. Voila!! So easy to do and such a lifesaver for driving just about anywhere. We easily found our rural B&B in Normandy and drove right to the entryway outside Villers-Bocage, which is near Bayeux.

Thanks. That GPS system did you use?

I have a TomTom, preloaded with Euro maps, purchased online. Better to buy the ones preloaded rather than the inexpensive ones and then buy maps.
The local bigbox store has various brands also. I have been disappointed in the battery life, but have been told that's not unusual given we only pull it out a few times a year.

Thanks, will take your advice and purchase a preloaded GPS today.

Good move getting the GPS. My experience is that the signage in Europe isn't as wonderful as other folks find it to be. As can be the case anywhere, signs that are perfectly clear to the locals and to the sign planners may be ambiguous to strangers. Or they may simply be missed such as on a narrow country road with high vegetation growing on the sides. I've done a full circle around more than one "rond point" looking for the right exit before GPS. Our brand is Garmin. I've toured Europe in the days before GPS and smart phones. It's so much easier now. We use our iPhone to check opening hours and addresses, the latter which we enter into the GPS to avoid using internet maps which use a lot of data. But you also need a good map which is essential for route planning and backup to the GPS on the road. Get the Michelin 1:200,000 map for the area you'll be visiting, or the Michelin France Atlas.

I also have a TomTom. I consistently hear good reviews for TomToms and Garmins, I wouldn't get another brand. I ended up getting the TomTom because it's made in Europe and that was the primary reason I bought it (but works fine here too). Get one with maps for Europe and N. America preloaded. I've heard downloading maps can cost as much as a lower price GPS by themselves.