glsebs

We have been to France several times, but have never been to these parts of the country. I want to make our air reservations for Sept. and am trying to figure out how many days we need for this trip. We want to spend 2 nights in Paris either at the beginning or end of the trip (we only want to spend 2 nights as we have been to Paris many times). We want to rent a car to see these areas, but do not want to drive a car in or out of Paris...rather stay in Paris, then take a train and pick up a car in a city in Normandy or Brittany or pick up car at CDG and drive somewhere close by for the first night and train back to Paris at the end.
I am thinking we need 9 nights including 2 in Paris to see the highlights of Normandy and Brittany.
Any help would be appreciated.

rex

We did a whirlwind of 8 days last September, and I would say that we were able to take in a modest fraction of the highlights of Normandy and Brittany. Our itinerary was as follows:

Day 1 - arrive Paris; afternoon at Giverny; first night near Lisieux

Day 2 - area around Camembert and the Pays d'Auge; 90 minute break in the town of Villedieu les Poeles en route to Paimpol.

Day 3 - stayed a second night in Paimpol; exploring in and around a small fraction of the the northern/eastern corner of Brittany.

Day 4 - a little under a half day in St, Malo and then about 3-4 hours at Mont St Michel, staying about 20 minutes from there

Day 5 - onward to Arromanches, spending almost all day en route, visiting sites of the invasion of Normandy at Sainte Mere l'Eglise, Pointe du Hoc and the American cemetery at Colleville sur Mer

Day 6 - delayed our departure from Arromanches quite a bit, taking another 3-4 hours at the museum there and Arromanches 360; onward for a lunch/blitz visit to Honfleur - - then finished our onward journey to Etretat.

Day 7 - stayed a second night in Etretat, consuming a fair part of the day visiting the Benedictine Palace at Fecamp.

Day 8 - drove the 3 hours back to Paris for our return flight home.

So, I would say that eight days is a fairly limited sampling of Normandy and Brittany combined; you may want to split your time "unevenly" as we did, or just choose one or the other. And you could spend 15 days instead in either without hitting quite a few of the "highlights".

Best wishes,

Rex
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kebanks

One option is to take a train to Rouen and pick up your car there (although getting the car at CDG is not bad either - no need to get into Paris downtown traffic, and the drive to Normandy is pretty quick). You should have plenty of time to get a good flavor of both regions in a week. Of course, you could easily do much longer in either, but ... a week is pretty nice. I did an abbreviated tour in 4 days - too short, but still great. Since you've gotten this far, you probably know what you want to see, but my one piece of advice is, try to visit Mont St. Michel off-peak. In fact, I'd probably stay on the Mont. It's an amazing place, but you gotta miss the tourist hordes to really appreciate it.

Jean

If the focus of your trip to Normandy is the D-Day invasion, don't miss the Peace Museum in Caen.

klondike

YOU COULD TRAIN TO RENNES. PICK UP YOUR CAR. HEAD NORTH PASSING THROUGH COMBOURG (L0VELY HOTEL/RESTAURANT DU LAC) OF CHATEAUBRIAND FAME. PASS THROUGH DINAN, ONTO DINARD AND ST. MALO. FOLLOW ALONG THE COAST TO MONT ST MICHEL. AGREE WITH ABOVE, THE MONT IS TOTALLY DIFFERENT "AFTER HOURS". (HAVE STAYED AT HOTEL ST. PIERRE AND LIKED IT) THIS WILL GIVE YOU A TASTE OF BRITTANY--CREPES, LOCAL ARCHITECTURE ETC., THOUGH FOR LANGUAGE, DRESS AND PARISH CLOSES YOU WOULD NEED TO GO FURTHER WEST TOWARDS THE "INTERIOR" AND FINISTERE. I LIKE THE PREVIOUS RECOMMENDATIONS FOR NORMANDY (HONFLEUR IS REALLY HIGH ON MY LIST), LEAVING THE CAR IN ROUEN AND TRAINING BACK TO PARIS.
GOOD LUCK AND LET US KNOW HOW THE TRIP GOES!