Narrowing down daytrips from Paris
 

Upcoming trip to Paris will be our 4th. On previous visits we've done daytrips to Versailles, Fontainebleau, Chantilly and Vaux-le-Vicomte. We definitely want to go to Chartres, Giverny and Malmaison. On our short list of other destinations:

Rouen
Amboise
Auvers-sur-Oise
Ile des Impressionnistes

We haven't been to the Loire Valley and don't really want to do a big tour of multiple chateaux all in just one day, so are thinking of Amboise since we can tour the chateau and Da Vinci's home and still have time to experience the small town.

I am thinking we may be able to see Malmaison and Ile des Impressionnistes on the same day; if anyone has experience doing that, would appreciate info on the logisitics, overall experience (I've been to Malmaison many years ago, but not Ile des Impressionistes)

Auvers-sur-Oise - We're primarily interested in the Van Gogh associations

Rouen - for the cathedral and city in general -- not too interested in wineries

We know we won't be able to do all these; we will have to make a decision soon since train tickets to Rouen and Amboise are cheaper now than if we bought them on the spot.
Any input would be most welcome. Thanks.

Hi VANNE,

A good starting point might be PARIS TO THE PAST: Traveling Through French History by Train by Ina Caro, a real Francophile who also includes suggestions for a fine lunch at the destinations she so lovingly describes.

If you have visited all those chateaux around Paris - why go to Amboise to visit just 1 chateau??? The train schedules there & back aren't that great either.

Glad you're not interested in wineries in Rouen - I don't think there are any. Normandy is not really a winegrowning region. Are you confusing it with Reims??

Personally, I would go to Rouen - one of our favorite cities in France. It is a little different from Paris with all the cross-timbered houses.

This is from my Normandy & Brittany itinerary:

This is a beautiful city – one of our favorites in France. We’ve visited it twice. It is a large city, and getting into the historic center can be a little hectic. Remember - shops close for lunch around noon, so get there by 9:30 so that you can pop into some shops that look interesting. Lots of cross-timbered buildings & great churches. Follow the walking itinerary in the Michelin Green Guide. However, we had mixed impressions of the main pedestrian street through the city – the Rue Gros Horloge**. It is a very pretty street, but it’s loaded with visually distracting chain stores (Pimkie, Foot Locker, etc) and it is difficult to really appreciate the beautiful architecture with these distractions. We prefer other streets. One of our favorites is the Rue de Martinville* east of the Cathedral Notre Dame. Follow it as far as the cobblestones go. Slip into the beautiful and quiet Aitre St Maclou** courtyard at the end of the cobblestone section of Martainville. We also like the architecture along Rue Damiette* and the adjacent Rue Eau de Robec with the stream running down the middle of the street.

Stu Dudley

How long are you in Paris for? In 2008 we were there for 12 nights, and decided to go to Bruges, Belgium... Left around 6 am (got a fantastic Prem rate) and we got back in Paris the following night around 6pm. It gave us a glimpse of another country, and we liked it enough that we returned to tour some of Belgium in 2010.

If you want to stay in France, I really love the Loire Valley, and again, I would try to stay at least overnight.

Have fun!

Stu - we haven't been to the Loire Valley before; we don't really have more than a day for a trip with the other things we have planned, so thought Amboise might be a place where we could experience a small town and see a chateau (actually 2 counting Da Vinci's home) without signing on for a whole tour of chateaux; sometime in the future we'll probably spend a few days so we can tour the other chateaux.

And you're correct; Rouen is on our list, but when I was writing what we're interested in there, I inadvertently was thinking of Reims, which I've already been to, when I mentioned we weren't that interested in wineries.

Ruby99 - I've been to Belgium, Netherlands and we've both been to England many times; when I asked my husband if he'd like to do a daytrip out of the country, he preferred to stay in France and mostly go to places we don't have to prebook trains so we can be more flexible on our travel days.

Latedaytraveler - I've heard of the Caro book and tried to get it from our local bookstores but it wasn't in stock --will probably order online. Just thought I'd get some comments from others that might nudge us one way or the other, particularly re the two locations where we'd want to book tickets ahead. I'm sure eventually we'll get to all of them.

I'd vote for Amboise - the Da Vinci Chateau is like nothing else I've seen - more like a country estate than the usual chateaux.

The grounds particularly impressed me; plenty of sculptures plus some other parts that I won't spoil the surprise with. There are a couple of options for cafes in the grounds - much more appealing than the touristy offerings in Amboise itself.

I seem to remember there were evening markets in the street outside the main castle - might be worth investigating these if you have a choice of days you can set aside for that visit. Di

We were in Paris last year in May and went on several day trips that were great - All by train - out in the morning and back in the evening: Dijon - We went on Market day which was great. Strasbourg - a great city for walking and touring. We also went to Reims to tour champagne houses... Some ideas for you...

Can' recommend Paris to the Past highly enough. Tons of great options with the history of why you should visit these places.

I vote for Amboise. A really pretty town with a wide variety of things to see do that are very different.

Amboise does appeal to both of us -- particularly the Da Vinci house with models of some of his inventions. And it seems to be of a size that we would feel we can see everything we want to see in a day.

Dijon and Strasbourg were on our possibles list, along with Lyon, but we decided we would probably rather have at least a day and a half to 2 days for those cities. We know we'll keep going back to France as long as we're physically able (which I certainly hope will be a long time) so we're not in a hurry to see everything all at once.

TTT

Hi again VANNE,

Agree with DI2315 - I would also recommend Amboise to visit Chateau Du Close Luce, given to Da Vinci by the King of France, where the master spent his last three years. Thanks to that arrangement, France got the Mona Lisa.

DENISEA wrote "Can't recommend Paris to the Past highly enough." I think that Caro wrote that book before PARIS TO THE PAST: Traveling Through French History by Train. Both are excellent, but the latter focuses on day trips from Paris.

Factoid: Caro is the wife of presidential historian Robert Caro - they travel in style. :)

If you've been to Malmaison already I don't know that it's worth going back just for the island. The only thing to see/do there is visit the restaurant where Renoir created his famous painting and perhaps dine there, although the walk along the river is nice. Other than that the only thing to see are the tableaux which depict famous paintings on the spot where the artist created them. Chartres, Giverny and Auvers-sur-Oise are all worthwhile day trips that are easily accessible from Paris and the transport fares are fixed so you can do them last minute based on the weather and your whims. If you want more day trip options from Paris I'd be happy to post my list of Paris day trips, though I could probably give you a few dozen other options that aren't on my list if you've got specific requests.

da Vinci left his heart in Amboise - his tomb or at least that of his heart if not the body (not sure) is in town.


And check out the street of troglodyte houses hidden away on a small street just behind the castle.

https://www.google.com/search?q=ambo...=1600&bih=1075

The Amboise train station is across the Loire, perhaps 1.5 km or so from the town center - if walking you get a neat view of the castle hovering high above the Loire from the ancient bridge traversing the Loire here.

If going to Amboise there are two rail routes - one is to hop TGVs from Paris-Montparnasse station to St-Pierre-des-Corps then trains to Amboise or you can take direct trains from Paris-Austerlitz station to Amboise.

The latter has pretty much a flat fare system so you can buy your tickets right before the train or anytime in Paris- TGVs have a multi-tiered fare structure - just show up and ouch - you'll pay a whole lot more than booking far in advance at www.voyages-sncf.com or www.capitraintrain.com - same trains same fares latter is supposed to be much easier to use.

For complete flexibility on your return just take the slower but cheaper walk-up fare train via Les Aubrais/Orleans to Paris - but for variety and a faster trip book the outward ticket if you can find one of those deep discounted tickets (non-changeable non-refundable though I think) - as you never know how much time you may want in a place like Amboise having a fully flexible ticket to use on any of the about hourly slow train route may be desirable - you can always change the ticket - so set a realistically late time to return and if you're ready to go earlier just change the ticket.

Frenchmystique - understand your question about Malmaison, but my husband hasn't seen it. Since I've traveled more than my husband sometimes I'm seeing things for the 2nd time when he's seeing them for the 1st; but it's been I hate to admit over 40 years since I was there, so I'll enjoy seeing it again. Ile des Impressionistes is not a big priority, but it appears something we could do in the same day. I'm now thinking it could be possible for us to get to Giverny right when it opens and then possibly go on to Rouen, forgetting about the Ile des Impressionnistes. We'll just see how things go time wise. Rouen may have to wait for another time -- logistics may well make it impractical.

PalenQ - thanks for the train advice. I discovered last night that I didn't necessarily have to prebook Amboise to get a decent fare, so I think we will not prebook. I'd rather have the flexibility more than saving a few euros.

Auvers-sur-Oise is an easy commuter train trip from Paris-Nord, even though you have to change in Pontoise during weekdays. It costs less than 5 euros to get there.

Here is a photo report about it that you might find interesting: http://tinyurl.com/auvers7-2014

For someone who has already seen Versailles, Fontainebleau, Chantilly and Vaux-le-Vicomte, I think you would be very disappointed by Château Amboise. 80% of Château Amboise was destroyed during the Revolution. What remains is comparatively unremarkable. It´s best viewed from the far side of the Loire River which, if you take the train to Amboise, you will see as the train station itself is on the far side of the river and a bit of a walk into town.

Le Clos Lucé, or Leonardo´s home given to him by François I, is not really a château, at least not by most standards. It contains absolutely nothing of Leonardo´s and probably not really worth a day trip from Paris to visit.

Amboise is a sufficiently charming town but it is absolutely swarming with tourists in summer. If I were to suggest a Loire Valley location worthy of a day´s travel from Paris, I would either take the TER (train from Austerlitz) to Blois and then the bus to Chambord and Cheverny, and not overlook the Château Blois itself:
http://www.azalys-blois.fr/fileadmin...S_CHATEAUX.pdf

or the early TGV to Tours Centre (not St Pierre des Corps) and take one of the many mini bus tours to local sites from the Office de Tourisme just across the street from the train station:
http://www.tours-tourisme.fr/voir-fa...s-les-chateaux

You can admission purchase tickets at a slight discount here:
http://www.tours-tourisme.fr/boutique/billetterie.html
http://www.bloischambord.com/blois/p...e/passchateaux

If you do take the TGV to Tours, consider staying for dinner, train schedules permitting, and visit the historic Place Plumereau - a short walk from the train station.

We found the castle in Amboise fascinating just because it wasn't a "pretty/pretty" chateau - but seemed more of a legitimate military fortress and a big change from many of the others.

Also Le Clos Luce had some wonderful displays of drawings and reconstructions of machines by Leonardo - also fscinating.

If I could only do one chateau I think there would be other I would prefer (Chenonceau, Chambord, the gardens at Villandry) but after all those this was different.

We LOVE Strasbourg - but agree that you need more like 3 or 4 days to see it and the wine road down to Colmar.

I adored Rouen.

We did exactly the trip suggested by Sarastro, taking the train to Blois and then the navette to various châteaux in the vicinity and I highly recommend it.

http://www.bloischambord.co.uk/organ...ambordcheverny

There are frequent departures all day so you can spend as much or as little time as you please at each château. The price can't be beat! It would have been a perfect day if the weather hadn't suddenly turned rainy and windy.

We went in April, and instead of the large bus shown on the brochure, there was a mini-bus.

Hi NYTRAVELER,

Interesting comment: "We found the castle in Amboise fascinating just because it wasn't a "pretty/pretty" chateau - but seemed more of a legitimate military fortress and a big change from many of the others."

I believe there are some 300 "chateaux" in the Loire region of all shapes and sizes. If I may quote from my trip report of 2012:

"Why so many chateaux? The Hundred Years War 1337-1453 (dates vary) was basically a bloody, protracted struggle between France and England and their surrogates stemming from their contradictory claims of sovereignty and inheritance dating back to the Battle of Hastings. We will not attempt to untangle the byzantine complexities of those noble families competing for power including the Capets, Anjous, Burgundians, and Valois. Result – the Kings of France retreated from the coast to the fertile Loire Valley during this time where they built their splendid chateaux.

The first structures were basically fortifications. But as the threat of invasion diminished over time, they became more elegant, akin to the 'stately homes' of Britain. Of course, 'when the French kings began constructing their huge châteaux here, the nobility, not wanting or even daring to be far from the seat of power, followed suit.' Voila- chateaux everywhere! Philippe [guide] said that many are now privately owned by old industrial families who can afford to maintain them..."

KEROUAC, enjoyed revisiting your wonderful excursion to Auvers-sur-Oise - loved the wheat fields with poppies and the hollyhocks in particular.

bvlenci- thanks for the info. The navette wouldn't work for us since we're not going till Oct., but will keep in mind for a future trip.

We'll have been in the Loire for 2 weeks by the time you take off on your trip. We're staying in a Gite halfway between Blois & Amboise. Post something after Sept 24 or top this thread to get my attention, & I'll try to provide my thoughts on the Amboise Chateau compared to the other 14 two & three star chateaux we're planning on visiting in the region. I'll also provide some input on the city of Amboise compared to the hundreds of similarly-sized towns we've visited in France. We've spent about 4 weeks in this area east of Chinon on prior trips - but none since my wife got a digital camera. We stayed in a Gite for a week west of Chinon a few years ago - with digital camera.

I'll also provide my thoughts on the Da Vinci house. We visited Milan last year & saw the huge room/library with his sketches/designs in his own handwriting.

Stu Dudley

the Da Vinci House, which I have visited umpteen times, gets mixed reviews - I like it but many find it fake - re-created machines hanging from the walls - not sure why many are less than enthused but it's small and takes relatively little time.

The Chateau d'Amboise is yes a fortified castle (chateau fort) and thus looks more like a fortress on the front facade hovering over the Loire than more sumptuous Chenonceau - about 15 miles or so from Amboise and ubiquitously called the finest Loire castle - you can take a train right to Chenonceau too if you want to see the consensus finest castle but there is little in the little town of Chenonceaux - yes with an x on the end for some reason - to see or do save a few cafes, small stores, etc.

I like the Amboise Castle a lot - reeks of history with Francois I reigning from here and bring the Rennaisance to France, literally, in bringing an aging Leonardo here and put him up in his own house with lovely gardens.

Amboise is also IMO at the very prettiest stretch of the Loire - a wide sandy river bed here with in dry seasons trinklets of water sashshaying thru it. The view from the island in the middle of the Loire - the western tip is superb - great place for a picnic.

The OP is asking this question in reference to making day trips from Paris. They are not planning an extended stay in the Loire Valley. In the context of a day trip, I would not consider Amboise as compelling a visit as other possibilities such as Strasbourg, Dijon, Chartres or even Tours; particularly for someone who already has visited many of the most important châteaux in France.

I think it depends on your interests, I think Amboise is just as interesting as Chartres, that's for sure. There isn't much to do there of any importance but look at the cathedral, I found Amboise more interesting than Chartres.

I don't really know why people are so interested in seeing chateaux, actually. I am not that interested in seeing big empty stone buildings where rich people lived. So they have to have something special of interest (internally or historically) or be the house of some personnage I am particularly interested in for me to care much about them. For that reason, I found the ones in AMboise and Blois interesting because they were different. It also helps if they have some beautiful gardens, but that isn't enough for me. YOu can just more easily go to Fontainebleau if you want to see pretty gardens and a beautiful chateau, and there is more to see, there, also, withe the Napoleon museum and the history.

I, too, found the Chateau d'Amboise fascinating - it reeks of history, as did Le Clos Luce. I spent three days in Amboise, driving to Blois one of those days. Amboise is a charming town, and would be a lovely day trip! I spent 10 days in the Loire Valley, also staying in Chinon and Saumur - visiting MANY chateaux. Amboise was my favorite place to stay.

I think Rouen deserves more than a day trip, as does Strasbourg, but Chartres is a lovely day trip, and so easy to do. I also give my vote for Ina Caro's books, both of them! She has wonderful ideas. Another book with great ideas is "An Hour From Paris" by Annabel Simms - concise and shorter than Caro's, but good nevertheless. I bought both from Amazon, and had a wonderful time reading and planning before my last 2 week stay in Paris, in May. And I did some day trips suggested in both those books.

There isn't much to do there of any importance but look at the cathedral>

You may want to look around a bit more and discover some nice things most tourists who beeline from the train station to cathedral and back miss in Chartres - like Little Venice - a quaint canal with ancient wooden buildings hanging over it and Picassiette's House - a world-renown exemplar of Art Naive - a street cleaner took the bits and shards of glasses, plates, etc - detritus he found and put them in his garden, fashioning them into veritable works of art - like his reporcution from broken tiles of Chartres Cathedral.

Local kids nicknamed the street cleaner "Picassiette" - a feminized form of Picasso that was mocking him.

Chartres has some really unique things apart from the cathedral but it takes ferreting them out.

Images of the Maison Picassiette:

https://www.google.com/search?q=mais...w=1455&bih=977

I think we've got a good list for daytrips -- can't really make up our minds on Rouen vs. Amboise so I think we'll probably just decide on the spur of the moment -- we'll get up and check the weather reports and decide where to go. We usually travel with a list of things we want to do and if we get 75% (or even 50%) in, that's fine with us - even though it's our 4th trip to Paris together and I've done another many years ago, there's still so much to see in Paris. We like to take time to "smell the roses" (although in reality I'm not that fond of the scent of roses), rather than running around too much.

Really appreciate all the input!

I must agree with PalenQ that there is more to Chartres than just the cathedral and a few minutes spent on the tourist office website would reveal this.

We'll definitely explore the city -- I've read about the canal and the Art Naïve house. One of the reasons I put Chartres on the list is that even though I've already seen the cathedral, I was with a college group at the time and all we were allowed time for was to see the cathedral.