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Part 1 of 5
Last week my mom was in town. We putzed around Germany for most days, but over the 3 day weekend we took a trip to France. **I feel obliged to mention here how incredibly awesome my husband is for literally taking my place for three full days while I got to have fun exploring. He did laundry, made pumpkin spice french toast for the kids, took the kiddos shopping and the house was totally spotless when I came home! I am one lucky girl!**
Anyway on to the trip details. We packed A LOT in three days. Can Paris and Normandy be done in 3 days? Well yes, but I wouldn’t exactly recommend it. There were a few hiccups. I umm drove on the wrong side of the road in Normandy. Got a speeding ticket on the way to the train station in Germany. Oh and we missed our train from Normandy to Paris. Oops. But when you don’t have kids in tow these things aren’t such a big deal. As the french would say, cest la vie!
For this trip I did a lot of journaling. I bought a kindle book, Globejotting by Dave Fox, a few months back that has some great tips for travel journaling and it really helped me in trying to capture and remember each experience. In addition to snapping a gazillion pictures I wrote down little bits and pieces that to me stood out and since there are so many different ideas I captured I plan to do a “mini series”. It was only a 3 day trip, but we packed in so much in two very incredible places that I have a lot of different things I experienced.
For this post I’ll just highlight some of my favorites overall:
Sheep Herding in Normandy
Our first night in Normandy we were in the midst of enjoying one of the best meals I’ve ever had when….
My mom glanced out the window and noticed a whole herd of sheep walking in the street. They must have been bringing the sheep in for the night because the next morning the sheep were being led back to the fields. It was one of those moments were it really felt like we were somewhere very different.
Seeing Mont St. Michele for the First Time
Mont St Michele is personally one of my favorite sites I’ve visited thus far. It was a culmination of senses to explore this extraordinary church.
Omaha Beach
Being in a place were so many young souls sacrificed their lives is raw. It’s humbling. It’s thought provoking and it will change the way you feel and think about war and our military and what it means to be an American.
Seeing the Eiffel Tower
It was a very soggy day in Paris, but an umbrella is just another accessory for a girl in the city of lights! It sure does look tiny in this picture, but when you see it in person it’s huge! It’s gorgeous.
Eating Chipotle in Paris
You read that right! Chipotle was a highlight for me on this trip just like it was a highlight when I went to London. It reminds me of home.
Next I’ll share some tips I learned for planning a trip to Normandy and Paris. What to pack. Where to stay. How to get around. What to see. And how to set up a good itinerary.
Read Part 2
[...] About « Ooh la la! A Weekend Getaway to Normandy and Paris [...]
With only eight days and one day trip planned, I woldun’t necessarily recommend going very far out of Ile-de-France. Versailles is accessible by RER, so you don’t need to take the national rail. Fontainebleu isn’t far away, either. Chartres is very do-able as a day trip it’s a nice little medievalish town with a lovely cathedral. As for Normandy, Rouen is only an hour away. Giverny is also 45 minutes by train as well, although the train station is in Vernon, so you’d either have to take a taxi or a bus from there to Giverny a few kilometres away. With the new (well, as of 2007, anyway) TGV Est, Reims, the capital of Champagne and the site of the cathedral where France’s kings were crowned, is a mere 45 minutes away. Unfortunately, some of more interesting sites in Normandy that others are suggesting, such as Bayeux and Mont Saint-Michel, are a bit too far away (or, rather, require transfers and long layovers) if you’re going to taking the train. If you’re driving or plan to spend a night away, I would highly recommend those two. I really adored both. But I also REALLY adore Paris and think that an overnight day-trip on an eight-day trip is too much. But that’s just me.Someone else suggested some place in the Loire valley. Given a choice between Normandy (with the exception of Bayeux and Mont St-Michel) and the Loire, I’d actually take the latter. Tours is an hour away by TGV, but doesn’t boast any castles of its own. Orleans is only an hour away as well (but, again, no castles). Blois, which does have a castle, is between an hour and a half and two hours away. As with the case of Normandy, some of the other castles that I really loved (Chinon, Azay-le-Rideau) require too much time to visit in just one day by train.IF you decide to go to Versailles, DO visit the town and not just the palace