The Herring Festivals of North France take the otherwise rather humble fish and celebrate it in great style. I love herrings and claim to know a little about them (my Finnish relatives are responsible for that). But even I have to admit that nowhere in Finland rivals North France in its herring adulation and public festivities. 

The Poisson Roi

The King Fish (also called the ‘silver of the sea’) is a noble beast, a staple food for our ancestors and a major factor in the prosperity of Yarmouth in the UK, and towns and cities along the North France coast. 

I did a little research and was astonished. Do you know about the Hatchet, the Big eyed long fin, the Sanaga pygmy, the fierce sounding Wolf, and dozens of other herring varieties?

They are fascinating, but let’s not bother with those living in seas far away; what we are dealing with here is the abundant, glorious, Atlantic herring which can be eaten raw, pickled, fermented, barbecued and smoked (kippers).  

Herrings have been a staple diet since Roman times and probably way before that. Above all, herrings are very good for you and are in no danger of being overfished.

Normandy Herring Festivals 2026

Normandy is famous for its herring festivals. They take place in November each year. In fishing towns from Le Tréport, along the Alabaster coast ports of Dieppe, St-Valery-en-Caux, Fécamp and inland Lieurey, herring festivals dominate November’s food festivals. 

Tons of herrings are served up, many cooked on huge open barbecue style fires, and washed down with good wine. There’s entertainment and the locals dress up in traditional costume. It’s a fabulous day (or weekend); even non devotees are converted.

Check out the Normandy Website on Herring Festivals

Le Tréport Herring Festival: Nov 7-8, 2026
The historic fishing port is dominated by the highest chalk cliffs in Europe (106m/348 ft.) These dramatic cliffs are lit up every evening from  June to September and on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays from October to May, making a dramatic backdrop to the town. Take the funicular railway up to the top, a delightful neighbourhood of old streets and houses, originally inhabited by the Cordiers (line fishermen). Le Tréport was once one of the major herring centres of Europe.

There’s plenty to enjoy at Le Tréport which officially heralds the start of the herring festival season. Sample grilled, marinated, smoked and barbecued herring with chips, buy at the fish markets and fishermen stalls, or the artisan stalls and be entertained with music as you go.

Dieppe Herring and Scallop Festival: Nov 7-8, 2026
Over 100,000 people descend on this popular port for the best known festival in Normandy, and probably the whole of France, which includes the classier scallop. During the festival the quays are buzzing and the smell of cooking herrings fills the air.

At any time of the year, stroll through Le Pollet, the former fisherman’s quarter with its old houses and small streets. Dieppe’s Saturday morning market is not to be missed; it was voted (a few years ago but hey ho that hasn’t changed), as France’s best.

Lieurey Herring Festival: Nov 11, 2026
Lieurey may be inland but 10,000 visitors come here every year to celebrate a tradition that goes back to the 15th century. Merchants who were delivering herrings to soldiers stopped in Lieurey during a snowstorm and sold their herrings to the villagers instead. And it’s a charming, little known town to visit as well.

Saint-Valery-en-Caux Herring Festival: Nov 21-22, 2026
The town of St-Valery-en-Caux shelters under the cliffs, making it the perfect safe fishing port and seaside resort. Walk along the promenade that stretches out beside the sea for a healthy dose of ozone.

The herring festival delivers everything you expect: lots of grilled herrings, lots to drink and take in and sea shanties to listen to.

Fécamp Herring and Scallop Festival: Nov 28-29, 2026
The fishing tradition dates back to 1030 and the fair to 50 years later. In 1088, Duke Robert II, eldest son of William the conqueror, gave the Abbey of Abbey of Fécamp the right to establish an annual fair ‘that will last as long as herring fishing exists’. The festival sees around 40,000 visitors who come to eat, see filleting demonstrations, the election of the Herring Queen and entertainment running from sea shanties to family fun on the Sadi Carnot, Jean Recher, and Grand Quai quays.

If you’re here for the festival, don’t miss a visit to Les Pêcheries Musée which takes you back to the glory days of the fishing industry when the fishing boats set out for the Iceland and Newfoundland banks to fish for cod, fishing trips that lasted for months and were sometimes fatal. If it’s cold, make a quick trip to Palais Bénédictine, the main distillery for the famous liqueur.

While we’re on the subject of fishy carnivals…

Pas de Calais

Boulogne-sur-Mer Herring Festival: Nov 21-22, 2026
Boulogne is France’s foremost fishing port. 320,000 tonnes of seafood are processed each year, and stored in some of the largest refrigeration facilities in Europe. So it’s not surprising that the Boulogne Herring Festival is such a big event. It takes place around the Napoleon basin, in the heart of Boulogne’s harbour. Try the noble fish – smoked, grilled, marinated and in soup. Listen to sea shanties from the local group, Vareuses Porteloises, and look at traditional floats and stands. And enjoy the culinary demonstrations.

Dunkirk Carnival: Jan-Apr 2027
The Dunkirk Carnival is a totally bonkers event, celebrating 300 years of those departures to the New World. Plan to be there on Shrove Tuesday. Why? Well to make sure you’re there to receive herrings thrown from the Town Hall balcony. Don’t worry; the smoked herrings are wrapped. But do dress up if you can so you fit in perfectly with the locals. It takes place over weekends in January to March each year.

More Information

How to get to Normandy from the UK
Normandy Travel Guide

Events in France in November

France and Food

The Food of France – An intriguing story
Discover the Regional Food of France
Surprisingly, the artist Toulouse-Lautrec was a great cook. He followed the seasons and local produce. More about this unexpected gourmet and his recipe book, the Art of Cuisine.

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Caen attracts two kinds of visitors: those who are there specifically for the D-Day Landing Beaches and all things World War II…and those who land here after the Channel crossing…and leave immediately to drive furiously to whatever destination they’re making for. Here’s a guide to Caen to persuade you to make this a short break.

Having written extensively on D-Day both here (see my list/links at the end bottom of the article) and been the co-author of the Bradt D-Day Landing Guide, I well understand the former.

But those who just see Caen as a jumping off port are missing out on this delightful, lively city where visitors who defy the usual practice and make it a destination stop are well rewarded.

A Little History of Caen

William and Mathilda

2027 is an important year for Normandy – and Europe. It sees the international celebration of William the Conqueror and Caen is the perfect place to start their colourful story.

Two of the main buildings in Caen are associated with William the Conqueror (c. 1028-1087) and Mathilda of Flanders (c. 1031-1083), so please excuse this very short history (or scroll past).

William was known as William the Bastard, being the illegitimate son of unmarried Duke Robert I of Normandy and his mistress Herleva. William’s chosen wife was the aristocratic Mathilda – granddaughter of King Robert II of France. Her reply to his declaration was pretty curt – she would not marry a bastard. The story then goes into Mills and Boon territory. William either rode to Bruges, forced himself into her bedroom and beat her. Or he dragged her from her horse and presumably declared his undying resolve in the mud.

Apparently fascinated by such a manly response, Mathilda consented. Historians, naturally, dispute this version, but let’s not get in the way of a good story.

William and Mathilda were married  in 1051-2 (probably in Rouen Cathedral), despite Pope Leo IX banning the union on the grounds of consanguinity – the couple were third cousins once removed. Four or five children later, Pope Nicholas II granted a dispensation after the couple agreed to found two churches as penance, the Abbaye aux Hommes and the Abbaye aux Dames.

Top Sights in Caen

Château de Caen

Begun by William the Conqueror in 1060 and fortified by his son Henry Beauclerk in 1123, it retains enough of the old buildings to show its size and importance. A walk over the moat into the citadel shows you how difficult the castle would be to attack. The greatest damage was done when Caen was bombed in 1944. Since then restoration work has brought the castle back to life.

A walk up to the ramparts reveals the city below, the church of St-Pierre and in the distance the Abbaye aux Hommes.

I’d advise you to start, if possible, with a visit to the Exchequer, a handsome stone building from the late 11^th century. Inside it’s empty but wait for the immersive show. The doors close behind you; the lights dim to blackness and the great salon is filled with the sounds and sights of A Journey through the 1000-year history of Caen based on the 2025 commemorative year.  It brings to life the history of the ancient city, taking you back into the lives of long distant ancestors, through the industrial era, on to World War II and beyond.

There’s plenty to see in the extensive grounds: the Musée de Normandie takes you at a gallop through the story of the region; the Fine Arts Museum takes you on a whistle stop tour of art through the ages and you can visit the sinister tower of Queen Mathilda.

If you can allow at least half a day.

Abbaye aux Hommes

The magnificent building, with glorious flowering gardens in front, is impressive. To one side stands the Church of Saint-Etienne, one of Normandy’s greatest Romanesque buildings. Don’t miss this out; it’s imposing and atmospheric. The west front is a wonderful mix of Romanesque; with three tiers in different styles flanked by two ornate towers.

The vast interior is plain, with an 18^th-century organ standing proud at the west end. At the east end you’ll find the tomb of William the Conqueror, though after the church was sacked by the Hugenots in the 16^th century, his remains were scattered. All that remains of him is a femur, which is buried beneath the stone.

The main building in the complex, designed in the 18^th century, is a wonderful example of the neo-classical style. Today it’s the town hall, but it also has a good exhibition space and cloisters which in their feeling of serenity and privacy take you away from the stresses of everyday life. Don’t miss the Chapter Hall where the monks originally gathered daily to listen to one (just one) of the 73 chapters of the life of St Benedict. Today it’s the wedding room of the city hall.

Abbaye aux Dames

Founded in 1062 by Queen Matilda and consecrated in June 1066, it stands about 1 mile away from the Abbaye aux Hommes. Step inside the Eglise de la Trinité, mostly built in the 11^th century in Romanesque style. Queen Matilda is buried here which I find rather sad; William and Matilda were a devoted couple. The building is a smaller version of the Abbaye aux Hommes; the grand façade looking more welcoming, the cloister smaller and more intimate. It was occupied by Benedictine nuns until the French Revolution then followed the usual path of such buildings. It first became a barracks, then housed beggars and the homeless, became a hospital in 1823, then a hospice in 1908 and today houses the Regional Normandy Council.

Take a guided tour to see the whole building, including the crypt. It’s surrounded by a large park with lovely views over Caen.

Walk the City

Caen is an easy city to walk around and the tourist office (in the Hotel d’Esceville), conveniently located south of the castle, is a good place to start from.

Walk down rue St Pierre, now mainly a shopping street with bland modern buildings…except for two half-timbered buildings at 52 and 54, stand out, rather incongruously.

If you’re feeling energetic and have time, take a left down rue Paul-Doumer to the Place de la Republique, laid out as a public garden. Then walk past the 17^th-Century Notre Dame de la Gloriette to Place Malherbe and into Place St Sauveur.

Stop for a coffee in Place Saint Sauveur and sit and look at the 18^th-century houses that march down the sides. Or shop at the market on Friday mornings for local Normandy cheeses, breads, meats and more. It’s all presided over by a statue of Louis XIV depicted as a Roman emperor rather than the Sun King. When I was there he was encased in a wooden box, decorated with some dubious Bacchanalian figures. You could see the regal figure but you could also see the back wooden wall as well. Hopefully it was temporary and he has now been restored to his real glory.

Then you are at the Abbaye aux Hommes.

Jardin des Plantes et Jardin Botanique

The collection was started in 1689 from the private garden of Jean-Baptiste Callard de la Ducquerle. Today there’s an impressive main building and acres of plant-filled gardens. You can grab something to eat here. While it’s popular with locals for its advice, lessons and information on plants generally, it’s also a delightful place for visitors o wander through. Check opening times and ticket prices here.

Where to Stay in Caen

We stayed at The People Caen, which is an upmarket hostel. Being of a slightly greater age than your normal hostel person, we were a little nervous. But it’s a fabulous place for people of any age and filled with families with the odd grandparent in tow.

Bedrooms are comfortable, light and airy though not large; bathrooms are good. There’s a rooftop bar with great views, good pizzas to order in the evening and the odd market inside selling all sorts of colourful, sometimes over-the-top kind of fashion that only suits somebody under 21.

Added to this, there’s a garage next door (though beware of using foreign credit cards; we spent a couple of hours with the very helpful receptionist trying to pay before succeeding). Once your car is safely stowed away, tram T2 starts its route here at Presqu’Île. There’s also a free shuttle bus taking you around Caen. The one from here goes through the centre of town ending up at the Palais des Sports.

There are plenty of hotels in Caen, from budget accommodation to luxury.

Where to Eat in Caen

Vaugueux is the district to make for. It’s an area of small streets just east of the Chateau with a whole pedestrianised street of excellent restaurants and bars. We walked there from the hostel, about a 20 minute pleasant stroll. Our destination? Horace.

Horace is a delightful restaurant located in one of the old houses that fill the district. We ate on the outside terrace, a people-watching magnet. The menu is traditional using local ingredients. An excellent €24 and €28 menu takes in crispy camembert with apple and Normandy sausage, mains such as confit of duck, salmon and pasta for vegetarians. Desserts might included warm chocolate cake with passion-fruit sorbet and almond cake with lemon and vervain. The €42 menu includes the likes of oysters, sea bream ceviche and duck foie gras for starters, scallops, sirloin steak and more.

Horace
15 rue du Vaugueux 
14000 Caen
Tel: +33 (0) 2 31 93 50 7
Open Thursday to Monday 12noon-1.30pm & 7-9.30pm

Le Carlotta
Located on the Bassin Saint Pierre quay, Le Carlotta is a delightful Art Deco brasserie, complete with all the glorious over-the-top decorated glass, mirrors and plush red seating you expect to see in a traditional brasserie. Take advantage of the seaside location and order seafood – from oysters to a groaning fruits de mer plateau (€49 or €70). Those after turf rather than surf might go for duck confit parmentier (with a potato topping), or a generous steak. It’s not the cheapest restaurant in Caen but it’s gracious, well positioned and serves excellent meals.

Le Carlotta
16 quai Vendeuvre
14000 Caen
Tel: +33 (0)2 31 86 68 99
Open Monday to Friday noon-2.30pm & 7-11pm

How to Get to Caen

By Sea

Like most Brits we went on Brittany Ferries from Portsmouth, one of the best ferry companies. The Guillaume de Normandie, the second of their Hybrid-LNG ships, takes ferry crossings up another level. If you go overnight take a comfortable cabin with a good bathroom. And eat if you can, in the Bella Riva restaurant rather than the casual café to keep the cruise feeling. There are allergy free and pet friendly cabins as well. Public spaces are roomy and it’s remarkably quiet compared to the diesel engine ferries.  

Top Tip:
We travelled by day, landing at Caen around 10pm. We got through fairly fast (if you can take the right-hand lane exiting the ferry which gives you two control points. But with the new 2026 restrictions it might take longer to get out of the French port. With our late arrival we booked at the Hotel du Phare. It’s a basic 2-star hotel, with a charming staff. We arrived too late to have a drink in the bar, but the manager brought us glasses and biscuits as we opened the bottle of Calvados we had bought on board. Rooms are fine for a quick overnight stay; there’s a good breakfast and you can park right outside the hotel. If you take a front view room you can see the port and the ferry, a 2-minute drive away.

Hotel du Phare
10 Place du Général de Gaulle
Ouistreham 14150
Tel: +33 (0)2 31 97 13 13
Normandy Tourism Website information on Le Phare
Rooms from  €75 a night

Caen and World War II

Caen was the great objective of the D-Day Landings in June 1944. But it took far longer for the Allies to take than originally planned. On June 7, on their way from the Normandy landing beaches, the British and Canadian Divisions ran into the formidable German 12^th SS Panzer Division, the infamous Hitlerjugend (Hitler Youth). Fighting in the villages all around Caen took an extremely heavy toll and there are memorials in all these areas. You’ll find Commonwealth War Graves Commissions graveyards, places kept beautifully where the ages of those killed make you weep. There are memorials like the one dedicated to the Typhoon pilots, a dramatic black marble monument shaped as two arrows meeting, commemorating the 151 Typhoon pilots killed in Normandy between May and August 1944. And the emotive Abbaye d’Ardenne, where the Canadian Massacre memorial in a small peaceful garden is witness to the 15 Canadian prisoners of war murdered on June 7.

If you want to see these, and a whole lot more, then (excuse the blatant advert), please buy a copy of the book I wrote with Alastair McKenzie, D-Day Landings, A Travel Guide to Normandy’s Beaches and Battlegrounds. It‘s published by Bradt Travel Guides and you can get it in bookshops or through Bradt Travel Guides website, or Amazon.  

Mémorial de Caen 

If you have just one museum to visit outside the centre, make it the Mémorial de Caen. It covers both world wars in detail, but is particularly strong on World War II. Superb themes, artefacts, videos and more will really bring history to life. But be warned, some of the story is very uncomfortable. The museum moves from One War to Another, through France in the dark years of the 30s, from European to World War and more to finish with, through Genocide, and propaganda to the end of the war…and what impact it had. There’s an excellent section on the D-Day Landings which I recommend you see before setting off around the sites around Caen. It ends with a 19-minute film.

The museum then continues to the Cold War and more. Don’t miss General Richter’s Underground Bunker which is a separate building.

Le Mémorial de Caen
Esplanade Général Eisenhower
CS 55026
14050 Caen Cedex 4
Tel : +33 (0) 2 31 06 06 45
Website
Opening times vary during the year so check the website. But mainly the museum is open daily 9am-6pm.
Tickets: Adult €20.80; child and seniors €18.50; Family €53. Other rates valuable.
Combined tickets with other attractions also available.

More about Normandy

Normandy Impressionist Festival 2026
Normandy and Impressionism – A general overall look at the great Impressionist art movement and what to see in Normandy
Guide to the Impressionist Painters
Normandy Travel Guide – What to see and Do in Normandy
Getting to Normandy

World War II in Normandy

D-Day Landing Beaches from Utah to Sword

Caen Tourism Website

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The wide-ranging Normandy Impressionist Festival (Normandie Impressionisme) runs from May 29 to September 27, 2026. It’s a great year for Impressionism, marking the centenary of Claude Monet’s death in Giverny. The artist spent the last 43 years of his life here, making and painting his garden, marking Monet’s painting into a more abstract mode. The theme of this year’s Impressionist Festival is one of questions and ideas around Un Possible Jardin – The Gardens of Possibilities – a Contemporary Homage to Claude Monet. It’s directly inspired by Monet’s Giverny garden and the idea of gardens that are personal and intimate or public, openness or closure, nature controlled or allowed to rampage free and more.

It’s a very French and philosophical approach, but if you want to, just enjoy the huge number of different exhibitions for the art alone, leaving the philosophy to others.

The contemporary trail takes the idea of Monet’s Giverny garden with a series of exhibitions in places like Honfleur, Rouen, Vernon, Le Havre and more.

The festival concentrates on important contemporary works. Some of the most famous international artists have contributed: Ai Weiwei, Fujiko Nakaya, Noemie Goudal and others.

The Birth of Impressionism

It’s the evening of April 15, 1874, and a group of 30 young, unknown and struggling  painters gather in the studio of the photographer Félix Nadar at 35 boulevard des Capucines for an exhibition of their work. The Cooperative and Anonymous Society of Painters, Sculptors and Printmakers included Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Edgar Degas, Berthe Morisot, Claude Monet, Camille Pissaro, Alfred Sisley and Paul Cézanne. They were showing works that had been rejected by the Académie des Beaux-Arts Salon. 

The exhibition was not a success; it was too revolutionary for the time. The name ‘Impressionism’ was coined as an insult by a Parisian journalist called Louis Leroy. He was writing about Monet’s Impressionism, Soleil Levant, a painting of the sun rising over the port at Le Havre and he referred to it as ‘unfinished’. He wrote sarcastically in the journal Charivari on April 25, 1874: “What does this painting represent? Impression! Impression, I was sure of it. I also said to myself, since I am impressed, there must be some impression in it.”

Impressionism was born in that studio, and greeted with universal initial horror; the style was such a complete change from the stuffy classicism of the past 100 years. It took decades before Impressionism was appreciated and the artists struggled for many years.

2026 Normandy Impressionist Festival

The exhibitions centre around Normandy and Paris, the two places most associated with the Impressionists. It was on the beaches of the Normandy coastline and along the bustling boulevards of Paris where the artists set up their easels to record life and paint in the open air, something made possible by the invention of oil paints in tubes.

Major Exhibitions of Normandy Impressionist Festival 2026

Museums in Normandy

Giverny

Musée des Impressionnismes: Monet in Giverny: Before the Water Lilies, 1883-1890 takes Monet’s early years here, from 1883 to 1890 when he bought the house and began designing the garden. 30 paintings depict poplars, meadows, the banks of the Epte and the Seine in different weather patterns: rain and sunlight, mist and clouds.
March 27 to July 5, 2026

Honfleur

Musée Eugène Boudin: In this exceptionally pretty little port town, the museum is featuring Monet’s early days as an artist. Boudin encouraged the young painter to go outdoors to paint en plein air.

Rouen

Musée des Beaux-Arts de Rouen has the largest collection of works by Monet outside Paris. Particularly worth seeing are his paintings of Rouen Cathedral. In summer you can see the facades of Rouen Cathedral lit up nightly, usually from June to September. The theme for this year is still to be announced.

Studio DRIFT shows the installation Meadow, with water lily lights opening under the visitors’ heads. It’s in the city centre heritage space: the 10^th century Sainte-Croix-des-Pelletiers church.

Le Havre

The maritime city is not appreciated enough for its museums and galleries. But this year it pushes the boat out with Monet in Le Havre at the Museum of Modern Art (MuMa).

Monet lived in Le Havre as a child and a young man, from 1845 when Monet was five years old to 1874, a seminal year for Monet and Impressionism. It was a formative time: he painted his first canvas, View Taken at Rouelles as well as major works like The Pointe de la Hève at Sainte-Adresse (National Gallery, London) and Seascape:, Night Effect (1864, National Gallery, Scotland). At the mouth of the Seine Estuary, nearby Pointe de la Hève at Sainte-Adresse was seen as the ‘end of the world’.

His family and local collectors were immensely supportive, and his painter friends Eugene Boudin and Gustave Courbet introduced him to new patrons. The exhibition has documents not seen before about his life, paintings, drawings and sketchbooks as well as photographs.
June 5-September 27, 2026

Caen

Celeste Boursier-Mougenot created a sound installation inspired by Monet’s water lilies – Clinamen which is outdoors in Caen at the Colline aux Oiseaux Park. FRAC Normandie has a crysstal garden and a circle of 12 ‘sound swings’  (which you can play on) topped with church bells.

Paris

Musée de l’Orangerie: Monet – au fil de l’eau (Monet – In Real Time). The theme of Monet  painting time focuses on how Monet’s style clanged from the 1870s to the 1890s. Almost 40 paintings are displayed at the museum that was called a true ‘Sistine Chapel of Impressionism (Andre Masson in 1952), with particular focus on the famous Nymphéas (Water Lilies).
September 30, 2026 to January 25, 2027.

Musée Marmottan Monet: Houses the world’s largest collection of Monet paintings (including Impression, Sunrise). The museum will host Histoires du Paysage de Monet a Hockney (1890-1925). Focusing on landscape art it starts with Monet and then goes on to show works by major 20^th and 21^st century artists, ending with David Hockney’s famous Normandy pieces. 

La Maison Impressioniste Argenteuil

West of Paris on the banks of the Seine, Claude Monet lived in Argenteuil from 1871 to 1878. He painted over 256 works here, with 156 depicting Argenteuil. His studio and living rooms have been reconstructed in the Museum. Along with the documents here you get an idea of Monet’s life and work.

Monet’s House in Vétheuil

Claude Monet lived in a rented house in Vétheuil, about 15 minutes from Giverny, from 1878 to 1881. It was an unhappy time for the artist; his first wife Camille, died here and his paintings were not selling. But the paintings of his small, steep garden are lush and happy. You can visit the house this year at specific times. Check the website for openings.
Apr 1-Oct 31, 2026.

Where to see Clade Monet’s paintings in Paris

Musée d’Orsay has the greatest collection of Impressionist paintings in the world. 

Houses and Studios of the Impressionists

Walking around an artist’s house and studio gives a wonderfully realistic feel of the painter, their life and work. The most visited, and well-known, is the house of Claude Monet in Giverny (see above).

Visit any of these other houses during the Normandy Impressionist Festival 2026; all are well worth a detour.

Jean-François Millet was born in 1841 in Gréville-Hague, northeast Normandy. The modest house is now a museum, recalling his childhood in the mid 19th century.
In 1849 he moved to Barbizon on the edge of the Forest of Fontainebleau and lived there until 1875. Here he painted the local rural life, in particular L’Angélus and Les Glaneuses, two canvases that have been exhibited around the world. The Millet Museum has his paintings as well as other Impressionist painters, engravings and prints.

Gustave Caillebotte (1848-1894) lived in Yerres from 1860 to 1880. The large Caillebotte Museum south of Paris occupies his house. A visit takes you back to the late 19th-century and gives you the chance to see many of his works.

Vincent van Gogh (1853-1890) spent his final days at the Auberge Ravoux in Auvers-sur-Oise. He lived in the atmospheric room under the eaves of the house in a Paris suburb. Today it’s a restaurant; have lunch or dinner then see the room.
More about Vincent van Gogh in Paris.

More Impressionist Delights to Savour

There are plenty of events put on at the Impressionist Normandy festival.
Take a cycle tour around Giverny with a guide who knows the village well and makes sure you see all the major sites linked to Claude Monet.

Try your hand at painting like an Impressionist. The Alabaster Coast provides the inspiration; you provide (hopefully) the artistic expertise, with an art teacher to guide you.

If you want to experience how the Impressionist painters spent their leisure hours, try the Founaise restaurant at Chatou. It’s a restaurant but the outside terrace recalls the guinguettes, open-air cafés often located beside a river where the atmosphere was casual and the food and drink offering a cheap and cheerful option.

Look at both these official websites for all the information on the wide-ranging exhibitions and events:

Impressionist Adventures
Normandy Impressionist Festival 2026 – Normandy Tourist Office

Normandy and Impressionism – A general overall look at the great Impressionist art movement and what to see in Normandy
Guide to the Impressionist Painters

Normandy Travel Guide – What to see and Do in Normandy
Getting to Normandy

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Here are some top Normandy Events in 2025 to look out for.

Caen Millennium in 2025

Caen celebrates its Millennium in great style in 2025. There are plenty of exhibitions and some wonderful events like the weekend June 27-29 when the tall ships gather at Caen port and la Presqu’île. The celebration continues into the autumn.
Read more about the Caen Millennium

Last Chance to See the Bayeux Tapestry

To Sep 1, 2025: The Bayeux Tapestry Museum is closing as a new museum is built. The extraordinary 11^th-century tapestry will be kept in a specially designed storage area. It’s a classified Historic Monument, listed on the UNESCO Memory of the World register.
The new museum is scheduled to open in 2027.

D-Day Landings

Apr 12-Sep 12, 2025: Standing with Giants. Get to the British Normandy Memorial in Ver-sur-Mer overlooking Gold Beach for a return of Standing with Giants. The extraordinary installation of 1,475 figures includes soldiers as well as radio operators, medics and a Scotsman playing the bagpipes. There are also figures representing the only two women on the Memorial. Nurses Sisters Evershed and Field died while saving 75 men from a sinking hospital ship, plus 50 French resistance fighter. The figures in the meadows of the Memorial are extraordinarily moving. This is one of the must-see events in Normandy 2025.
Normandy D-Day Landing Beaches from Utah to Sword

‘I Must Go Down to the Sea Again…’

There are some wonderful events in the sea around Normandy in 2025.

May 23–Jun 1, 2025: CIC Normandy Channel Race starts in Caen on Sunday May 25. Sailors take their Class 40s up the Canal de l’Orne into the English Channel then make a detour via the Iles Saint-Marcouf in the Utah beach section of the D-Day Landings in 1944. Then it’s up around the Isle of Wight before heading west to sail around the Tuskar Rock and Fastnet Rock to the south of Ireland. The yachts then return to Caen via Guernsey where they’ll encounter the strong currents of the Raz-Blanchard. Past the Goury Lighthouse, situated at ‘the end of the world’ off Cape Hague, and they’ve completed the 1000-mile race.

July 4-7, 2025: The 2025 Tall Ships Races begins in Le Havre. Over 40 of these magnificent boats are moored in Le Havre for four days of celebration and discovery. There’s a boat and a crew parade, concerts and fireworks before they set off for Dunkirk. From there they’ll go to Aberdeen in Scotland and Kristiansland in Norway before finishing in Esbjerg, Denmark.
The Tall Ships Races are more than great voyages; they’re designed to train the young (over half of each ship’s crew must be between 15 and 25 years old) and encourage international friendship.

Jul 26-Aug 2, 2025: Start of the 100^th Rolex Fastnet Race on July 26. Setting off from Cowes, the race celebrates 100 years both of the race itself, and the founding of the Royal Ocean Racing Club in 1925. The 695-nautical mile course is one of the world’s great offshore races around the Fastnet Rock south of Ireland. It finishes at Cherbourg-en-Cotentin. The fastest sailors take a couple of days; others can take five to eight. Cherbourg welcomes them all with a week’s celebration.
The first race in 1925 had just 7 boats, a select bunch who went on to form the Royal Ocean Racing Club. This year it’s anticipated to be over 400 boats of all ages, monohulls and multihulls and all classes.  
It’s a gruelling, demanding race with strict rules for entry, aimed at experienced sailors who have competed in a fixed number of races in the year leading up to the race.

On Two Wheels

July 8-10, 2025: On Jul 8, the Tour de France takes to the road for the 173 km ride from Amiens to Rouen. Jul 9 it’s in Caen for an individual time trial, and on Jul 10 the 210 km course goes from Bayeux to Vire-Normandie before heading for Brittany.

Other News about Normandy

UNESCO AND THE D-DAY LANDING BEACHES

The D-Day Landings on the beaches in 1944 are in line for UNESCO World Heritage Status. All five sectors are included, as, according to the Ministry of Culture, the beaches represent a “place of gathering around a universal message” and carry “the memory of a fight for freedom and peace”.

Brittany Ferries Goes Green with New Hybrid Ships

Brittany Ferries have launched two new hybrid ferries. Guillaume de Normandie runs between Portsmouth and Caen. Saint-Malo goes between Portsmouth and Saint-Malo in Brittany.

Events in Normandy 2026 & 2027

Jul 1-Aug 31, 2026: The Normandy Impressionist Festival is spectacular with exhibitions and events all over the region.

Normandy and Impressionism
Guide to the French Impressionist Artists…including three great female painters.

2027 sees a huge celebration for the Millennium of William the Conqueror. Normandy will be pulling out all the stops for this, and it will be a fabulous commemoration. One fabulous site I urge you to visit is the romantic ruined abbey of Jumièges. Founded in 654, the Benedictine monastery was rebuilt in the 10^th century and was consecrated in 1067 in the presence of William the Conqueror who had returned from England. It’s on my list of the great sacred sites of France.

June 17-27, 2027: Tall Ships Race. The largest gathering of tall ships returns to Rouen.

More Events in France

Events in France in May 2025
Events in France in June 2025
Events in France in July 2025

More about Normandy

Normandy Travel Guide
Best ways to travel to Normandy’s ports and major cities
Where to stay near the D-Day Landing Beaches
Guide to Courseulles-sur-Mer at the centre of the Landing Beaches
New Travel to and around Normandy: new flight and shuttle bus along the D-Day Landing Beaches
Normandy D-Day Festival 2025

More about Normandy on the official Normandy Tourism website

The post Great Normandy Events in 2025 appeared first on Mary Anne's France.

The D-Day Festival in Normandy runs officially from May 31 to June 15, 2025. But events start in April and you’ll also find a lot to do from May 15 to June 30 as the region celebrates the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II.

Towns, villages, museums and military sites put on exhibitions, events and parades. It happens all along the coast where the D-Day Landings took place as well as inland.

From June 1 to 9 Normandy will be very busy but do try to go. It won’t be as packed as last year when Normandy celebrated the 80th anniversary of D-Day. And with the added celebration of the end of World War II, there will be a great atmosphere.

You’ll also find that many sites continue to commemorate and celebrate during the rest of the year. So even if you miss the main June extravaganza, there’s a lot to see and do.

Don’t Miss…

…The British Normandy Memorial

Standing with Giants
The British Normandy Memorial is one of the most moving memorials to D-Day and World War II. Last year, to commemorate the D-Day Landings’ 80^th anniversary, 1,475 silhouettes were brought from the UK. This year they are back again, to mark the 80^th anniversary of the end of World War II. They will stand here from mid May to September.

Standing in the wild meadow fields of the memorial, the silhouettes represent the number of fatalities under British command on June 6, 1944. Hand-made from recycled signs, they were assembled by local community groups in Stanton Harcourt, near Witney in Oxfordshire.

What to See and Do at the Normandy D-Day Festival 2025

Every Tourist Office in Normandy will have booklets of all the events. So pick one up, look at the dates you’re there and choose what to see, experience, visit and take part in.

What Caught My Eye for the Normandy D-Day Festival 2025

Find out more about Sword Beach in a novel if fairly eccentric way. The tourist office at Ouistreham rents out umbrellas fitted with headphones and GPS. Follow the 2km audio tour through Ouistreham and the neighbouring towns of Lion-sur-Mer and Colleville-Montgomery, learning all about the area’s D-Day history and, on a lighter note, admiring the grand villas along the seafront.

At Sainte-Mère-Eglise, in the field right behind the Airborne Museum, you’ll find the annual Camp Géronimo. The camp produces faithful reconstructions of the installations used by the American troops, particularly the paratroopers, during the Battle of Normandy. There are daily workshops run by enthusiasts, parades and vehicle exhibitions.

A few events to look out for

Events are being added all the time to the official Normandy website, so keep checking it out as you get nearer to your visit.

Events on Saturday May 31, 2025

Courseulles-sur-Mer, 3pm: Canadian Troops Disembarking at Courseulles in June 1944. Follow the story with two guides who take you back to the day the Canadian troops arrived. Adult 10€, child €3.

Sainte-Mère-Église, 10am: International March for Peace from Maison de la Paix.

Events on Tuesday June 3, 2025

Carentan-les-Marais, 9am: Festival Day at Place du Valnoble.

Events on Wednesday June 4, 2025

Carentan-les-Marais, 2pm: Camp Reconstruction at 8 Lieu-dit Villageg de la Haute Addeville.

Events from Thursday June 5

June 5-8: Colleville-sur-Mer. Daily from 11 am: Overlord Museum shows the great vehicles of 1944 like Sherman, Famo and other motorized vehicles. Demonstration of the vehicles at 11am and 3pm.

Events on June 6, 2025

Batterie de Crisbecq, Saint-Marcouf, from 9am: 81^st Anniversary has a reconstructed camp and live shows.

Sainte-Mère-Église from 10am: Day of D-Day Celebrations (Journée festive).

Vierville-sur-Mer: Omaha footbridges open to the public (to June 9).

Arromanches-les-Bains, noon: Somme Battlefield Pipe Band in the square in front of the Musée du Débarquement. The Somme Battlefield Pipe Band promotes the music and history of the Scottish soldiers, particularly at the Somme. The band plays traditional Scottish tunes as well as tunes from Ireland, America, Canada and Australia.

Events on June 7, 2025

Ouistreham, 10am: D-Day Parade

Bayeux, 7pm: Bal de la Liberté in Place de Gaulle with Radio Cadillac (swing pop) and Stomp (swing band). Dress the part and enjoy the dancing. Free admission; catering or bring a picnic.

Courseulles-sur-Mer, Juno Beach Centre, from 10am: Bal de Juno – Concert Dancing Day. Dance the Lindy Hop from the 1930s and 40s and learn from the dancers of Rock & Go from Caen. Free.

Colleville-sur-Mer, Overlord Museum, 5pm: M.V.C.G Liberty Convoy leaves the museum for Grandcamp-Maisy. See the displays on the port and the parade through the town.

Luc-sur-Mer, Langrune-sur-Mer, Saint-Aubin-sur-Mer, Bernières-sur-Mer and Courseulles-sur-Mer: Military vehicles parade through the different communes and there’s a bagpipe performance in each town. Details from the local tourist office.

Vierville-sur-Mer, Rue du Hamel aux Prêtres, 7pm. Concerts celebrating American music from the 1940s to the 70s, with a picnic and ending with fireworks.

Douvres-la-Delivrande, Place des Marronniers, 7pm: Liberation Ball with people in 1940s dress. Music and refreshments on site.

Carentan-les-Marais, Place du Grand Valnoble, noon: Festive Day and Grand Parade.
10am: Route de Saint-Côme, Parachute jumps from 10am.

Sainte-Mère-Église, rue Eisenhower, 10am: Festive Day and Fireworks.

Arromanches-les-Bains, 10am Somme Battlefield Pipe Band.
2pm: Orange Band of Liberation performs in the Jardin des pins behind the Landing Museum.
6pm: Rues piétonnes d’Arromanches, performance of Band of Brothers.
9pm: Esplanade du musée Place du 6 Juin, 9pm. Open air film.

Events on June 8, 2025

Bernières-sur-Mer, Salle de la Mer, 9pm: Prize-winning documentary film Look into their eyes (Dans leurs yeux) seen through the eyes of Rémy and Marguerite Cassigneul, liberated by the Canadians on June 6, 1944.

Vierville-sur-Mer, Route de Formigny, from 8am: Military Antiques Fair.  

Courselles-sur-Mer, Juno Beach Centre, Open Air screening of The Last Rifleman in the evening (check the Juno Beach Centre for times). Inspired by a true story, the film is the story of Artie Crawford, a Second World War veteran who escapes from his care home in Northern Ireland to travel to France to commemorate the 75th anniversary of D-Day. Starring Pierce Brosnan.

Events on June 9, 2025

Arromanches-les-Bains, from 10am: Entertainment.

Events on June 14, 2025

Bernières-sur-Mer, from 9am. Whole programme of beach walks, animations, food stalls and more.

Events on July 16, 2025

Creully sur Seulles, Château de Creully, 2pm: The Coded messages of the Landings (Les messages codés du Débarquement) is a workshop for adults and children on how the codes were deciphered. It’s in the chateau occupied by the BBC during World War II. Best to reserve.

This is part of the Les Étonnants Patrimoines (Amazing Heritage) programme which highlights special events in Normandy’s long history.

Exhibitions on the 81st Anniversary of D-Day

Juno Beach Centre, Courseulles-sur-Mer: To Dec 31: Rising to the Challenge commemorates the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF). From 1939 to 1945 nearly 250,000 Canadians served in the RCAF; around 18,000 of them lost their lives.

Sainte-Mère-Église. Jul 1-Aug 31, 2025: Cotentin Farm Museum exhibition: Système D-[DAY] shows how civilians coped with the war and how they took and used military materials on farms and fields in their daily lives. A gas mask case becomes a milk jug, a parachute is made into a blouse and more.   

More on D-Day and Normandy

Major article on the Normandy D-Day Landing Beaches

Practical Information

All the events are listed in the D-Day Festival Brochure you can pick up at any tourist office in Normandy. It’s online here.

Events in France in May
Events in France in June

Special Travel Pass

Explore Normandy Pass
The Explore Normandy Pass is well worth getting. You get a lot of content on the area and for just 1€, you also get discounts at over 70 D-Day sites and museums in Normandy.

More about Normandy

Great Normandy Events in 2025

How to Get to Normandy from the UK
New Travel to and around Normandy: new flight and shuttle bus along the D-Day Landing Beaches
Guide to Normandy
Guide to Courseulles-sur-Mer at the centre of the Landing Beaches
Caen celebrates its Millennium this year with a large number of events; well worth a visit.

Accommodation & Hotels

Pierre et Vacances Self-Catering Apartment in Courseulles-sur-Mer and Normandy

Hotels and Accommodation near the D-Day Landing Beaches

If you want to read more, then please consider buying the guide book D-Day Landing Beaches Guide Book by myself (Mary Anne Evans) and Alastair McKenzie and published by Bradt Guides in March 2024. It’s full of information, and details of the different sites, CWGC cemeteries (and German cemeteries), memorials, monuments and museums.

The post Normandy D-Day Festival 2025 appeared first on Mary Anne's France.

2025 is a big year for Caen as the city celebrates its Millennium in grand style. In 1025 Caen in Normandy was beginning to grow as the small port opened its trade to the world. It was still a small town but was about to become a significant player in Europe. And why? William the Conqueror of course.
Why choose 2025? Well any year might have been chosen. But 1025 marks the first written mention of Cadumus, a major settlement dating back to the Romans.

1,000 Years of History at the Caen Millennium 2025

The Caen Vigils

The Caen Millennium celebrations began a year ago with the Caen Vigils. From March 21, 2024 to March 20, 2025, local participants watch over Caen for one hour at sunrise and sunset. Each one drew or wrote about their impressions of seeing the sun rise and set over the old buildings. Their work will be available later.
Main Caen Millennium Events

Caen Château Events

The celebrations begin on March 20 with two days of discovery. It’s about more than the celebration: on March 20, Caen Château reopens after two years of renovations. There’s entertainment and a spectacular fire and fireworks event, orchestrated by La Machine company from Nantes which makes grand objects like the fire-breathing Calais Dragon.
Each evening from 19.50 to 23.00 a monumental fresco is projected onto the outer walls of the castle.
Caen Castle Inauguration

History Days

March 21-28, 2025: Les Journées de l’Histoire. Find out more about Caen’s long history with exhibitions, visits, ateliers open to the public, films, walks and more. They take place at the Château, l’Abbaye-aux-Dames and l’Université, and all are free.
In the park of l’Abbaye aux dames, a reconstructed medieval village takes you back to the days of Richard II. See how people lived in the past. And of course, there’s a diorama of the conquest of England at the Battle of Hastings.

Caen Château offers an immersive experience in the former Exchequer Office, built between 1098 and 1122, taking you through Caen’s history to today.

Caen Millennium Parade

May 9, 2025: This ambitious parade has a 5km trail that takes you through five stations, each symbolising a period of Caen’s history or key events like the city’s construction. At each one, a poetics troupe of 100 participants tell the story. It starts at 7.30pm.

Maritime Weekend

Jun 27-29, 2025: Le Week-end Maritime from Caen to the sea. Look at those great ships of the past at Caen port and la Presqu’île. For two days you can go on board to discover more about the different ships like le Belem, le Phoenix, le Milpat, la Granvillaise and la Nébuleuse. There are concerts, projections, activities and more before the major parade on June 29.
The flotilla will move to Le Havre for the Tall Ships Race July 4-7.

June 27-29, 2025: Ephemeral Objects. Constructed by the artist Olivier Grossetête and his team, four works made from strengthened cardboard astonish Caen. There’s a lighthouse, a Swedish house, a fishing lodge inspired by the château de Bénouville and a bridge floating on the canal.

Débordions

Débordions (which approximately translates as ‘overflowing’) starts on the weekend of June 27 to 29 then continues to October. Caen’s Presqu’île is transformed into a living art-science-society laboratory via a trail that, in true French fashion, invites you to discover, reflect and marvel. Here you’ll find six giant zootropes that you interact with to show images and films.

Le Tour de France

While not part of the Caen Millennium, the Tour de France visits Caen on July 11. Stage 5 is an individual time trial over 33km.

Aquanauts

September 19-21, 2025: Aquanauts promises to be something spectacular. This aquatic and aerial ballet by the Swedish company Cirkus Cirkör takes place in Saint-Pierre. 40 circus artists and swimmers blend together to take your eye, and imagination, to the skies and beyond.

More about Normandy

Normandy Travel Guide
Normandy and Impressionism

D-Day Landing Beaches from Utah to Sword

How to get to Caen

Brittany Ferries unveils the Guillaume de Normandie, one of its two new hybrid ferries that operates between Portsmouth and Caen. Starting in April, it’s an important feature of France’s eco credentials, operating on liquefied natural gas (LNG) and battery power.

How to get to Caen from the UK

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The D-Day Festival in Normandy happens every year but this year it’s special, commemorating the 80th anniversary of the D-Day Landings. There are special D-Day Festival in Normandy events from May 27 to June 18 but the most important dates are from June 1 to 9. Towns, villages, museums, military sites put on exhibitions, events and a whole lot more. It happens all along the coast where the D-Day Landings took place as well as inland.

The Festival runs from the east at Merville-Franceville, to Caen, Audrieu, Montfiquet, along all the beaches then into the Cotentin Peninsula up to Cherbourg and down the west side to Portail-sur-Mer.

From June 1 to 9, Normandy will be packed with visitors attending the exhibitions, concerts, picnics, military vehicle parades, dances, films, special camps, parachute drops and a whole lot more. 

What to See and Do

Every Tourist Office in Normandy will have the booklet of all the events. So pick one up, look at the dates you will be there and choose what to see, experience, visit and take part in.

What Caught My Eye for the D-Day Festival in Normandy 2024

Saturday 1 June: Picnics are being organised, as well as concerts and re-enactments.

Arromanches-les-Bains: Huge artwork will be created from 9am on on the beach by Sébastien Yondo Makembe (Sym Arts). Picnics, concerts and ere-enactments.
Vierville-sur-Mer: Omaha Beach Freedom Picnic Concerts. Three concerts give you nearly 6 hours of live music, followed by fireworks at 11.30pm.

All Five Landing Beaches: As night falls, over 20 huge firework displays will light up the sky simultaneously over the five Landing Beaches. A fantastic family-friendly and free event.

June 2, 4, 6, 7: Paratrooper demonstrations at the Merville Battery. You’ll see how paratroopers prepared for their D-Day jumps.

June 4-9: Sainte-Mère-Église offers 6 days with demonstrations, exhibitions, concerts, jumps, re-enactments, music, dancing and more.

June 5: Saint-Lô: International Ceremony in tribute to the civilian victims.
Sword Beach: Around 200 musicians from 13 different nations will parade along the beach for the international Pipers Parade. 3.30pm to 5pm. Look up into the sky for a flight of vintage British Piper aircraft.

Events on June 6, 2024

The official international ceremony of the D-Day Festival events in Normandy takes place on Thursday 6 June 2024 on Omaha Beach. Heads of state, veterans and officials will commemorate the 80th anniversary of D-Day (by invitation only). If you’re there, remember that many beaches and roads will be cordoned off with no access to visitors, vehicles etc.

Special events before and after: Franco-American Ceremony in Colleville-sur-Mer, before the official International Ceremony.
Franco-Canadian Ceremony in Courseulles-sur-Mer, after the official International Ceremony.

King Charles and Queen Camilla join French President Emmanuel Macron, PM Rishi Sunak and labour leader Sir Keir Starmer at a special celebration at the British Normandy Memorial at Ver-sur-Mer. The British King and Queen then open the Winston Churchill Centre for Education and Learning. This is the first official and very important ceremony at the Memorial.

Prince William is at the Canadian commemorative event at the Juno Beach Centre, Courseulles-sur-Mer. He will then join over 25 heads of state and veterans for the official international ceremony on Omaha Beach. 

In Arromanches-les-Bains
World War II military uniforms and vehicles on display 10am-6pm
Somme Battlefield Pipe Band: an association dedicated to promoting the music and history of Scottish soldiers. Their musical repertoire consists mainly of traditional Scottish tunes, with a few Irish, American, Canadian and Australian tunes. 5-6pm
Fireworks at Arromanches-les-Bains 11.30pm

Everywhere in the World: Listen at 7.44pm (French time) as Liberty Bell Towers in France and around the world will ring out the message for memory, liberty and peace.

June 7: Two very special events will take place though only to an invited audience and with huge restrictions and security:
Ceremony with American President Joe Biden in Cherbourg
Bayeux Liberation Ceremony with President Macron in Bayeux

Jun 7: Arromanches-les-Bains: As part of British D-Day Week, display of 300 historic D-Day vehicles, opposite the remains of the Winston Churchill artificial Mulberry harbour.
Musical stages: Jazz band, Pipe band, French songs.

June 8
Arromanches-les-Bains: The Patrouille de France Air Show takes to the skies above the town from 3pm to 6pm.
Douvres-la-Déliverandes: The 35-strong brass band Le Bagad de Lan-Bihoué will march in front of costumed people on foot and on bicycles, followed by vintage military and civilian vehicles. Evening ball; refreshment bar and food trucks. 4 to 11pm.

June 8, 9: Isigny-sur-Mer. Isigny Swing festival, a free two-day festival of concerts and swing dancing in the Parc de l’Hôtel de ville.

June 9: La Fière. From 10am watch the large parachute drop with characters in period costume jumping from several C-47s, historic aircraft. Followed by military troop drops. Bring appropriate clothing and a picnic.

Bayeux Liberty Parade. As part of British D-Day Week, a traditional parade of 300 historic vehicles, including British ones, will drive along the southern ring road (Liberty Alley) of the first liberated town in mainland France. 11pm-12.30pm.
Port-en-Bessin. Display of around 100 historic D-Day vehicles, in the centre of the first oil port of D-Day. Musical stages: Jazz band, Pipe band, French songs. 4-6pm.
Longues-sur-Mer: Display of around 100 historic D-Day vehicles, near the German Coastal Defense Battery.

More D-Day Festival Events after the Big Ceremonies

Don’t worry if you come after June 9 and the big events; there’s plenty to see and do in Normandy along the D-Day Landing Beaches, lasting until November, 2024. Here’s a very small selection but you will discover a whole lot more from the local tourist offices.

June 11: Caen. Girly Swing Band. Dance to pre-war music (Charles Trenet, Edith Piaf, Mistinguett). 8pm to 10pm.

June 27: Caen, Utah Beach and other D-Day landing sites. Grand Choral pour la Paix sees a full orchestra and 250 singers perform music and songs around the theme of peace from Queen, Beethoven, Balavoine, Voulzy, Karl Jenkins and many more, plus an original creation for this project. Le jour où tu reviendras (The Day You Return) recounts the war from the point of view of the mother of a young soldier at the front, who trembles every day as she listens to the radio. 8pm to 10.30pm.

Reconstructions of Military Camps

Jun 2-6: Walk around the military camps specially reconstructed to show what life was like. Tents, vehicles, displays and more at Bloody Gulch, Meutis, Normandy Victory Museum at Carentan-les-Marais, Camp Géronimo at Sainte-Mere-Eglise, Arromanches-les-Bains, Saint-Laurent-sur-Mer, Omaha (Vierville-sur-Mer), Merville-Franceville Plage and Camp Hillman at Colleville-Montgomery.

Military Fairs

For the real enthusiasts these take place in different places: June 2 at Grandcamp-Maisy and Carentan-les-Marais; Sainte-Mere-Eglise; in the command post in Crisbecq and Jun 7 at Vierville-sur-Mer.

Special Exhibitions of the D-Day Festival in Normandy

Caen:  Apr 15-Aug 23: Calvados, 6 June 1944. D-Day through the eyes of civilians. Exhibition at the Calvados Archives (free admission).

May 8, 2024-January 5, 2025: Caen Memorial Museum has a major exhibition dedicated to the United States between the wars: The Dawn of the American Century, 1919-1944. The museum will also be showcasing its new space, which has been transformed into a London Underground corridor. There are also exhibits devoted to the Resistance movement in Normandy.

Deauville: May 25-October 31: Robert Capa, Icons shows the photographer’s images shot on the beaches of Normandy, in partnership with Magnum Photos. At the Franciscaines de Deauville in the seaside resort of Deauville which is well worth a visit.

More on D-Day and Normandy

Major article on the Normandy D-Day Landing Beaches

Practical Information

All the events are listed in the D-Day Festival Brochure you can pick up at any tourist office in Normandy. It’s online here.

Events in France in May
Events in France in June

More about Normandy

How to Get to Normandy from the UK
New Travel to and around Normandy: new flight and shuttle bus along the D-Day Landing Beaches
Guide to Normandy
Guide to Courseulles-sur-Mer at the centre of the Landing Beaches

Accommodation & Hotels

Pierre et Vacances Self-Catering Apartment in Courseulles-sur-Mer and Normandy
Hotels and Accommodation near the D-Day Landing Beaches

The guide book D-Day Landing Beaches Guide Book by Mary Anne Evans and Alastair McKenzie published by Bradt Guides in March 2024.

The post D-Day Festival in Normandy 2024 appeared first on Mary Anne's France.

We all know something about the famous 19th-century Impressionist painters, but who were they? Here’s a quick guide so you can impress with your knowledge of the major characters of one of the world’s greatest (and favourite) art movements.

Impressionism as an art form is generally taken to start on the evening of April 15, 1874, when a group of young, struggling and unknown painters put on a show of their work in the studio of the photographer Félix Nadar at 35 boulevard des Capucines in Paris. The group included Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Edgar Degas, Berthe Morisot, Claude Monet, Camille Pissaro, Alfred Sisley and Paul Cézanne. They were showing works that had been rejected by the official Académie des Beaux-Arts Salon.  

The word ‘Impressionist’ was first coined by the French art critic Louis Leroy who hated the new style of art.  Derisively titling his article The Exhibition of the Impressionists, Leroy declared that Monet’s painting of Soleil Levant was at most, a sketch, and could hardly be termed a finished work. He wrote ‘Impression—I was certain of it. I was just telling myself that, since I was impressed, there had to be some impression in it…and what freedom, what ease of workmanship! Wallpaper in its embryonic state is more finished than that seascape’. Little did he know.

Pre-Impressionist Painters

By the mid 1850s a new style was sweeping through the French art world. It was influenced by artists like the Romantic colourist Eugène Delacroix; the leader of the Realists, Gustave Courbet, and painters of the Barbizon school like Johan Barthold Jongkind, Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot and Eugène Boudin. They had all begun to paint outdoors (en plein air) directly from nature in a spontaneous style. This group of artists befriended, advised and inspired the artists who came to define Impressionism.

Major Pre-Impressionist Painters

Jean-François Millet

Jean-François Millet (October 4, 1814-January 20, 1875) was one of the founders of the Barbizon School which flourished between 1830 and 1870. Millet moved to Barbizon in 1849, when he and his fellow artists were painting landscapes and scenes of rural life; Millet himself is noted for his paintings of peasant farmers. He is known best for his oil paintings but he also produced pastels, Conté crayon drawings and etchings.
He is buried in the graveyard at Chailly-en-Biere, Seine-et-Marne, Île-de-France

Charles-François Daubigny

Charles-François Daubigny (February 15, 1817-February 19, 1878) was known both as a painter and printmaker, mostly in the art of etching.  Born into a family of painters, he moved to Barbizon in 1843 and meeting Camille Corot and Gustave Courbet, his style changed from the traditional to working in the open air. He turned his boat into a studio and painted along the Seine and Oise, often around Auvers. He met Claude Monet in London in 1870 and later Paul Cézanne and influenced them both.
He is buried in Père Lachaise Cemetery, Paris.

Eugène Boudin

Eugène Boudin (July 12, 1824-August 8, 1898) was born in Honfleur, the son of a harbour pilot. His love of painting sea and sky began when at age 10 he worked on a steamboat that plied its passage between Le Havre and Honfleur. He believed that one brushstroke the artist did outdoors was of more use than two days in the studio. He was a major influence on Claude Monet. Camille Corot called Boudin ‘the King of the Skies’.
He is buried in Saint-Vincent cemetery in Montmartre, Paris.

Édouard Manet

Édouard Manet (January 23, 1832-April 30, 1883) was one of the most influential of the Pre-Impressionist painters moving on from Realism. He was born into an upper-class family, and rejecting their choice of the navy as a career, turned to painting. In 1863, his major work, The Luncheon on the Grass (Le dejeuner sur l’herbe) or Olympia was rejected by the Academy of Fine Arts because it showed a nude woman with two clothed men at a picnic. It became one of the many paintings considered the watershed works that marked the beginnings of modern art. He painted a wide variety of subjects, from Paris café life to scenes of contemporary wars, from Paris streets to small still lifes.
He is buried in Passy cemetery, Paris.

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot (July 16, 1796-February 22, 1875). Corot’s father wanted him to become a draper, but at the age of 26 he decided it was not for him.  ‘I told my father that business and I were simply incompatible, and that I was getting a divorce.’
Despite this, his father gave him a yearly allowance so he could afford a studio, materials and travel unlike many of his fellow Impressionists.
From 1825 to 1828 he was in Italy, producing over 200 drawings and 150 paintings. In 1829 he was in Barbizon, meeting the members of the Barbizon school. 
He produced a huge amount of works, mainly landscapes in a style that still echoed the Neo-Classical tradition while anticipating open air Impressionism art. He was very successful and extremely generous to his fellow artists and their relatives, for instance, giving Millet’s widow 10,000 francs to support her and her children after her husband died.
He is buried in Père Lachaise cemetery in Paris.

Eugène Delacroix

Eugène Delacroix (April 26, 1798-August 13, 1863) was regarded as the leader of the French Romantic school, inspired by Rubens and the Venetian Renaissance painters. His dramatic works were expressive and his use of colour influenced the future Impressionists. He painted numerous religious works plus over 100 paintings from his trips to Spain and north Africa.
Delacroix’s most influential work came in 1830 with the painting Liberty Leading the People. The boy holding a pistol aloft on the right is sometimes thought to be an inspiration for the Gavroche character in Victor Hugo’s 1862 novel Les Misérables.
He is buried in Père Lachaise cemetery in Paris.

Johan Barthold Jongkind

Johan Barthold Jongkind (June 3, 1819-February 9, 1891) was a Dutch painter and printmaker who influenced the Impressionists as much by his teaching as by his paintings (mainly marine landscapes). In 1862 in Honfleur he made friends with Alfred Sisley, Eugène Boudin and the young Claude Monet, who described him as ‘…a quiet man with such a talent that is beyond words’^.  He moved to the small town of La Côte-Saint-André near Grenoble in Isère.
He died in 1891 and is buried in the cemetery of La Côte-Saint-André.

Impressionist Painters

Jacob Abraham Camille Pissarro

Jacob Abraham Camille Pissarro (July 10, 1830-November 13, 1903). A Danish-French Impressionist and Neo-Impressionist painter, he was influenced by Courbet and Corot, then worked with Georges Seurat and Paul Signac in the Neo-Impressionist style. 
He was a great mentor as Paul Cézanne remarked: ‘He was a father for me. A man to consult and a little like the good Lord’. Pierre-Auguste Renoir referred to his work as ‘revolutionary’.
Pissarro is the only artist to have shown his work at all eight Paris Impressionist exhibitions, from 1874 to 1886.
In the late 1860s, Pissarro became fascinated with Japanese prints, leading him to experiment in new compositions. He turned his back on Neo-Impressionism in the 1880s.
He is buried in  Père Lachaise cemetery in Paris.

Hilaire-Germain-Edgar De Gas

Hilaire-Germain-Edgar De Gas (Degas, July 19, 1834-September 27, 1917) is best known for his pastel drawings and oil paintings, particularly of dancers. He helped organise the early Impressionist exhibitions, but never regarded himself as one of them. He despised the idea of working in the open air: ‘You know what I think of people who work out in the open. If I were the government I would have a special brigade of gendarmes to keep an eye on artists who paint landscapes from nature. Oh, I don’t mean to kill anyone; just a little dose of bird-shot now and then as a warning’.
It was his Parisian scenes, his off-centre compositions, his way of dealing with colour and form and his relationship with the Impressionist artists, most notably Mary Cassatt and Manet, which link him to Impressionism.
He is buried in  Père Lachaise cemetery in Paris.

Oscar-Claude Monet

Oscar-Claude Monet (November 14, 1840-December 5, 1926) is the most famous of the Impressionist painters. He’s seen as a key precursor to modernism, painting nature as he saw it, particularly en plein air (outdoor) landscapes and was influenced early in his career by Boudin. The term Impressionism is derived from the title of his painting Impression, soleil levant, exhibited in 1874 (the ‘exhibition of rejects’) initiated by Monet and his associates as an alternative to the official Salon.
The family moved to Argenteuil in 1871 then from 1883, Monet lived in Giverny. He began to transform the property and garden, including the famous water-lily pond.
The painter wanted to document the French countryside and sights, capturing the changing of light and seasons by using the same subject many times throughout the year. The best known are his series of haystacks  (1890–1891), Rouen Cathedral (1892–1894), and the paintings of water lilies in his garden in Giverny. He was a success during his lifetime and after, becoming one of the world’s most famous painters.
He is buried in Giverny churchyard.
Monet Foundation Museum, Giverny

Pierre-August Renoir

Pierre-August Renoir (February 25, 1841- December 3, 1919). The leading Impressionist painter is known for his sensual pictures of women and delightful outdoor scenes. Influenced by Pissarro and Manet, he became successful relatively early on in his life. In 1890 he married Aline Victorine Charigot, twenty years his junior and painted her many times. In 1907, suffering from rheumatoid arthritis, he moved to Cagnes-sur-Mer in Provence.
His children included actor Pierre Renoir (1885–1952), filmmaker Jean Renoir (1894–1979) and ceramic artist Claude Renoir (1901–1969). He was the grandfather of the filmmaker Claude Renoir (1913–1993), son of Pierre.
He is buried in Essoyes, Aube.
Visit Renoir’s family home and studio in the small town of Essoyes in Champagne.

Alfred Sisley

Alfred Sisley (October 30, 1839-January 29, 1899). Born in Paris to wealthy British parents, Sisley spent most of his life in France but made significant trips to Britain. Of all the Impressionist painters, Sisley was the most dedicated proponent of plein air landscape painting. 
He painted the River Thames mostly around Hampton Court, East Molesey and Thames Ditton. 
Until 1880, Sisley lived and worked in the country west of Paris; then he and his family moved to a small village near Moret-sur-Loing,  close to the forest of Fontainebleau and near Barbizon. 
On August 5, 1897, Sisley and his partner married in Cardiff Register Office. They stayed in Penarth and Langland Bay on the Gower Peninsula, again producing notable landscapes. Sisley is also known for his paintings of the Seine and its bridges.
He is buried at Moret-sur-Loing.
Château at Fontainebleau

Frédéric Bazille

Frédéric Bazille (December 6, 1841-November 28, 1870). In 1862 Bazille moved to Paris, met Renoir and Sisley and began taking art classes. In 1864 he began painting full-time. Less well known than his peers, his close friends included Monet, Sisley and Manet.
He was relatively wealthy and helped support other artists by giving them space in his studio and materials to use. Many of Bazille’s major works are examples of figure painting where he placed the subject figure within a landscape painted outdoors.  
He fought in the Franco-Prussian war and was killed leading an assault against the Germans.
His father took his body back to be buried in Montpellier’s Protestant cemetery.

Gustave Caillebotte

Gustave Caillebotte (August 19, 1848-February 21, 1894) belonged to the Impressionist painters circle, but his paintings were more realistic than the others, possibly due to his interest in photography as an art form. His styles of painting varied considerably, following those of his peers, Millet and Courbet, as well his contemporary, Degas. He painted domestic scenes, often depicting his relatives. He is best known for his paintings of urban Paris. 
In 1881, Caillebotte bought a house in Petit-Gennevilliers, on the banks of the Seine near Argenteuil, moving there permanently in 1888. 
He is buried in  Père Lachaise cemetery in Paris.
Visit his house and museum.

Female Impressionist Painters: Les Trois Grandes Dames (The Three Great Ladies)

Les trois grandes dames (the three great ladies) was the collective name given by Gustave Geffroy to the three great female Impressionist painters.

Mary Stevenson Cassatt

Mary Stevenson Cassatt (May 22, 184-June 14, 1926). Born in Pennysylvania, Mary Cassat lived mostly in France. Her works, particularly pastels, concentrated on women – mothers and children and women’s private lives. 
She was invited to exhibit with the Impressionists in 1877 by Degas, who became her lifelong friend. One critic later wrote: ‘M. Degas and Mlle. Cassatt are…the only artists who distinguish themselves…and who offer some attraction and some excuse in the pretentious show of window dressing and infantile daubing.’ Faint praise indeed. 
She is buried in Le Mesnil-Théribus, Oise, Hauts-de-France.

Berthe Marie Pauline Morisot

Berthe Marie Pauline Morisot (January 14, 1841-March 2, 1895). The great niece of Rococo artist Jean-François Fragonard, she learnt to draw by the common practice of copying pictures at the Louvre. In 1861 she met Camille Corot and took up plein air painting.
She met Edouard Manet in 1868, and married his brother Eugene Manet in 1874. That same year she showed her work at the ‘rejected’ Impressionist exhibition of 1874, the first of many such exhibitions.
She is buried in Passy cemetery, Paris. 

Marie Bracquemond

Marie Bracquemond (December 1, 1840 -January 17, 1916). Marie Bracquemond learnt from Ingres (1780-1867), and Gauguin (1848–1903). She married the printmaker Felix Bracquemond who helped popularize Japanese art in France. She produced at least 157 original works but only 31 have been located in existing collections.
She is buried in the cemetery at Bruyères, Saint Omer.

Post-Impressionist and Neo-Impressionist Painters

Neo-Impressionism is a term coined by French art critic Félix Fénéon in 1886 to describe an art movement founded by Georges Seurat. Seurat’s most renowned masterpiece, A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte, marked the beginning of this movement when the painting made its first appearance at an exhibition of the Société des Artistes Indépendants (Salon des Indépendants) in Paris.
There are many overlaps between the two movements so I have put both these kinds of Impressionist Painters here.
Here’s a good article explaining some of the differences between Impressionism and Neo-Impressionism.

Georges Seurat

Georges Seurat (December 2, 1859-March 29, 1891) is known as the main founder of Post-Impressionist painting and the creator of pointillism. His large-scale work (3.0m; 10ft wide) A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte (1884–1886) was a revelation, initiating the new Neo-Impressionist movement. It’s one of the icons of late 19th-century painting and took Seurat two years to complete. The painting was the inspiration for James Lapine and Stephen Sondheim’s  musical Sunday in the Park with George.  
Seurat died in Paris in his parents’ home at the age of 31 of a disease which has never been fully identified.  His son died two weeks later from the same disease.
He is buried in  Père Lachaise cemetery in Paris.

Vincent van Gogh

Vincent van Gogh (March 30, 1853-July 29, 1890). One of the best known, and most influential Post-Impressionist painters, van Gogh led a tortured life. From a middle-class family, he had a variety of work until taking to painting in 1881. His first subjects were mainly still lifes and peasant labourers. He moved to Paris  in 1886, meeting Émile Bernard and Paul Gauguin. In 1888 he moved to Arles where his style changed and he painted local olive groves, wheat fields and sunflowers.
Gauguin joined him but the friendship ended in a furious confrontation with a razor when van Gogh cut off his left ear. Having suffered most of his life from psychotic episodes, he spent time in mental hospitals. On July 27, 1890 he shot himself in the chest with a revolver and died 2 days later.
The artist who influenced so many painters produced around 2,100 works, including 860 oil paintings, many in the last two years of his life. But during his lifetime, only one of his paintings, The Red Vineyard was sold. 
He is buried in Auvers-sur-Oise cemetery in Paris.

Read about the life of van Gogh in Paris where he lived under the rooftops with his brother.

Paul Cézanne

Paul Cézanne (19 January 1839 – 22 October 1906) was born and lived most of his life in Aix-en-Provence. He refused to become a banker, as his father had wanted, took evening classes and in 1861 left Aix for Paris. He was refused entry into the École des Beaux-Arts but became friends with Camille Pissarro, and later with Claude Monet, Renoir and Sisley. He was not universally popular; Manet called the shy and socially gauche man ‘a mason who paints with a trowel’.
He went through various different styles of painting, later rejecting Impressionism. His emphasis on geometric shapes had a profound influence on later artists like Picasso and the new art of Cubism.
Despite Cezanne turning his back on the Impressionists and following his own particular style, which was particularly hated in Aix, his paintings became more sought after during his lifetime, though not approaching the prices paid for paintings by Manet, Monet or Renoir.
He is buried in Saint-Pierre Cemetery, Aix.
Visit the Atelier de Cezanne

Maximilien Luce

Maximilien Luce (March 13, 1858-February 6, 1941) was known for his paintings, his graphic art, and his anarchist actions. He trained as a wood-engraver from the age of 14. He then went on to painting, firstly as an Impressionist, then from 1884 as a Pointillist, influenced by Seurat, before going back to Impressionism.
One critic, from the New York Times, wrote that this Pointillist period was the height of Luce’s career. He described the 1895 painting On the Bank of the Seine at Poissy as ‘a lyrical celebration of nature.’
Luce took many different subjects in his works, mostly landscapes, but also portraits, still lifes, domestic scenes and images of working men like rolling mill operators.
He is buried in Rolleboise, Yvelines, Ile-de-France.

Maurice Denis

Maurice Denis (November 25, 1870-November 13, 1943). An important figure in the period when Impressionism gave way to modern art, Denis is associated with Les Nabis, Symbolism and later Neo-classicism. His theories contributed to the foundations of Cubism, Fauvism and Abstract art. 
Religion was his other passion. In 1885 he recorded in his personal journal how much he admired the colours, candle light and incense of the ceremonies at his local church. After World War I he founded the Ateliers d’Art Sacré (Workshops of Sacred Art). 
In 1890 he and other artists like Bonnard, Vuillard and Paul Ranson formed a group they called the Nabis, taken from the Hebrew word Nabi, which means prophet. 
He decorated a number of churches and was also commissioned to decorate important civic buildings in the 1920s and 30s.
Maurice Denis house and museum in Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Paris

Pierre Bonnard

Pierre Bonnard (October 3, 1867-January 23, 1947) was a founding member of the Post-Impressionist group of the avant-garde painters called Les Nabis. Influenced by Paul Gauguin and the prints of Japanese artists like Hokusai, Bonnard was known for his decorative paintings and bold use of colour. As such he was a leading figure in the move from Impressionism to Modernism. 
During World War I, Bonnard concentrated on nudes and portraits, and large compositions. He became part of the French art establishment and in 1918 he was selected, along with Renoir, as an honorary President of the Association of Young French Artists
He is buried in the Cimetière des Anges (Le Cannet, Alpes-Maritimes), beside his wife, Marthe.

More about Normandy and Impressionist Painters

Normandy Impressionist Festival 2024
Normandy and Impressionism – A general overall look at the great Impressionist art movement and what to see in Normandy
Normandy Travel Guide – What to see and Do
Getting to Normandy

Regions of France

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Courseulles-sur-Mer is a charming seaside resort on the Normandy coast. The French love the small town with its marina for small yachts, its fish market, glorious beaches and good restaurants and shopping. Foreign visitors come to visit the Juno Beach Centre, the museum commemorating and revealing the role that Canada and their armed forces played in the great D-Day Landings that began in the early hours of June 6, 1944.

I came to Courseulles-sur-Mer while researching a guide book to the Normandy D-Day landing beaches for 2024 with my partner and fellow author. We had visited the Juno Beach Centre before, but like so many visitors, had sped our way on to the other famous beaches. Thank goodness we had booked a long stay here, using Courseulles as a base for our trips to the beaches, museums, memorials and sites of this glorious stretch of the Normandy Coast. In between we managed to enjoy the resort.

Courseulles-sur-Mer makes a perfect short break. It’s located very near Sword, Gold and Omaha beaches and is just a short hop to Caen and Bayeux. It really is a small gem on the Coeur de Nacre (Mother of Pearl) coast.

What to Do in Courseulles-sur-Mer

Juno Beach Centre

Juno Beach Centre has a two-part story which sets it apart from the other D-Day museums. It starts with why and how did the Canadians become part of the Allied forces? They didn’t have to; though part of the Commonwealth there was no legislation for Britain to call on Canada. And unlike the USA there was no direct attack on their country as the Americans had suffered at Pearl Harbour.

The decision to enter the Second World War was a result of a mix of political and social causes, stemming from the difficulties and deprivations in Canada in the 1930s. Equally as strong were the ties of loyalty between Canada and Great Britain. On September 10, 1939, Canada declared war on Germany, a week after Britain had done so.

14,000 of the 135,000 allied troops taking part in Operation Overlord on June 6, 1944 were Canadian. They captured the towns of Graye-sur-Mer, Courseulles-sur-Mer, Bernières-sur-Mer and part of Saint-Aubin-sur-Mer. 1,079 were injured of whom 381 were killed on D-Day itself; 5,500 during the Battle of Normandy during July and August 1944.

In total, 45,000 Canadians lost their lives during the war.  

What You See in Juno Beach Centre

There’s plenty to see in the museum with artefacts, models, uniforms and a lot of impressive video and audio showing both the war in Europe and the way Canada mobilized and supported their troops throughout the war.

You start with a video in a room designed to resemble a beach landing craft before entering the main museum.

You leave after watching the 12-minute film called They Walk With You about the Canadians’ experience in Normandy. If you’re even slightly emotional, take tissues with you. The film is a real tear jerker but it also takes you into th wider perspective of war, bravery and the world.

You can also take a guided tour of the bunkers in Juno Park, or walk around them yourself.

The Geography of Courseulles-sur-Mer

Courseulles-sur-Mer has an interesting layout. Juno Beach is directly on the sea and is the place for D-Day memorials and crosses as well as Juno Beach Centre. Just inland is Ile de la Plaisance, a small island where Le Chant des Oiseaux (where we stayed) and various restaurants are located. You get to it via one road or foot bridges. To the east lies the main town, with shops, small restaurants and hotels and the Tourist Office.

Beach Life in Courseulles-sur-Mer

Courseulles-sur-Mer forms part of the 12 km-long Coeur de Nacre coastal stretch that runs east, taking in other delightful small resorts: Bernières-sur-Mer, Saint-Aubin-sur-Mer, Langrune-sur-Mer and Luc-sur-Mer.

You can walk along the beaches that stretch out along the bay or cycle this part of the 1,500 km-long Vélomaritime route that runs from Roscoff in Brittany up to Dunkirk. It’s part of the ambitious 4,000 km-long Central European Cycle Route that links Roscoff to Kyiv in Ukraine.

Families can ride on horseback (or pony for smaller ones) along the beach, or perhaps try your hand at sports like land surfing or sailing; check at the Tourist Office for details.

Port Life in Courseulles-sur-Mer

Some 20 fishing boats are based here in Courseulles, bringing fish and shellfish to the fish market along the quay. From Monday to Saturday both locals and visitors come here from 8am to 1pm to buy directly from the fishermen. For a local speciality buy the scallops – apparently 7 out of 10 scallops sold in France come from Normandy. And if you’re here in the winter, don’t miss the Fête de la Coquille (Scallop Festival) here on Saturday and Sunday Nov 18 & 19, 2023. (It’s always the third weekend of November).
For fresh oysters (and all fish), go to Régals de l’Ile run by the Benoist family and Maison Daubert.

Where to Stay in Courseulles-sur-Mer

As we were staying for a week, we took a Pierre et Vacances self-catering apartment, Le Chant des Oiseaux, which suited us perfectly. Read about it here.

La Crémaillère Hotel, a favourite with the British, occupies several buildings. Ask for a room with a sea view or looking onto the garden. All rooms are pleasantly decorated and a good size and there’s a cottage as well. They do some good special offers on a dinner, bed and breakfast formula; there’s a good outside terrace for summer wining and dining. However we ate at the restaurant and were not impressed with the cooking, though the waiter was one of the best we’ve come across.

La Cantellerie is a substantial 19^th-century red brick house offering bed and breakfast. There are 6 rooms, a peaceful garden and welcoming breakfast room. Prices per room are from €85 to €119 per night (the more expensive rooms can sleep 3 people). At popular times of the year, you have to book for a minimum of 2 nights. It’s in the centre of town but you might prefer to book dinner here.

Where to Eat in Courseulle-sur-Mer

We ate at Restaurant de l’île Benoist on Ile de Plaisance, sitting at a window table looking out of wide windows over the waters surrounding the little island and witnessing a spectacular sunset. The meal was as spectacular. The restaurant is part of the Benoist fish and shellfish specialists so choose fish. It’s as fresh as it gets, is cooked with care and presented with style. Excellent meat options also. Menus: lunch €25; 3-course set menu €40; child menu €15. Open Wed to Sun lunch & dinner.
Rte de Ver. Tel: +33 (0)2 31 77 35 16.

Also recommended

La Maison Bleue, also on Ile de Plaisance, offers something for everyone: fish dishes and traditional cooking using seasonal local ingredients. It has a great location and terrace looking out over the surrounding waters. Menus Lunch €29.50; child up to 10 years €14. It’s open daily lunch & dinner.
Rue Marine Dunkerque. Tel: 09 74 56 58 86.

Le Quai Est opposite the island, is a simply decorated restaurant where the cooking takes centre stage. Again, good very fresh fish and some meat dishes. They have an excellent and well-priced take away menu which you have to order before service starts. Menus €35 & €45. Open Wed to Sun lunch & dinner.
13 Quai Est. Tel: +33 (0)2 31 97 20 90.

Practical Information

Courseulles-sur-Mer Tourist Office
5 Rue du 11 Novembre
Tel: +33 (0)2 31 37 46 80
Website

How to Get to Normandy from the UK
Guide to D-Day Landing Beaches
Hotels near the D-Day Landing Beaches

The post Courseulles-sur-Mer on the Normandy coast appeared first on Mary Anne's France.

In May my partner and I, researching the Normandy D-Day Landing Beaches for a Bradt guide book, stayed in a Pierre et Vacances self-catering apartment. This was our third research trip and while we’ve stayed in great hotels in the past (and there are many along the coast), this time we needed a place where we could work when we wanted, particularly in the evening, make cups of tea and coffee when we needed and have flexibility. We needed accommodation near the beaches which had good WiFi, a kitchen and if possible a view.

I already knew about Pierre et Vacances who have holiday residences all over France. Guest writer Fiona Quinn stayed in Presqu’île de la Touques for her guide to Deauville and Trouville on the east coastal stretch of Normandy.

Pierre et Vacances Self Catering Apartments – Le Chant des Oiseaux

There are eight Pierre et Vacances resorts in Normandy, most of them near the coast. Le Chant des Oiseaux in Courseulles-sur-Mer was ideal. Not only is Courseulles in the middle of four of the Normandy beaches: Sword, Juno (a 4-minute drive or 10-minute walk from the apartment), Gold and Omaha, it’s also a delightful small resort with a lovely long sandy beach, a marina, fishing port, good restaurants and shops.  

 No problem checking in. We arrived at 6.30pm, were given our keys and information on the resort. The nearby well-stocked Carrefour Market stayed open until 8pm which meant a quick dash (3 minutes away by car) for stocking up on essentials for our stay.

Reception

The reception desk, open from 9am to 7pm, has two helpful and friendly assistants who speak English. For late arrivals, instructions are emailed in advance on how to get the keys and apartment details.

We ordered baguettes and croissants each evening for the next day and they supplied a couple of emergency coffee filter papers for the machine (we hadn’t thought that far ahead). The receptionists can order pizzas for an evening meal and make restaurant bookings for you. Reserve through them; you get a small reduction on the restaurant bill.

Our Self-Catering Apartment

Our 2-bedroom apartment was on the second floor up an exterior staircase (ground, first and second storeys). The master bedroom had a good sized double bed, a large wardrobe with hangers and a wall-mounted TV, though there’s very little space around the bed. The second bedroom, off the main kitchen/reception area, had bunk beds for kids. The apartment can sleep six with sofa beds in the main room though that would be a bit crowded.

The kitchen area was equipped with a fridge with a small freezer, hob, microwave, dishwasher and plenty of plates, glasses and cutlery, plus a coffee machine and dishwasher. In fact so many plates, glasses and cutlery that we only ran the dishwasher once – on our departure.

You sort your rubbish using one container for food waste, one for recycling paper and plastic bottles and one for household waste; bottles go into the bottle bin. Then you take it all to the waste shed. You’re in eco-conscious France. Like many French companies Pierre et Vacances has its own agenda. It follows low-carbon solutions, supports local communities, is in the process of insulating all the buildings, uses renewable energies and is partnering with SNCF to encourage train rather than car travel.

But back to the apartment: the main room has a large table (with six chairs), the two sofa beds, cupboards and shelves plus a TV. Two bathrooms, one with toilet, basin and shower, the second with bath and basin had enough hooks and shelves for toiletries, dressing gowns etc. (Sorry guys, I think the designer must have been a woman).

All apartments have bed linen, towels, a welcome cleaning kit and free cleaning on departure.

A balcony with table and chairs looked out onto the back of the resort and beyond to open fields. There’s ample parking outside each house.

Amenities

We didn’t have time to swim in the heated indoor pool, nor use the laundry room. Offered, but not taken up by us, was a weekly guided discovery tour of the area. There are also pedal and electric bicycles and if needed, trailers and baby seats (extra cost). Maybe next time.

Practical Information

You can book for one night, five, eight or however many you want depending on availability. And you can book to start your holiday any day of the week.

A seven-night stay costs from £543 for a one-bedroom apartment which sleeps up to five people and the total price includes accommodation, taxes and charges except for the national tourist tax of €1.50 per person per day (free for children up to 18 years old).

Pierre et Vacances in Normandy

Each of the eight destinations in Normandy is different, with most of them located near the beach. Some are new build; others are old renovated buildings.

Holiday Village Normandy Garden in Branville, Residence et Spa in Houlgate, Residence Les Embruns in Deauville, Presqu’Ile de la Touques also in Deauville, Le Chant des Oiseaux in Courseulles-sur-mer, Residence Les Tamaris in Trouville, Residence Port Guillaume in Cabourg and Residence Le Green Beach, Omaha Beach (a golf destination).

More about Pierre et Vacances Self-Catering Apartments

Pierre et Vacances is well known in France though less of a household name in the UK and USA. It’s been going since 1967 and now has over 383 destinations and almost 24,500 holiday accommodations in France and the Caribbean, Spain, the Canary and the Balearic Islands, Italy, Croatia, Portugal and Mauritius. The company has recently added accommodation in Montenegro, Greece, Crete, Morocco and Madeira.

To book with Pierre et Vacances tel: 0870 0267 145 or visit www.pierreetvacances.com  

Guide to Courseulles-sur-Mer

More Information on Normandy

Ferries to Normandy from the UK
Guide to Normandy
Normandy D-Day Landing Beaches
Hotels and Accommodation near the D-Day Landing Beaches

The guide book D-Day Landing Beaches Guide Book by Mary Anne Evans and Alastair McKenzie was published by Bradt Guides in March 2024.

Declaration: We were on a press trip and were hosted by Pierre et Vacances. However my opinion is my own, and we were so impressed by the accommodation we are booking another stay which we will pay for.

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