Thank you to those who helped me in my previous thread. I’ve begun to finalize my travel plans. I have an apartment in Amsterdam booked for 5 nights. I think we will take a train from Amsterdam to Paris. I have 11 nights to plan for between Paris, Normandy and the Loire Valley. We have been to Paris once before. I am thinking 4 nights in Paris. I’m not sure whether to do that when we arrive from Amsterdam or at the end. We have a 10:30 am flight out of CDG.
We will rent a car for the Normandy,Loire part of the trip. I want to go to Giverny at the beginning or end of the Normandy portion. H is comfortable driving a stick shift. He is also comfortable driving in a foreign country. I’m a pretty good navigator.
I’ve been playing around with three variations. My first thought is that we train to Paris and pick up the car at Gare Du Nord. Head to Giverny and spend the night in Honfleur. I’m concerned that unless we get an early train that timing is tight. 2 nights in Bayeux,1 night in Mt St Michel area,2 nights in Ambroise. That leaves 5 nights with the last 4 being in Paris.could add 1 night somewhere else along route.
option 2 and 3 would be to take the train to Paris and have the first part of the trip be 4 nights in Paris. Pick up a car and head to Honfleur stopping at Giverny on the way. Proceed same as option 1. The dilemma being where to return the car and where to sleep that last night. Do we stay near the airport.
The other option is after 4 nights in Paris head to Ambroise and do option 2 in reverse. Again do we return car at airport and sleep at airport hotel.
Would appreciate any feedback or options I’m just not seeing.
First off, I’m insanely jealous!
While it’s really all about personal preference, my suggestion would be as such: The Normandy and Loire Valley parts, while tons of fun, are going to be the least relaxing since you are driving and switching hotels every night. In particular, don’t underestimate the stress on the sole driver. So I might suggest that you do Amsterdam, then pick up your car and do Normandy / Loire Valley, and then come back to Paris, dump the car and spend a few days in Paris grounded in the same hotel.
This also gives you more options - if you get out in the countryside and want to stay an extra day, you could call your Paris hotel and cancel your first night, or alternatively if you have had enough of the driving and smaller towns you can come into Paris early.
Of course, the only “wrong” way to do this trip is to not invite me along 
Have fun!
I would spend the last few nights in Paris.Don’t stay at an airport hotel. The best part of Paris are the nights. (I’ve stayed at a few Paris airport hotels when our flights were cancelled. I don’t recommend the experience.) Also, you might want to keep your itinerary to Normandy or the Loire just a little open since the weather can dictate where you might want to be.
I don’t think she was suggesting spend the entire Paris stay at a CDG airport hotel, just potentially the last night. I recently was at the Marriott CDG to catch an early morning flight and it was nice to just take a shuttle to CDG that morning instead of worrying about getting there in early morning traffic. It was a perfectly fine Marriott and by that point, you’ve seen everything you want to see.
If you are driving into Paris from elsewhere, consider the Hertz at the Carrousel du Louvre, which is (obviously by the name) within walking distance of the Louvre / Tuileries. Several years ago, we did what you are doing – we were in the countryside and then came into Paris – so we dropped off our rental car there and just walked to our hotel nearby. I think there may be other car rental companies at that location as well, but I’m not positive.
I’m with the others, both on the itinerary and on the jealousy aspect!
I know that PG. One night out of four. It’s still not worth it. A 10:30 departure —don’t use a shuttle, it’s easier and more efficient (no traffic) to get the train to the airport.Shuttle or Taxi in traffic will take upwards to 80 minutes. The train, which leaves every 10 minutes takes 30 minutes. I have done it multiple times (the non stop AirFrance CDG-LAX leaves at 10:45)
A 10:30 am departure means you should be there by 8:30 am, which in PG time means walking through the doors of the airport at 8:15 am with passport in hand. I’d personally rather have a nice farewell dinner and do my schlepping to an airport hotel the night before, because at that point I don’t really care about the hotel experience, but that’s me - especially if I can save a little money on the hotel. Other people would rather stay that extra night and take their chances in the morning. I think this one falls solidly under personal preference!
THAT’S true. I have a particular aversion to airport hotels and avoid them whenever possible. Our last stay at CDG --involved inedible food, noisy rooms, and a long line for the shuttle (45 minutes!) I kept wondering why it took us longer to get from the airport hotel to the airport than it took us to get from the Gar Du Nord to the airport. I honestly can’t remember which American chain hotel this was. I’m trying to blot it out. An awful way to end what was really an otherwise wonderful stay.
BTW— It’s probably important to choose your airport hotel wisely. The above hotel was booked for us by American Airlines because they cancelled our fight. (CDG/DFW/LAX) The ticket was purchased with the last of my AA frequent flyer miles. I spoke with a Parisienne passenger on the same cancelled flight into Dallas. She told me that twice before last year she had the very same flight cancelled “due to mechanical difficulties”. Hard to imagine what goes on there. From now on it’s Air France for me.
Thank you for the responses. I need to run my ideas by my H. I think he would prefer to get the driving portion done first and end in Paris. I’m trying to get most of the details done before I present him with an itinerary.
Pizza girl and MomofAdult- I’m sure you both would be more enthusiastic and helpful travel partners at this phase. This is a trip I’ve long wanted to do. My H isn’t against it but he is in the playfully complaining mode. Our ideas vary widely on what is a good travel destination. Over the years we have worked out a compromise that we alternate types of trips. He usually complains beforehand if it’s a trip I want to do. He is fine once we are on our way and he acknowledges he always is pleasantly surprised that he actually enjoyed a city or museum. Our last trip was a trip to Tonga that included 8 nights just the 2 of us on a 36 ft sailboat. That is his idea of a holiday. While I enjoy the water and seeing other parts of the world I’m not at heart a sailor. I’ve spent many a vacation on a sailboat all over the world.
Musicamusica- correct flight AirFrance to LAX. I used up a bunch of American Express points for 2 business class tickets. I’ve not flown out of CDG before so I appreciate the different prospectives.
So jealous! Only one piece of advice - the French radar cameras are automated and you WILL receive a speeding ticket when they catch you exceeding the speed limit, even by a few km. One of my (apparently poorly executed) jobs as navigator was to update the driver on changing speed limits, especially since DH’s French is “inexistent”
Congrats----Non stop Business class on Air France. It will be lovely.
Make sure you are familiar with the car before leaving the car rental. We were in Normandy at the WWII museum and tried to back out of our parking space. First time we had to reverse the car. We could not work the reverse shift and we tried every which way. Finally got a Frenchman to show us. We had to pull the stick way up to engage the reverse gear, never saw it in US cars and we both owned cars with stick shift.
That was some years ago, maybe the newer cars are more intuitive.
Have a nice trip.
Good catch. We had a similar problem in France.
Last year we had a Paris Normandy trip and previously have had an Amsterdam-Brugge trip so familiar but not the same itinerary. For Amsterdam we picked up a rental car and drove to Brugge for two nights, stopping in Antwerp to see the Cathedral and then spent 2 nights in Brugge, driving back to the airport in Amsterdam, stopping at the Hague to see the Mauritshaus and The Girl with the Pearl Earring and had a nice afternoon in the Hague in general.
For the Paris Normandy trip we picked up our car at CDG when we landed- around 10:30 AM DH can drive stick but none were available and we ended up with a diesel automatic. We spent the first night in Rouen so we had the afternoon to tour historic Rouen and a very nice dinner. We drove early the next morning to Etrat and spent the afternoon in Honfleur and left for the outstanding WWII museum in Caen arriving before dark in Bayeux. We spent two nights in Bayeux touring the Normandy beaches and seeing the Bayeux tapestry and the Cathedral and then left the next morning for Mont St Michel. Truthfully I am almost sorry we did not just do Mont St Michel as a long day trip and return to Bayeux. It was a very rainy day -this was in mid-October and seeing the Mont from the distance is really a significant part of the experience. The Mont itself truthfully is not as amazing a site as one would want in my opinion. You climb up steep walkways which we did in heavy steady rain with tourist shops and restaurants alongside and then when you get to the Abbey itself, it is a very simple stark site itself and not as much interesting a site as one would want. We had prepaid our reservation in the area before you walk across causeway to the Mont itself which are mostly motel-type accomodations and tourist type shops. I am happy we saw it but wouldn’t go out of my way to go back unless we were headed to spots in Brittany. Of course maybe in the late spring or earlier in the late summer/fall when you could go back across the causeway and wonder a bit more and perhaps have dinner there would make the difference. In any case, weleft early the next morning and stopped in Chartres and made it to Paris around 5 PM, dropping off our rental car and then we had 4 full days in Paris. Perfect! Personally I would stay in Paris and just get up very early and get to the airport and have breakfast there rather than stay in an airport hotel.
I hoe you have a lovely trip! Since you will be in Normandy, you may wish to stop in Rouen. My husband and I quite enjoyed the city.
Also, I did not see the dates you are going. From June 10-July 10 France is hosting the European Football (soccer) Championships, so there will be many more visitors than the usually crowded places, and France will be implementing more security measures.
Keep in mind as you plan that seeing the beaches of Normandy is emotionally draining and you won’t be in the “well, that was interesting! Now let’s hop in the car and drive to the next hotel” mood that you would be after seeing a chateau in the Loire Valley. I’m being very serious here - it’s sobering and upsetting (and completely worth it, I don’t mean to suggest otherwise).
I also agree with bookmama - I love tapestries, so I was all over the Bayeux tapestry and I think Mont St Michel is neat to view from a distance but not all that interesting to actually tour.
I’m loving all the great feedback. I’m not super excited about Mt St Michel. Might be worth re looking at the route and switching things up.
We are going first week of May. Rain might be a factor but we won’t need to worry about crowds.
Just a heads up, May 1 is Labor Day (Fête du Travail ) and a lot will be closed. Make sure you can pick up your car that day if that’s when you are arriving. May 8 is Fête de la Victoire 1945(VE day) --so plenty of celebrations, parades et al will be held in Paris and Normandy. The later celebration might affect your ability to book in Bayeux that week. Still, it would be a wonderful time to be there. Bon Voyage!!