You can tour Normandy in two or three days (if you’re in a hurry), but it’s better to take two or three weeks (if you’re there to enjoy it).
The list below isn’t really an itinerary, even though I do build those too, just a selection of notable places with a short rundown of the standout sites worth seeing and lingering at, nothing more ambitious than that. If this isn’t your kind of trip, feel free to skip ahead. The list isn’t binding, and of course, it’s far from complete.
To tour Normandy, you need to get to France first, so your trip will likely start at Charles de Gaulle Airport. After a quick look at the map, you’ll see that most of Normandy’s sites lie southwest of the Seine, but even so, I’m going to send you north of the river too. You won’t regret it!
Wait, what about Mont-Saint-Michel?
As you’ll notice, Mont-Saint-Michel doesn’t appear in my itineraries, even though it’s officially part of Normandy (don’t tell the people of Brittany, they claim it belongs to them). The reason I left it out is that it’s such a well-known attraction that most travelers get there one way or another regardless. So I’d rather dedicate the itineraries below to places that are a bit less famous.
What’s more, if you do want to visit it, there are plenty of organized tours from Paris that make it easy, and you can find them in my article A Day Outside Paris.
And one more small thing before we start
If you haven’t gotten to it yet, I highly recommend reading the article The History and Cuisine of Normandy in a Nutshell. As the title suggests, it will give you a historical, artistic and culinary background on Normandy and help you get to know the places better, which will come up in the itinerary that follows.
A Normandy itinerary following history and art
Giverny
This one is for art lovers, but not only them. The village of Giverny sits on the banks of the Seine, about 90 kilometers from Paris. In 1883, the painter Claude Monet (1840-1926) rented a house here for his large family and began cultivating an extensive garden around it. In 1890 he managed to buy the house, where he lived until the day he died.
Monet’s heirs preserved the house and the painting studio inside it, and in 1980 the house opened to visitors as a museum devoted to Claude Monet’s life and work. The team of gardeners who tend the garden around the estate have received special training so they can maintain the flowers and trees exactly as Monet put them on canvas.
Where to stay in Giverny
The biggest advantage of staying in the village of Giverny is that you can get to Monet’s house early in the morning and enjoy it before the crowds arrive. If you stay here, you’ll also get to discover the village itself, which has some magical spots that most tourists miss.
If you decide to stay in Giverny, you can find some decent places to stay at this link.
Lyons-la-Forêt
Set your course toward the regional capital, Rouen. But before you get there, stop for a break in the village of Lyons-la-Forêt (the S is silent, and this “Lyon” of the forest shouldn’t be confused with the big city of Lyon). This is the right place to mention the association “Les Plus Beaux Villages de France” (the most beautiful villages in France), and this village is one of them. There’s no particular site here. It’s simply beautiful!
Where to stay in Lyons-la-Forêt
Since this is a charming village from which you can explore the northern part of Normandy, it’s well worth considering staying here for a few nights.
If you decide to do that, you can find some decent hotels and apartments at this link.
What are “Les Plus Beaux Villages de France” (the most beautiful villages in France)?
It all began with a meeting between a man and a book. Charles Ceyrac, mayor of Collonges-la-Rouge, received in 1981 a small book called “Beautiful Villages of France,” published by Reader’s Digest, which presented photos of several beautiful villages in France, with no particular ranking or classification. Ceyrac reached out to the mayors of other towns and villages across France and asked, “Why this village and not another one?” Sixty-six other mayors responded to his call, and on March 6, 1982, the association “Les Plus Beaux Villages de France” was officially founded. The association built a scale of questions and points, divided into three groups:
- Quality: 30 criteria are measured here, mainly around preserving the environment, preserving the history and character of the village, preventing excessive commercialization, and more.
- Publicity and promotion of the place’s name: this measures advertising, the establishment of commercial businesses purely for promotional purposes (such as restaurants and hotels), the contribution of those businesses to promoting the village, and so on.
- Development: promoting tourism and the economy in the village and the surrounding area, while sticking to the principles above, preserving quality of life, the fabric of the local community, and the overall quality of life in the village.
A village applying to join the organization must go through long tests and inspections conducted by committees of the organization, including anonymous, unidentified committees and examiners. If accepted, the village’s mayor signs a certificate of commitment upholding the organization’s principles as described above. A village accepted into the organization may display the organization’s emblem at its entrance, and it gets featured on all French tourism websites. Membership in the organization doesn’t come with real financial grants or support, but it indirectly contributes to the village’s development and promotion.
Over the years, this organization has earned a reputation of distinction, and member villages get significant priority in travel and tourism itineraries, both for domestic and international tourism.
Today, 159 villages belong to this association, out of more than 32,000 villages across France.
Rouen
The regional capital and the main city in the area. Like any big city, it naturally has plenty of sites, museums and other destinations worth visiting.
I’ll mention the Notre-Dame Cathedral of Rouen, which is especially large and beautiful, but it gained worldwide fame after the painter Claude Monet painted it 30 times, from exactly the same vantage point, at different hours of the day and in different weather. This is how the artist illustrated the concept of Impressionism: the same cathedral, yet it looks different every time.
This is where Joan of Arc was burned at the stake in the town square after the English put her on trial. Here you’ll find a colorful market in the old town square, and at the Musée des Beaux-Arts you’ll find the largest collection of Impressionist works outside of Paris (outside the Musée d’Orsay), and so much more.
Where to stay in Rouen
Staying in the city of Rouen has several advantages:
- If you stay here, you’ll have time to really get to know the old quarter instead of just rushing through a visit to the cathedral.
- Rouen is a big city with plenty of restaurants and shops, so if you stay here you won’t have any trouble finding food or places to shop.
- It’s a good base for day trips around northern Normandy or on your way to Paris.
So if you decide to stay in Rouen, you can find recommended places to stay at this link.
Fécamp
A fishing and port town on Normandy’s northern coast. If you’re short on time, skip it. The town was at one point the seat of the dukes of Normandy, and a departure point for fishermen heading out to the open sea to catch cod.
Today, the Abbey of the Holy Trinity (Abbaye de la Sainte-Trinité) is the main attraction in town, and not because of its sanctity. It’s where Benedictine monks produce the sweet and wonderful liqueur Bénédictine, following a secret recipe known to only three people at any given time. All that’s known is that the recipe is based on 27 herbs and spices.
In 1863, a wine merchant in the town, who gave himself the grandiose nickname “Alexandre le Grand,” concocted an herbal liqueur with the help of a local pharmacist, basing it on various medicinal recipes. He poured the liqueur into a specially shaped bottle and added the letters D.O.M. to the label:
(Deo, Optimo, Maximo), meaning “To God, most good, most great,” and hoped for the best.
Success came quickly, and the liqueur went around the world. To secure that success, he built a legend around the drink, about Benedictine monks and a secret recipe lost in the smoking ruins of the abbey of Fécamp during the French Revolution.
Étretat
Not far from there, less than 20 kilometers away (I recommend taking the smaller coastal road, the D11, rather than the wider inland road, D940, which is what Waze will likely send you on), you’ll find one of Normandy’s gems: Étretat. It’s the direct geological continuation of the White Cliffs of Dover on the English coast; the French coast here is also made of white chalk cliffs, brittle, tall and beautiful.
A small fishing town was established in a little bay between these cliffs. Its residents today fish for tourists rather than fish, with small houses typical of the whole region: stone walls combined with wooden beams, what the locals call maison à colombages (half-timbered house).
The town is pretty but doesn’t have any particular site of its own (aside from a few restaurants and shops, tourist traps). So what can you do there?
- Short walks along the marked trails on the cliffs, overlooking seabird colonies and the tall rock formation jutting out into the sea known as “the Elephant’s Leg.” Be careful, the path at the top of the cliff isn’t fenced!
- If you liked the Netflix series Lupin, you’ll probably want to see where the final episode of the first season took place. You can also visit the house of Maurice Leblanc, where he wrote the series of books starring the gentleman thief Arsène Lupin, which inspired the TV series.
Le Havre
A big, gray port city sitting at the wide mouth of the Seine as it meets the English Channel. Because it was the largest port in the area, the city was bombed during World War II, first by the Germans, who then turned its port into one of the main departure points for the German fleet heading into the Atlantic, which in turn led the Allies to bomb it as well. The result? 82% of the city was destroyed, and it was entirely rebuilt after the war.
The city, home to about 180,000 people, doesn’t have any truly standout tourist site today. Like any big city, it has museums, sports centers, theaters and so on. The one site in Le Havre worth noting is the cathedral. The earlier one was completely destroyed in the bombings, and as part of rebuilding the city, architect Auguste Perret was asked to design a new cathedral, which he did together with architect Raymond Audigier.
Perret, a committed atheist, wanted the cathedral to be a monument to all the victims of the war, while Audigier, a devout Catholic, wanted to build something like a candle of thanksgiving for the arrival of peace. Together, the two built a church with a tall spire (107 meters) visible from a great distance. What makes the cathedral special is that it’s built entirely of reinforced concrete, an unusual material for a religious building, but one that was very fashionable during the postwar years of construction and rebuilding.
The Pont de Normandie
As early as 1931, the chamber of commerce and industry of Le Havre requested a bridge be built over the wide mouth of the Seine to shorten the route from the port city into the interior, heading south. After delays caused by World War II, an international competition was held and a plan was chosen to build the Pont de Tancarville.
Construction of that bridge began in November 1955, and it opened to vehicle traffic in July 1959. For decades it was the main transportation route between northern and southern Normandy, the longest suspension bridge in France. As traffic grew heavier, it was decided in the mid-1980s to build a new bridge, larger and taller, that would allow large ships to pass on the Seine. Construction of this new bridge began in 1989, and it opened in January 1995. It’s 2,143 meters long and rises 214 meters above the water. For a few years it held the record for the longest suspension bridge in the world, until the Tatara Bridge in Japan was completed in 1999.
Crossing the bridge requires a toll (5.50 euros for a regular car). To see this marvel of engineering in its full glory, I recommend that after crossing it, you continue to the waterfront of the town of Honfleur (the next stop on this itinerary). At the entrance to the town, turn right onto Avenue du Président Duchesne, continue straight north until you reach the water’s edge, then turn right, and the road will bring you right underneath the bridge.
Honfleur
Honfleur is a small town of just over 8,000 residents, but like every town along the northern coast, its population doubles and triples in the summer season: thousands of tourists, French and foreign alike, flock to all the coastal towns here. One of the most interesting sites in town is the church of Sainte-Catherine.
The church is built entirely of wood and dates back to the second half of the 15th century. True to the period, the bell tower stands apart from the main building: if fire broke out in one of the wooden structures, only that one would burn. The church follows the layout of a typical town market hall of the era, a style you can still spot in many towns in the region: a sloped tile roof resting on a set of strong, sturdy posts, like a covered square in the middle of town. The weekly market used to take place under that roof, rain or snow.
The town has other churches too, but most of the interest centers on the “Vieux Bassin” (the “Old Basin,” from the 17th century), a small, colorful and picturesque harbor that gives the whole charming town its distinctive feel. The harbor, once home to the town’s fishermen, has long since been taken over by cafés and restaurants that ring it on all sides. As in many places like this, there’s nothing quite as magical as leaning back in a wicker chair, facing the calm water, watching passersby go by while you hold a cup of coffee, a glass of wine, or an aperitif, depending on the hour.
In town you’ll also find a museum dedicated to the painter Eugène Boudin (1824-1898), one of the first painters in France who “dared” to go outside and paint in nature, which makes him one of the pioneers of Impressionism, even before anyone called it that.
Another small museum is dedicated to the French composer Erik Satie (1866-1925), a native of the town. Another site, a bit outside of town heading north toward the coastline, is the Naturospace, a large tropical garden enclosed in a giant greenhouse where thousands of colorful, strange and beautiful butterflies from around the world fly freely. A word of caution: because of the tropical atmosphere, the place is hot and humid.
Where to stay in Honfleur
I highly recommend staying in Honfleur, both because it’s a charming town in its own right and because it can serve as an excellent base for day trips along the Normandy coast.
If you’ve decided to stay there, you can find good vacation apartments and hotels at this link.
Trouville and Deauville
The coastal area west of Honfleur has long been a resort area for the wealthy. During the 19th century, when tourism and vacationing were a luxury not everyone could afford, the closest beach to Paris that the rich could reach was the Atlantic coast of Normandy. Those who could get to the coast could also afford to build beautiful, eye-catching villas.
Little by little, the northern Atlantic coast of France became a prestigious area, much like the southern Riviera is today. Grand houses, exclusive clubs, indulgent vacations with servants and luxurious spa treatments… Today, the wealth is less flashy, but the grandeur and prestige are still there.
On the way from Honfleur to Deauville you can take the main road, the D579 followed by the D74, but I recommend winding along the waterline instead, along the coast, on the smaller D513. There you’ll catch glimpses of the beach and the waves now and then, and you’ll also get to enjoy beautiful villas, even if some of them are shuttered away behind blinds or stone walls protecting the owners’ privacy.
Almost the entire coastline is one continuous stretch of settlement, with no real “border” between one town and the next. Just before Deauville, on its beach, several famous scenes from Claude Lelouch’s film “A Man and a Woman” (“Un Homme et Une Femme”) were filmed. You’ll pass through a town called Trouville, known mainly for its straight, flat sandy beaches, which makes it the natural birthplace of a sport you’ll hardly find anywhere else in the world (it also exists on the beaches of northern France near Calais and Dunkerque, as well as on the beaches of Belgium).
Sand yachting
Char à voile, literally “sail cart.” It’s a vehicle that’s part carriage, part sailboat, and it has existed for hundreds of years.
Today it’s a very lightweight vehicle, built from aluminum beams on three wheels, with a large sail rising above it. The strong winds blowing along these beaches are what drive these vehicles, which can reach very high speeds (the world record is 152 km/h). At the sailing club of Trouville-Hennequeville (C.N.T.H, Club Nautique de Trouville-Hennequeville), you can rent one of these by the hour and, after a few instructions and tips, head out for your own adventure with the sand and the wind.
The city of Deauville
The D513 crosses a bridge over a river called La Touques, and suddenly you’re right in the heart of Deauville. It’s a small, wealthy town, home to some of the richest people in the world, who built themselves grand, ornate villas here.
As you walk along the boardwalk or the town’s streets, you won’t be able to shake the feeling of competition: the owners seem to be competing with each other over who can build something stranger, crazier, or simply more extravagant and showy.
Deauville is considered one of the most prestigious resort towns in France. Once a year it hosts an important, famous horse race that draws the who’s who of the entire world, and the American film festival held there every year (founded in 1975) is one of the most important in Europe.
It also has a grand international conference center (CID, Centre International de Deauville), which opened in 1992 and is built several floors deep into the ground so as not to disturb the view of the coastline. You’ll also find a large, elegant casino there (18 and up only) and plenty of some of the most expensive hotels and restaurants in the world.
Until 1860, the town had no particular claim to fame. Then the wife of the Duc de Morny, the official title of Emperor Napoleon III’s half-brother, arrived. She fell in love with the place and urged her husband to develop it so she could keep coming back.
A first hotel was built there, and later a railway line was laid, one of the first in France. Wherever royalty goes, everyone else follows, and so the rest of the entourage close to the emperor and his brother soon arrived too. A virtuous circle took hold: the town had to meet the needs of its distinguished guests, who brought along their servants and retinues. The retinues, in turn, needed various services and entertainment, and the rest is history.
Among the grand villas in town, one of the most remarkable is the Villa Strassburger (1, Avenue Strassburger). It was built in 1907 by Baron Henri Rothschild and sold in 1924 to the American millionaire Ralph Strassburger. Today it belongs to the city of Deauville, which uses it for exhibitions and special events (closed to visitors the rest of the year). You can take a peek inside this fascinating villa in this video (unfortunately it’s in French):
At the very least, you can admire the building from the outside: the villa is large and grand, built in the local style while preserving all the classic features of a typical Normandy house: timber beams, square chimneys, round turrets and more.
Where to stay in Deauville
Did you fall in love with Deauville? You’re welcome to make it your base for day trips. If you’ve decided to take my advice, I’d suggest looking for good vacation apartments and a few decent hotels at this link.
Caen
Bayeux and Caen are 30 km apart (via the N13). Caen was the city of William the Conqueror and at one point even served as the capital of Normandy. It’s known as “the city of a hundred bell towers” (“Ville aux Cent Clochers”) for its many churches, religious buildings, public buildings and more, like any small city (105,000 residents).
In 1969, the city’s then-mayor had the idea of building a “Memorial for Peace” (“Mémorial pour la Paix”) in the city, as opposed to the “war museums” built elsewhere in the world. The striking building was inaugurated in September 1986 and is one of the most visited museums in France outside of Paris.
The museum does display plenty of items, documents and collections related to World War II, but they’re organized and presented from the perspective of peace and reconciliation, rather than war and destruction. Over the years, additional exhibits have been added covering other wars around the world, including civil wars and genocides that took place in various parts of the globe.
Bayeux
The small town of Bayeux, with about 13,500 residents, can claim two facts related to World War II. It’s a city that suffered no damage at all during the war (one of the few in northern France), and it was also the first city on the European continent where the Germans surrendered and handed over command to the Allies after the invasion.
Bayeux has existed since the Celtic and Roman periods. During the Viking invasions it served as an important trading center. Like many small towns, it has a theater, a handful of churches, a few museums and so on. But its worldwide fame comes down to two things: the lace and the tapestry.
Bayeux lace is a tradition that developed in the region starting in the 17th century, after the education of the town’s children was entrusted, in 1676, to the nuns at the town hospital. One of the activities they taught the children was lace-making from linen thread using a special technique with bobbins (dentelle aux fuseaux).
The result is an extraordinarily delicate lace with especially intricate structures and patterns, which grew more refined over the years and spread throughout Normandy. Its fame traveled far, and napkins, sheets and lace garments sold for exorbitant prices.
The Bayeux tapestry is also known as the “Tapestry of Queen Matilda,” or by its older name, “the Tapestry of the Conquest.” It’s not really a tapestry at all but nine embroidered strips of fabric, joined together with an invisible seam into one long strip, 50 centimeters wide and 70 meters long. The “tapestry” depicts the story of the conquest of England by William the Conqueror (the Battle of Hastings, 1066).
The work was most likely commissioned by Odo, Bishop of Bayeux, who was also William the Conqueror’s half-brother. The embroidery is a rare historical document, since it tells the story of the conquest from the Norman point of view, in an attempt to justify the invasion of England, while most surviving documents tell the story from the English point of view (which, of course, does not justify the invasion of their land).
The embroidery was kept in the city’s cathedral, and when word spread in 1562 that Protestant soldiers (Huguenots) were approaching, it was hidden away and forgotten. It wasn’t rediscovered until 1728, by a historian studying the subject, who named it after Queen Matilda, a name that stuck until more advanced research on the embroidery was carried out at the end of the 20th century (1982-83). Today the embroidery is on display at the “Tapestry Museum” (“Musée de la Tapisserie”).
Where to stay in Bayeux
There are two main reasons to make this town your base for touring Normandy. The first, as you’ve just read, is that it’s a charming town in its own right. The second is its location, which will let you easily reach the landing beaches, which we’ll get to shortly.
So if you’d like to stay there, feel free to check out this link.
Lisieux
On your way back to Paris, you can stop in the small town of Lisieux, home to about 20,000 residents. Here too there are no special sites to speak of, except for the basilica. The Basilique Sainte-Thérèse, gleaming white marble, stands atop a hill and can be seen from far away. Construction began in 1929, was only completed after the war, and the basilica was consecrated in 1954.
It’s dedicated to Saint Thérèse, a nun of the Carmelite order (an order for women only) who was born and lived in the area. She was born in 1873 and died in 1897, at the age of 24. After her mother died when she was four, she was raised by her older sisters, both of whom were members of the Carmelite order. Her religious upbringing left a deep mark on her, and at age 15, while still under the legal age, she traveled to Rome to ask the Pope for special permission to join the order, citing her profound religious calling.
The Pope was deeply moved by the young woman’s religious devotion and approved her unusual request to join the order. After her death from tuberculosis, several of her writings were published, revealing a deep inner life with a theological depth remarkable for someone so young. Her story and her writings became famous throughout France and the world (500 million copies sold), and in 1925 she was canonized as a saint. After the basilica was built, devotion to her grew even further, and the white basilica is now the second most important pilgrimage site in France, after the town of Lourdes.
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And that’s where the “classic route” ends. From here, you’re welcome to continue on to Paris (or to the airport), or alternatively to try the next two routes.
The Cider Route: Route du Cidre
If you’re especially interested in food and drink, there’s a route made just for you: the cider route.
If you’d like to discover where the best cider in France is made, while enjoying the beautiful scenery of Normandy along the way, I recommend reading Normandy’s Cider Route: A Trail of Apples and Alcohol.
A walking route following World War II history
You won’t find a lot of ancient historical buildings or stunning views here, but if you’re interested in the history of World War II, you can’t skip this route, which follows the main Allied landing sites.
Ouistreham
Your first encounter with history will be in a small, pleasant town (about 9,500 residents) called Ouistreham. It’s a small fishing town with a colorful, charming harbor sitting right where the Orne river flows into the ocean. This is the easternmost landing point (Sword Beach) reached by the first landing craft out of the entire international armada that came from the sea.
This is also one of the filming locations for the movie “The Longest Day.” The site once held a large German army bunker, part of which was blown up by British commandos during its capture in June 1944. Only the tower remains today, now a small museum dedicated, of course, to the events of those days. This is where Normandy’s commemorative tourism begins, continuing all along the coast to Utah Beach.
Arromanches
Arromanches-les-Bains, or simply Arromanches as everyone calls it, will go down in history as a central site of the invasion of Normandy, because its beautiful, flat beaches were chosen for the construction of the first artificial harbor built during the invasion.
Both sides understood from the start that the invasion would involve heavy equipment, not just infantry, and heavy equipment needs a proper harbor, not landing craft on a beach. The assumption was that the German army would keep guarding and defending the existing harbors, Le Havre and Cherbourg. So there was no way around building a temporary harbor, at least until the large existing harbors could be liberated.
In the first days of the invasion, once the Allied beachhead was secured and the Germans pushed back from the coastline, massive concrete blocks were towed from Britain across the sea, sometimes rough, starting on June 9, 1944, and sunk off the invasion beaches at two sites: Arromanches on Gold Beach (Mulberry Harbour B) and Omaha Beach (Mulberry Harbour A).
Today, Arromanches is a commemorative site and a small, tourist-friendly village. About 500 residents live in the village, most of them involved in history and tourism. A museum commemorating the invasion was established here, and this is the main official memorial site of the invasion, where the annual memorial ceremony is held. The museum displays many items from the invasion period, including uniforms, documents and sand tables depicting the battles and troop deployments. Outside the buildings, on the beach, you can still see the remains of concrete bunkers and sections of the harbor and steel jetties. Next to the museum, a small movie theater was built showing a 360-degree film about the invasion.
Where to stay in Arromanches
Arromanches is perfectly located among all the main sites of the invasion of Normandy, so it can make an excellent base for exploring the area. If you’d like to stay there, you can find some nice apartments and hotels through this link.
Colleville-sur-Mer
Head west from Arromanches on the D514, along the coast. 19 kilometers from there sits a small village called Colleville-sur-Mer (Colleville by the sea). The most interesting thing about this village is its name. In the early Middle Ages (around the 9th century), there was an isolated farm in the area where a Viking named Koll lived, a descendant of the invaders from the north. A small town grew up around the farm, and everyone called it “Koll’s village.”
Over the years, this became the current name, Colleville (a literal translation would be “Colle’s town”: the letter K isn’t very common in French, and it was naturally replaced with a C). Because of its proximity to the sea, “sur-Mer” was added over time. As mentioned, there’s nothing particularly interesting about this small village of about 170 residents, except for what lies just outside it: the American military cemetery.
About 100,000 soldiers were killed during the invasion of Normandy. The vast majority were buried hastily during the days of fighting, and after the war, almost all of them were moved to 27 organized cemeteries along the invasion coast. Only a small number of the fallen were returned to their home countries.
The military cemetery at Colleville-sur-Mer is the largest among the Allied military cemeteries from World War II in Normandy, holding the graves of 9,387 American soldiers. The cemetery is well kept and maintained, and it is simply… beautiful! It’s a strange thing to say about a cemetery, but it’s absolutely worth a visit.
Utah Beach Museum
In recent years, especially after the 50th anniversary of the invasion (1995), additional invasion museums were established at other spots along the coast, most of them private, run by collectors and enthusiasts. A visit to “Utah Beach” isn’t to a particular town or village, but to a special museum that is today one of the most impressive in the entire invasion area.
In 1962, the mayor of Sainte-Marie-du-Mont (literally, “Holy Mary of the Mountain”) decided to build a museum on the invasion beach, to commemorate the invasion and mark the debt the French people owe the American soldiers. Since then, the museum has been expanded several times (today it has 3,000 square meters of display and screening space), and its collections have grown through various donations, objects and equipment found and preserved around the world.
A special structure displays a B-26 “Marauder” bomber, one of the few remaining in the world. In another hall you can see a model of the artificial harbor built on the beach, and in yet another hall, the award-winning documentary “La Plage de la Victoire” (“The Beach of Victory”) is screened, telling the story of the 830,000 soldiers who invaded the Normandy beaches with 725,000 tons of war equipment.
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This is where the route covering the landing beaches ends. If you’d like to read a similar but slightly different route created by my friend Danny Ashkenazi, feel free to check out the article A Walking Route in Normandy Following the Invasions: The Landing Beaches and the Tapestry of Bayeux.
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