VIDÉO: Driving back from Le Havre through Honfleur and along the coastline, taking advantage of the new convertible rental (and a bonus photo of my brocante finds!).
Things I learned this weekend:
Avoid the bigger cities and villages in Calvados on the weekends, especially on sunny days.
Unexpected turns of events can often bring beautiful surprises.
A couple of days before my husband arrived, a warning light on my old Land Rover clicked on, and the booster started to throttle the engine, making going up and down these Normandie vallées painfully slow. A quick search on the internet told me the warning could be one of three things, all very expensive. Ugh. As luck would have it, I found a Land Rover garage in Le Havre, and they set an appointment for today. And within walking distance? A Hertz rental car.
With all of those details dialed in, I headed over to the Le Havre train station Saturday morning to collect the hubby. It is the first time he has been to this part of Normandie, and I was excited to introduce him to Honfleur on day one. On day two, I scheduled moules frites and the beaches of Deauville and Trouville.
I knew both towns would be busy with weekend traffic. But what I wasn’t prepared for was the number of Parisians pouring into both locations for a sunny séjour. I made reservations at a restaurant I was anxious to try and hopefully share with you. The reviews were fab, and every time I walked by the sunny terraces, they were packed. While the meal was decent, the service was not. It took us three hours to be served an appetizer and entree – we skipped dessert in fear that we’d still be sitting there when dinner service started. Ha! We walked around the village for a bit, but I could see jet lag and overwhelm settling in on Jeff’s face. We headed home to a bottle of chilled Chablis and our private sun-soaked terrace. Perfect.
Read the rest of this story, PLUS my tips in the comments below! 👇👇👇