Category: Travel

Mont Saint Michel has been on our bucket list for a very long time. Captured by the beauty of its location, and construction, it is one of Europes most recognisable landmarks.

You are immediately in awe when you first see it, a shame if you happen to be driving at the time!

It was difficult for Jasmine to see what we were driving to so it was easier to say ‘can you see the big rock in the water with a pointy building?’ and bingo – she got it!

Again blessed with incredible weather, Claudine was determined to capture the island at sunset, so we took to the road to find that perfect spot. It seems the French don’t really want to capitalise on this stunning outlook, anywhere else in the world there would be restaurants and bars as far as the eye trying to cash in on the view. Alas it is left to the local livestock to relax and enjoy.

We hit the queues early to get the shuttle bus from the oversized carpark to the island. You cant simply drive over the bridge that connects the island to the mainland unless you are staying on the island, and even then it is recommended that you don’t. Buses (free) ferry tourists though the gated town of La Caserne, a tourist ‘buffer’ before you reach the modern bridge. You can still walk across the mud flats if you choose to but be warned, there is quick sand.

It must have been quite a spectacle watching the construction of the Abbey over time, all the rock (granite) was quarried from the neighbouring Chausey islands and ferried across in boats and badges. Rock from the same quarries also went as far as Paris and London for the reconstruction of sidewalks post WW2.

We learnt a great deal about the island. How it has been the centre of many sieges including the 100year war where it was never taken by the English. The Abbey was closed in 1791 and converted into a prison until 1863. It was declared a historic monument in 1864 and has been in a constant state of restoration ever since.

We enjoyed a light lunch in the ramparts of the city, benefiting from an amazing view back to the mainland at almost low tide.

Our visit exceeded our expectations in may ways. The Abbey is spectacular and the tour is fantastic. The weather will influence your visit significantly and we were blessed with a great day. We will definitely go back and have a personal tour next time. It is not overly touristy place, well it does not feel that way at least. The visual brilliance of the island and the local natural beauty adds to create a magical and stunning landscape.

Top tips for Mont-Saint-Michel

• Get there early. The cooler weather in the morning is a plus but it is getting in before the crowds fill up the car park and queues become significant for the buses to the island.
• Walk the ramparts, these provide an amazing view of the island and its surrounds plus there are less people than walking through the city street.
• Take comfortable walking shoes. Its a small island but there is a lot of walking to do.
• Plan to stay for lunch. Reward yourself in one of the fantastic restaurants – its a great way to cap off a visit. There are restaurants for every budget, we went to a Bar Creperie Restaurant La Nouvile Terrace.
• The sun set is spectacular. We stopped at this spot and walked out through the paddocks with locals, but in early July sunset is around 10:30pm.

Drive along the coast, past Dauville

The memory of what happened along the Normandy coast is as vivid today as it was 75 years ago. Every street sign has a flag with a hero from the allied army in recognition of their efforts. Because of the way Operation Overreach was designed, the American, Canadian, English and allied forces attacked seperate parts of German fortifications. As you drive through the small Normandy towns they each pay respect to the countries that helped liberate them, it is very touching.

We visited 4 specific sites, each dedicated to the moments when the allied forces made immeasurable sacrifices, some beyond my generations imagination. I was surprised to see how much of a time capsule this region remain, and how much effort continues to be been made to ensure people never forget. So much of the 1940’s infrastructure still remains on the beaches, in the towns and the surrounding landscape.

Our first visit was to the the battery museum of Merville-Franceville. The fortifications, vintage equipment and digital interactions gave a detailed minute by minute visual and historical representation of the British efforts to silence the strategically important German long range coastal defences that otherwise would have significantly impacted the allied landings. The sacrifices made by the British here were astounding.

Our next location was the Grand Bunker of the Atlantic wall. This obscure tall building, amongst modest residential surrounds, whose purpose was to cover the entrance of the river Orne and the associated canal with its artillery. The 52ft high concrete tower has been fully restored to make it look how it was on the 6th of June 1944.

On 9 June, Lieutenant Bob Orrell of The British Royal Engineers, accompanied by just three men, placed explosive charges on the bunkers armour-plated door. It took these 4 men four hours to break open the bunker. The Germans were certain they were to be confronted by more than just 4 men as two German officers and fifty men surrendered. The liberation of town of Ouistreham was complete.

The museum a fantastic recreation of how the German operations were in 1944. The boys really enjoyed the displays and the vast array of authentic equipment, clothing and ammunition. The view from the top, only accessed by a 18ft ladder used at your own risk, was amazing and you can see how this position was so strategic in the local region.

Next on our visit was Arromanches beach at the remains of the Mulberry floating harbour. This was incredible to see such a large array of infrastructure used in the Normandy landings still in situ, although clearly battered and deteriorating.

The floating harbour was only meant to be temporary however it ended up serving for five months after a similar harbour at Omaha beach was destroyed by the worst storm to hit Normandy in 40 years, supporting the transfer of 2.5 million men, 500k vehicles and over 4 million tonnes of supplies. The harbour was also known as Port Winston.

This was by far the business location we visited. To say that the North American tourists were noticeable would be an understatement. Escaping the wandering ‘Yankees’ we hit the beach to get up close to the infrastructure that has overtime broken free and drifted to shore. It must only be a matter of time before these extremely visible remnants of 1944 disappear forever.

The next visit was to the surviving German coastal defences at Longues-sur-Mer.

The battery is located between the Allied landing beaches of Gold and Omaha and actively shelled both beaches on D-Day. The battery was captured on June 7, the day after the landings, and played no further part in WW2.

The battery is the only one in Normandy to retain all its original guns in situ and is a listed historical monument. Frozen in time, the boys were provided with a real impression of the intensity of this war as each of the 5 fortifications visibly show varying degrees of destruction.

Last on our list for our tour was Point du Hoc at Cricqueville-en-Bessin, immortalised by the 1962 movie ‘The longest Day’. Point du Hoc is a clifftop position wth 100ft cliffs, overlooking both Utah and Omaha beaches. It was a strategically important German defence that was captured by US Army Rangers on D-Day where they had to scale the 100ft cliff walls.

The area was also heavily bombarded, the remains of which is brutally visible to this day. Craters, some more than 20ft deep, still scar the area.

Our visit to the Normandy landing sites were amazing. Everyone learnt a great deal of the sacrifices made by the incredibly brave men of the allied forces. It is a very moving and surreal place to visit. The vast distance covered by the landings give you a sense how big this day was, the largest sea-born invasion in history.

It was impressive how much to local towns still remember and give thanks to all the men, some from distant lands, in liberating them and bringing peace to the region that has now laster for 75 years. May this peace never end.

It was time to pack out bags once again and hit the road for five continuous nights of short stays with over a thousand kilometres of driving. But first we needed to get a taxi to our car leasing location. Turns our car location was just around the corner from a landmark the boys instantly recognised!

Our lunchtime destination was Giverny, the town where Claude Monet lived from 1883 until his death in 1926. The short(ish) drive was relatively nondescript until we arrived at the little town of Giverny which exceeded our expectations. It is a town well managed to control tourism and soften the effects on the local environment. It feels like the entire village is a living museum to Monet.

On arrival at Monet’s house you are directed though his gardens, too bad if it was raining, but fortunately for us it was another glorious day. The gardens are meticulous. So beautifully curated that the casual tourist would not notice the gardeners hard at work. Whilst we were there I counted no less than 6 gardeners working on various sections. Claude himself hired up to 7 gardeners at a time to tend to his inspiration.

I was surprised by the amount of Japanese prints Monet collected and chose to hang throughout his house. The house has been impressively restored to its former glory after falling into disrepair in the 1970’s. The colours throughout the house were chosen by Monet himself to represent the colour palate he used frequently in his paintings.

Next was a visit to the famous lily pond across the road. Monet had water diverted from the river Epte in order to create this landscaping masterpiece. It was surreal to be wandering along the banks of the pond that inspired Monet’s world famous works that hundreds of thousands of people visit every year, and that we admired a few days earlier whilst in Paris.

Our visit to Giverny wouldn’t be complete until we paid our respects at Monet’s final resting place in the church grounds less than a kilometre from his house.

Back into our chariot, and onto the Normandy coast, Honfleur to be precise.

The countryside roads seem incapable to handle traffic of any size let alone anything of volume – forget tourist buses, one wonders if the French do this on purpose to create a quaint atmosphere. You need nerves of steel to drive here, thats maybe why Claudine did most of the driving!

On arrival at Honfleur the small roads shrink even more to where just a single car can traverse the passageways. Even with our detailed directions to our boutique hotel for the evening it still took us close to an hour to find it, but thats ok, Honfleur is a living postcard. Seemingly time (and architecture) pressed the pause button in the 16th century in Honfleur. Our hotel rooms were small but practical, that is if you didn’t need to carry 30kg up the narrow corkscrew staircase. The temperature is noticeably lower than in Paris. And the seagulls – they are twice the size of anything I have ever seen and twice as noisy!

We wondered the port of Honfleur which had markets on at the time. We enjoyed pre-dinner drinks in the port while watching people – a favourite pasting in France!

Honfleur had a sensitive mix of culture and cosmopolitan with a side of street art splashed in.

We wondered the back street before dinner where I pointed out some of the detailed carvings in the local buildings, no doubt the wood carvers would spend their ‘off season’ caving ship figures on the local buildings.

An afternoon (plus and evening) in Honfleur was not enough. But before we departed early the next day I spent the pre-dawn wandering the streets. Partly because we needed to pay for our parking spot from 6am, partly because I wanted to get breakfast, and partly because I wanted to capture the harbour at first light – something that I will remember for a very long time!

Must Do’s:

• Honfleur. Simply put you must visit. It is a charming seaside port that is frozen in time. It has all the charm and sophistication of the region concentrated into a one kilometre radius. If you can – stay in the port and soak up all the atmosphere!
• Giverny, it is an easy day trip from Paris. For anyone who has been inspired by Monet, seen his paintings, an artist in their own wright, you must visit this place because it exceeds expectations.

Our second day in Paris was entirely dedicated to visiting the Palace of Versailles. This was the first time the boys (and of course Jasmine) have visited the palace built by King Louis XIV, the Sun King. Fun fact – King Louis XIV reigned for 72 years and 110 days making him the longest reigning European monarch to this day! The UK’s dear Queen Elizabeth ii needs another 5 years before reaching that record!

Following an epic first day, our second was much more manageable. A reasonably early morning, a quick shop for food supplies, and then onto the metro/RER for Versailles. From our apartment the trip took around one and a half hours, that is if you can keep up with the train indicator boards who seemingly like to change platforms with little notice in order to fool ‘lazy’ would-be travellers. The Tucker’s were onto their game early!

The weather was just perfect for us tourists, the traveling hordes of sub-continent groups however made visiting significant attractions such as Versailles difficult. I do not recall it being as busy the last time I visited.

We visited on a Tuesday, a day when music fills the gardens and every 15min a small selection of fountains are turned on. But first we engaged ‘elbow out’ mode to tackle the Palace and its thousands of visitors.

The water features were impressive, and encouraged us to explore more of the gardens with the kids. This was a change of pace and left the crowds behind us.

We loved our visit to Versailles. It gave the boys an appreciation of French history and some context to the French revolution. Jazzy wanted to know where the ‘bad Queen’ was who lost her head (Marie-Antionette) and repeatedly asked….. ‘is this where the bad Queen died?’

Tips for Versailles

• If visiting for the first time, pre-book – this gets you priority access which at first you don’t appreciate until you see the line for tickets and wonder ‘why didn’t any of those people thing about pre-booking?’. You must visit the palace – it is truly spectacular. There is a free audio guide that you can download onto your smartphone to learn all out the Palace.
• If you have visited before, next time explore the free public gardens like the locals who pack a picnic and enjoy the ambiance without charge. A bottle of wine, some stinky cheese and a fresh baguette will make anyone pass as a local.
• We always run out of time (and energy) to visit the lower palace residences of Le Grand Trianon and Le domaine de Marie-Antionette, we have to make sure these are visited next time – the queues appear much smaller!

The Tucker family loves Paris. Our stays never feel long enough and this one would be no different. Because of arranging other itinerary items first, our Paris stay is concentrated to just two and a half days which meant that our days were going to be more packed than the Parisian Metro at rush hour hopefully minus the smell of garlic.

We yet again woke early due to excitement and too early for the local Boulangerie shops to open so we took a walk down Rue de Gobelins, a local street, and too our surprise we were welcomed by hundreds of Teddy Bears dominating the neighbourhood. This turned out to be a thing, created last year by a local to generate some local vide which was embraced enthusiastically. 2019 is the second year of the parade of the bears. We even spotted one riding shotgun on a scooter, but this wasn’t your average child sized bear on the scooter, it was at least 4 ft tall.

Rue de Goblins also had some amazing street art. The boys and I enjoyed exploring the street so much we had walked some 3km before returning home with some freshly baked chocolate croissants.

Recharged with coffee and chocolate, we hit the Paris metro for a full day. Things have changed. The sounds and smell are the same, so are the ‘get out of my way’ locals, but the gypsies and buskers that made you wary of where you wallet was have all gone. I do miss a talented busker balancing precariously on the metro but it is for the better.

Our fist stop was the Louvre. Many museums and ‘attractions’ are closed on Mondays but the Louvre is not one of them. Thats probably why it was ‘sold out’ with pre-purchased tickets meaning we had to change plans. Mental note – next time pre-purchase tickets to the Louvre!

We took a walk through the Jardain des Tuileries, admiring the manual lawn mowers (too our surprise) and into the Musee de L’Orangerie to admire Monet’s massive masterpieces.

Switching gear, we headed the Metro to Montmartre for lunch. It is always such a pleasure to wander the streets and soak in the bohemian vibe that this location always exudes.

Before leaving Montmartre I took the family into a quaint and unassuming park near the Abbesses metro. In the corner of the part there were more than your average gathering of people taking picture of a wall. Turns our that the words “I Love You” are written in 311 different languages over 612 royal blue tiles.

The creator of the Le mur des je t’aime (I love you : the wall) is Fredric Baron. In 1992 he started collecting over 1000 different ways to write the magic worlds “I love you”. He filled three large notebooks from many different people whom lived in Paris with over 300 different languages. From this he went on to create the “The Book of I Love Yous” and distributed over 50,000 copies within France.

Next on our whirl wind day 1 of Paris was Le Jardin de Luxembourg. We visited these gardens last trip and we loved it. We again decided to pay the gardens and its central pond a visit, and it certainly didn’t disappoint. Model boat hire at 4euro for 30 minutes must make this the best value attraction in Paris! Whilst the boys and I raced our boats across the pond with wilful disregard to the other ‘pond punters’, Jasmine was quite content to strike a pose and soak in the aquatic atmosphere. I think that we have just created a new Paris tradition!

Finishing off the day was our pre-booked visit to the Eiffel tower. This holds special meaning to our family as it was the place that I proposed to Claudine some 17 years ago. The boys have visited before, but this was to be Jasmine’s first visit. To say that Jasmine was excited about the Eiffel tower is an understatement. Peppa Pig visited the tower in her adventures and ever since Jasmine has wanted to go.

Because we pre-purchased tickets we were able to almost entirely skip the queues of hundreds of people waiting to get to the top. I was amazed how Jasmine showed no fear looking out of the elevator as we ascended at the crowds disappearing below.

The weather was fantastic for the tower, a slight breeze kept the temperature to an honest 30 degrees. It was my fourth visit to the tower and it never disappoints. It has been such a pleasure taking all the children to this magnificent monument.

To cap off a packed day we had dinner with Anahita, a former colleague of Claudine when she worked in Paris in the late 90’s and have remained in close contact since, at Cafe de l’Industrie near the Bastille. Jean-luc and Benjamin both braved the Parisian institution of escargot (garlic snails) and I had back-to-back stake de tartare. Anahita very generously shouted us a very nice dinner out – thank you!

Top tips for visiting Paris

• Pre-book everything you want to see. Pre-booked tickets will (almost always) provide priority access and allow you to skip any queue. The Paris Museum Pass is a great one to start with if you don’t know where to start.
• Get a Metro day pass. You will need to ask for these at the Metro ticket office. Often you will catch many individual metro’s over a day and a day pass will become much more economical.
• e-Scooters are very popular in Paris and can be rented on the street side using a mobile device. This is a great way to quickly get around this great city.
• Plan you visit in great detail. There are so many fabulous sites in Paris and before you realise it you can spend an entire half day at just one (which is ok too).
• Get ready for Paris time. In summer it doesn’t get dark until 10:30pm so many do not go for dinner until after 9pm. It also means that you can cram much more into a day than you would expect. Want to see Paris at night time…… expect to wait until 11pm for this to happen and with Kids in tow, forget about it!