Help with France itinerary

You'll need more than a sweater in April. Provins is a medeval city and
not too far from CDG if you don't want to do a lot of driving on your
first day. For hotels we rely on logis de France and 2-3 star hotels
are just fine

On Mon, 20 Mar 2006 12:05:49 +0100, "Terry Richards"
wrote:


"AJC" wrote in message
.. .
On Sun, 19 Mar 2006 15:54:12 -0000, "nightjar" nightjar@insert my
surname here.uk.com wrote:

Even better than the N roads sometimes are the D roads. With sensible
planning using a good map, you can often find some cross country
routes that are scenic, very quiet (much quieter than N roads), and
fast.

Until you get stuck behind farmer Bob and his muck spreader...



I usually find that because the D roads are so quiet, it isn't usually
long before you can overtake. On the N roads that are not dual
carriageway, however, you can be a long time waiting to pass a truck,
caravan, ancient Renault 4 etc.
--==++AJC++==--

The "N" Routes Nationales, and the "D" Routes Departementales will take
you into the heart of town(s). If the towns are cities and you are
there at rush hour be prepared to sit in traffic; also be prepared to
negotiate a lot of "rond points". Most hotels can give you a pretty
good idea which "backroads" to take. Most of France is very pretty and
its hard to go really wrong.

"Frank Clarke" wrote in message
It occurs to me that you haven't mentioned here seeing the Bayeux
Tapestry
(sic); you will regret that in the future. The D-Day beaches are only
beaches
and nothing much to write home about, either. Their attraction is
merely
sentimental, not scenic.

The best part of the area is Arromanche-les-Bains and the museum
largely
dedicated to "Mulberry B" (the artificial harbor constructed by the
Brits).

I finally saw the Bayeux Tapestry last summer, and was amazed. For some
reason, I had expected it to be a huge rectangular wall-hanging in the
Gobelin style, but it turned out to be a sort of panel-by-panel film
strip -- much easier to follow the thrilling story. It is well
presented in its museum, and the whole town is great for walking.

Having been taken to Dieppe and the Normandy Beaches by my parents in
the 1950's, I wanted to take my own daughter there to hand down an
appreciation of Canada's contribution. The beaches may not be
particularly scenic, but they do serve to recall the enourmous, and
dangerous, task that was undertaken there in 1944. The Canadian Museum
at Juno Beach is a tiny, perfect gem -- just enough to see and learn.
My daughter was thrilled to find the name of her school on the panels
near the beach that listed the names of donors to the museum, and it
helped her to make a personal connection.

I would recommend a visit, and some sober reflection, by any citizens of
the countries involved on D-Day.

On 20 Mar 2006 00:00:52 -0800, "Ptich" wrote:
. com

Do you have reservations for Font de Gaume? You must have reservations in
advance; the best way is via FAX unless you are quite fluent in French; their
answering machine speaks only French.

Rick Steves in his France 2005 book seems to imply that finding a
parking slot near Font-de-Gaume may be difficult: "drivers who can't
get a parking here" should go to another cave. Is it really a problem ?
Does a reservation also guarantees a parking slot (I'd doubt it) ?

I recollect that there are about 100-120 slots in the FdG lot. That's got to be
'way more than is needed for any expected tourist load.


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