Paris to Normandy to Le Havre

[syr101]

Can you rent a car in Paris, drive to the Normandy beaches stay the night out that way and drop off a car near the port. Who can we use to do that.

 

[CruiserBruce]

I am sure you can. You just need to research the vendors that have rental offices in Le Havre for drop off.

[John Bull]

Yes.

Check the agencies with depots in Le Havre - there's Avis, Hertz, Enterprise, Europcar, SixT, & Thrifty, and all will have depots in Paris.

 

But a few things to consider.....

- Driving & navigation in Paris is no fun. You might want to take the train from Paris (Gare du Nord) to Caen or Bayeux, and rent a car from there (several agencies near Caen station, I don't know about car rental agencies in Bayeux but the rail service to Bayeux is less-frequent). If you leave Paris late you could book accommodation close to the station & pick up the car in the morning, but I'd strongly suggest leaving Paris early to give you most of two days for the D-Day sights and a wider choice of accommodation (city or village or coast or countryside).  

- I'm presuming that Le Havre is your embarkation port, in which case you need to know the latest registration time at the cruise terminal, not just the "back-on-board" time or sailing time. Ships usually depart Le Havre around 8pm, and hopefully registration time would  tie in quite well with rental agencies' hours (open til about 6pm, the French don't like long hours )

- bear in mind that there'll be a one-way fee for the car.

 

JB 

 

[Bob++]

Or you could take a train (about 2 hours) to LeHavre, and hire a car there (saving the extra charge) and then drive to one of the many hotels and pensions along the Normandy coast for the night. Deauville is less than an hour away by road.

Edited December 13, 2019 by Bob++

[John Bull]

4 hours ago, Bob++ said:

Or you could take a train (about 2 hours) to LeHavre, and hire a car there (saving the extra charge) and then drive to one of the many hotels and pensions along the Normandy coast for the night. Deauville is less than an hour away by road.

 

Good thinkin', Bob. 

 

From the same Paris Gare du Nord station.

Le Havre is about 90 minutes further from the D-Day sights than Caen.

But no one-way fee, and it's a lot easier returning the car along the same roads and to the same rental depot.

So yep, worthy of consideration. 

 

But with time to get in a couple of sights on Day One, perhaps better to overnight in or close to the American sector.

Perhaps Arromanches (lots of bars, restaurants, shops & sights) or Vierville-sur-mer (close to Omaha and the American Cemetery).

 

JB 

Edited December 13, 2019 by John Bull

[Bob++]

There is an Ibis at  Bayeux, Port-en-Bessin, which is right on the harbour front and handy for Omaha Beach. Ibis are a fairly basic but reputable hotel chain.

 

https://all.accor.com/hotel/6865/index.en.shtml

[Hlitner]

I would agree with JB's post about driving in Paris.  We have rented cars, a few times, in Paris when we were driving out of town to other parts of the country or Europe.  Driving in Paris is not for the faint of heart.   But I do agree that the best way to experience Normandy is with a rental car.  The region is actually quite rural and is well suited to having a vehicle.  Would I rent a car in Paris to drive to Normandy?  Yes.  But I would try to choose a rental car office that was convenient to an easy route out of Paris :).   Another very important issue with rental cars is that a majority of rental cars in France (and Europe) have a manual shift transmission.  If you can handle that, then no problem.  If not, you should make careful arrangements for an automatic. And then you need to pray that your agency honors your request.  We recently witnessed a few cruisers have major "melt downs" in Kotor, Montenegro when a local major rental car agency failed to honor reservations for automatics.  These folks were furious because none of them could drive a stick.  The agency accommodated them by simply canceling their reservation (with no penalties) but it did leave these two families without transportation. I have previously seen the same thing happen in Paris, when we rented from Europcar.

 

For Americans or Canadians who want to rent a car for 3 or more days, you might want to check with Autoeurope and/or Kemwel (they are sister companies) who are "consolidators" (or discounters) for several major rental companies (including Europcar and Hertz).  They will sometimes have deals which eliminate or minimize one-way drop fees.  Sixt is another company that might have reasonable or no one-way fees.

 

Hank