Honfleur: Underwhelming

From Le Havre, we took a day trip to check out Honfleur, which is right to the south of the mouth of the Seine. All the guidebooks recommend Honfleur over Le Havre, with its historical center spared from the devastations of WWII. Honfleur is a cute enough village. At the time I didn't think it warranted a day trip. Now, many museums later, after coming across various paintings of Honfleur, I realized that the place is a cradle of sorts of the Impressionists. We had to bag it.

St Catherine's Church was constructed entirely with wood timbers in the 1400's by the local fishermen and shipbuilders. To prevent a catastrophic fire, the belfry, famously painted by Claude Monet, was built separately across the street.








A few tricks with my camera to take a photo of St Catherine's Belfry ala Monet.


Honfleur's Old Port sees only pleasure boats and tourists these days.








We walked up the hill to Mont-Joli where one can see the mouth of the Seine; where the Seine River spills out into La Manche in French, aka the English Channel. Looking east is the spiffy new-ish bridge over the Seine that connects Le Havre to Honfleur....






...To the west it's a view across the Seine to Le Havre Port and out to the English Channel. Very cool!


The view out to the English Channel is best shown in this photo from the shore near our lunch spot for the day.


There is a park by the Seine with a pond dedicated to Monet. Here is my "ala Monet" shot.


One more Park shot. Flowers are still blooming even though it's October.

Le Havre: finally there

Le Havre, France, less than 100km from Rouen, was more or less leveled during WWII, took a distinctly different approach to rebuilding. Today 90% of Le Havre center consists of modern, utilitarian buildings, which do not draw visitors, and even though Le Havre got themself on the UNESCO list (2005), most travel guidebooks choose to leave out Le Havre or tell people not to bother.

We had to go, because

• During COVID we watched many old French films. At least a quarter of them make some reference to Le Havre. Even though we very well know, Le Havre is no longer the same place, we just had to go.
• Le Havre seemed to be the logical base for visiting Honfleur and Etretat.

We walked a big loop around the city. We neither like or dislike their rebuild, except for the modern church of St Joseph. I loved the stained glass interior. Saint Michel also had beautiful modern stain glass. I have since grown to dislike, or at least be very discriminating of traditional stained glass windows in churches, which are only pedantic, not inspirational or transformative.

On the train from Rouen to Le Havre.


Our apartment in Le Havre was near the Le Bassin du Commerce (Commerce Dock). There were great views: modern bridge, sunset, the Volcano Building and St Joseph's church; not to mention sailing school. We walked by it several times a day (and night).












The ferry "Contentin" runs between Le Havre and Portsmouth, England.


The Le Havre "Welcome Arch" is made of shipping containers (with me at right).


The mouth of the Port of Le Havre leads out into La Manche (English Channel).


Yacht Basin.


At the beach there is a skatepark and a boulodrome. ;-)




It's the time of year to dismantle and store the beach huts over the winter.


The Promenade .


Behind the Promenade, older mansions and modern apartments face the sea.




A tram runs from the beach through the heart of the city to the train and bus stations.


View from the old fortress, now a garden park (Les Jardins Suspendus).






City Hall, rebuilt in a modern style after WWII (with tram stop in front). And a nice varition on classical columns.






We admired the modern stained galss in St Michel located just behind City Hall.




St Joseph's Church. Also built after WWII. The interior is an amazing ensemble of wood, glass, and stone.








The library (lower left) has a very cool reading room.

Rouen: On our way to the coast of Normandy

Rouen is a curious place. The old town is at a river bend on the Seine. Unlike most towns in France, Rouen chose to not embrace its waterway(s). Back in the 1800s, they relocated their main train station to the right bank (a very fine art nouveau building too). Our bus happened to arrive on the left bank and we crossed the Seine on foot. Otherwise, if we had arrived by train, we would have missed the Seine all together.

Rouen had a very nice Cathedral, which fascinated Monet. What was recorded by Monet was almost decimated completely during WWII. Though information is not straight and forthcoming, we think much of the old town was rebuilt, including many half timber looking buildings. I am not convinced they necessarily even had that many before the war - someone 's idea of the past that was never there. This is in drastic contrast to Le Havre, which is still coming up on the itinerary.

All of Rouen's public museums are free, great move! They have some good stuff too!

In France, eating on long distance buses is usually prohibited, so if the bus driver's assistant has his sandwich in a ready-to-eat position, we pull out our sandwiches, chips, chocolate bar and drinks and let the picnic begin!. ;-)


The scene outside the bus window.


Walking across the Seine. That's the spire of the Cathedral in the distance.


Our first up "close" look at the Cathedral.


We walked inside and found that one third of the Cathedral was "closed", so after a quick tour we decide to return later.




Our apartment had an oven so Sun-Ling bought some pre-made puff pastry sheets and voila!


We head out to the train station to check on our departure day schedule and discover it's an outstanding Art Nouveau building.

The entrance hall of the Musée des Beaux-Arts is striking, with several monumental works in view.


A panorama of Rome by Joseph-Désiré Court.


Un mariage à Yport by Albert Fourié.


Ourselfies.


A tour guide holds court in front of "The Flagellation of Christ" by Caravaggio.


More monumental pieces.


Portrait of a woman with a snake by Paulus Bor.


Monet painted the Rouen Cathedral more than 30 times. Here's one of them with my "same scene" photo below it.


One of Monet's famous paintings of the Cathedral's West Facade.


The Seine Bridge and Port of Rouen by Pissaro with my sorta-similar photo below.




"Port of Rouen" by Torello Ancillotti .


An artist new to us: Jacques-Émile Blanche. We liked him a lot.



A painting by Jacques Villon, the brother of Marcel Duchamp.


Joan of Arc was burned at the stake in Rouen. There is a modern church (located in an old square) dedicated to her.






Our apartment was located near Rouen's famous clock. We walked by it more than several times.


Streets of Rouen.






The Ironwork Museum, housed in a deconsecrated church, was free and turned out to be quite interesting.


And the Ceramics Museum was pretty cool too.




Night photos of the Clock and the Cathedral.