You may be wondering why we went to Rouen and only stayed part of one day. We like the quiet hotel in Rouen because we know we'll get a great night's sleep after traveling for the better part of two days. In addition, if we pick up our car rental in Rouen, it is very easy to get out of the city and on our way. If we were to pick up a car in Paris it might take the whole vacation just to get out of the city!
In Rouen we had to a two block walk to the car rental agency. When we got there we discovered that we were once again bumped up to a Mercedes.
For those of you who have never driven in France I need to explain that most major intersections are rotaries. There are signs ahead of the rotary to indicate where the various exits from the rotary lead. You drive around in a circle until you find a sign that points to your destination.
This system has a few problems. Often the exit signs do not indicate which highway you will follow if you take that exit. Also, they don't always indicate all of the nearby cities. When in doubt, you simply go around the rotator until you think you've found the right exit. It helps to know all the cities in the direction you are going, however not all maps show the smaller cities and these are often the only cities listed. For a long time I thought it was just that we were not experienced with this system, but as you will see later, even the French get lost going to places near home!
Well, we got out of the central area of the city and missed a simple left turn of all things. It was marked "Air Port" and we wanted Les Andelys. This led to another one of the happy accidents associated with missed turns. I found a short cut and plotted a way back to our highway. The short cut gave Jan a chance to drive on a curved road that climbed about 150 feet almost straight up. It reminded me of the road at the end of Cottage Lane in Fish Creek, except it the curve on this road kept repeating!
Once back on the road we found another reminder of home. In the small town Grainville, there was a restaurant called "The Coyote." We didn't stop. We were off to see the Chateau Gailliard at Les Andelys.
The Chateau was constructed by Richard the Lionhearted in 1196-97 to protect Normandy from the French. It fell to the French in 1204 who forced a way in through the latrines! The castle was destroyed in the 1500s during the Wars of Religion. There are two reasons for visiting the Chateau now. First, the views of the Seine are magnificent; second, the ruin of the Chateau is a spectacular sight.
Louviers
Our second stop was Louviers. This is a small city just south of Rouen. We had read about it in the book "On Rue Tatin" by Susan Herrmann Loomis. The house (right) was once a convent, but by the time the Loomises moved in, it had fallen into disrepair. They have rehabbed the house and use it as home and for a cooking school. While the author talks about the house and cooking in France, the primary subject of the book is the difference between everyday life in France and America. We arrived in Louviers on the day before the Foire St. Michel. Many of the roads were closed because vendors were setting up their booths, but we managed to find a way through town to a side street where we could park. Since we prefer to park and walk around French cities, this was exactly what we wanted.
The church, Notre-Dame de Louviers (below), is considered one of the most beautiful churches in Haute Normandie, and much loved by the people of Louviers.
The river Eure hare no less than 21 natural and artificial branches running through Louviers. In the photo, swans and plantings enhance the view. The abundance of flowing water helped the growth of the textile industry in the city.
Our plan was to drive to Lisieux to stay at a hotel we stayed at in 2001, but we decided that the direct route back to Lisieux might be blocked by preparations for the Foire. We opted instead to go south to Evreux to get N13 to Lisieux. Not a good choice. We got to Evreux during the rush hour! The delay wasn't long, but it was close to 7 p.m. when we finally arrived at Lisieux.
The hotel we had hoped to stay at was already full. The management explained that there was a big fair nearby and the other hotels in Lisieux were also full. They suggested that we try Deauville which is roughly 24 miles north. The road to Deauville is a four-lane divided highway, so we got there just before 8 p.m. When we pulled into a hotel we noticed that there were lots of people strolling around the parking lot. It turned out that the fair was being held under a football field-size tent just outside of Deauville. Not only were there no rooms in this town, there was also a huge traffic jam! The people at the hotel suggested going to Caen.
Caen was a place we really wanted to avoid, but at 8 p.m. with the closest hotels in Caen 40 miles away, we didn't have much choice. The last time we were in Caen (2001), we got lost and spent more than two hours just trying to get out of town! This time we had two hotel guide books (provided by two chains) with maps and written instructions, so we felt we would be OK. At the turnoff for the closest hotel, we looked for a second rotary and followed the directions to the city indicated. We found ourselves on the "peripherique," the beltway around Caen. We were headed in the clockwise direction and already a quarter of the way around the city. I saw that we would have to go about three quarters of the way around the city to get to another hotel in our guide. It was dark by this time.
At exit three, the directions in the book were to take the first right. We did and found ourselves going counter clockwise on the peripherique. At this point we figured that "peripherique" was French for hell! Once you were in its grips, you would never get away! Determined to get free, we took the next exit and came upon a small sign directing us to an Ibis hotel. We drove a few miles, but this time, not on the peripherique! We got a room and had supper by about 9:30 p.m. That night we slept in a hotel without knowing which little town near Caen we were sleeping in!