Seine Maritime

Squeezed between high cliff headlands, Dieppe is an enjoyably small-scale port that used to be more of a resort. During the nineteenth century, Parisians came here by train to take the sea air, promenading along the front while the English indulged in the peculiar pastime of swimming.

Though ferry services have diminished in recent years, Dieppe remains a nice little place, and you won’t regret spending time here. If you have kids in tow, the aquariums of the Cité de la Mer and the strip of pebble beach are the obvious attractions; otherwise, you could settle for admiring the cliffs and the castle as you stroll the seafront lawns.

While LE HAVRE may hardly be picturesque or tranquil, neither is Normandy’s largest town the soulless sprawl some travellers suggest. Its port, the second-largest in France, takes up half the Seine estuary, but the town itself, home to almost 200,000 people, is a place of pilgrimage for fans of contemporary architecture.

Built in 1517 to replace the ancient ports of Harfleur and Honfleur, then silting up, Le Havre – “The Harbour” – swiftly became the principal trading post of northern France. Following its near-destruction during World War II, it was rebuilt by a single architect, Auguste Perret, between 1946 and 1964.

The sheer sense of space can be exhilarating: the showpiece monuments have a winning self-confidence, and the few surviving relics of the old city have been sensitively integrated into the whole. While the endless mundane residential blocks can be dispiriting, even those visitors who fail to agree with Perret’s famous dictum that “concrete is beautiful” may enjoy a stroll around his city.

Nestled into an especially delightful loop of the river, 23km west of Rouen, the majestic abbey of Jumièges  is said to have been founded by St Philibert in 654 AD. Now a haunting ruin, the abbey was burned by Vikings in 841, rebuilt a century later, then destroyed again during the Revolution. Its main surviving outline dates from the eleventh century – William the Conqueror himself attended its reconsecration in 1067. The twin towers, 52m high, are still standing, as is one arch of the roofless nave, while a one-sided yew tree stands amid what were once the cloisters.

The house where Claude Monet lived from 1883 until his death in 1926 remains much as he left it – complete with water-lily pond – at Giverny, 20km south of Les Andelys near the north bank of the Seine. While the gardens that Monet laid out are still lovingly tended, none of his original paintings is on display, so art lovers who make the pilgrimage here tend to be outnumbered by garden enthusiasts.

Visits start in the huge studio, built in 1915, where Monet painted the last and largest of his many depictions of water lilies (nymphéas). It now serves as a well-stocked book- and gift shop. The house itself is a long two-storey structure, painted pastel pink with green shutters. Almost all the main rooms are crammed floor-to-ceiling with Monet’s collection of Japanese prints. Most of the furnishings are gone, but you get a real sense of how the dining room used to be, with its walls and fittings painted a glorious bright yellow. The flower-filled gardens stretch down towards the river, though these days the footpath that drops to the water-lily pond burrows beneath the road. Once there, paths around the pond, as well as arching Japanese footbridges, offer differing views of the water lilies, cherished by gardeners in rowing boats. May and June, when the rhododendrons flower and the wisteria is in bloom, are the best times to visit.

The most dramatic sight anywhere along the Seine has to be Richard the Lionheart’s Château Gaillard, perched high above Les Andelys. Constructed in a position of impregnable power, it looked down over all movement on the river at the frontier of the English king’s domains. Built in less than a year (1196–97), the castle might have survived intact had Henri IV not ordered its destruction in 1603. As it is, the stout flint walls of its keep, roughly 4m thick, remain reasonably sound, and the outline of most of the rest is still clear, arranged over assorted green and chalky knolls. To reach it on foot, climb the steep path that leads off rue Richard-Coeur-de-Lion in Petit Andely.