Rouen

Rouen's Vieux-Marché, Gros-Horloge and cathedral in a single day

One long day covers central Rouen as a trip from Paris Saint-Lazare. See the Place du Vieux-Marché and the Joan of Arc church, climb the Gros-Horloge, give the Cathédrale Notre-Dame an hour, visit the Historial Jeanne d'Arc, Saint-Maclou and its aître, and end at the Museum of Fine Arts.

Morning. Take an early train from Saint-Lazare and walk down from Rouen Rive Droite to the Place du Vieux-Marché. The flowerbed marking where Joan of Arc died in 1431 sits beside the Église Sainte-Jeanne-d'Arc, whose scaled roof looks like an upturned boat; go inside for the Renaissance stained glass rescued from a church destroyed in the war. Then follow Rue du Gros-Horloge, the old high street, under the clock arch and climb the tower for the first view of the cathedral spire.

Midday. The Cathédrale Notre-Dame deserves an unhurried hour, from the lacework of the west front to the tomb of Richard the Lionheart's heart inside. Next door, the Historial Jeanne d'Arc tells her story in the archbishop's palace, where her name was formally cleared in 1456. Eat near the cathedral or back at the Vieux-Marché.

Afternoon. Walk east to the flamboyant Gothic Saint-Maclou church and slip through the passage into the Aître Saint-Maclou, its timbers carved with skulls and gravediggers' spades. Rue Eau de Robec, with its little channel of water, leads you on to the Museum of Fine Arts, which has Monet's own view of the cathedral among its Impressionists.

Evening. In summer, wait for dark and the projection on the cathedral front before catching a late train to Paris.

Canard à la rouennaise, Neufchâtel cheese and sucre de pomme

Rouen's own dish is canard à la rouennaise, a pink duck in a sauce of its pressed carcass, liver and red wine, served mostly around the Vieux-Marché. Normandy cream, butter and apples run through the rest, with Neufchâtel cheese, cider and calvados, sucre de pomme sticks and the mirliton almond tart.

Normandy cooks with cream, butter and apples, and Rouen adds one dish of its own. Canard à la rouennaise is a duck served pink, with a sauce thickened with its pressed carcass, liver and red wine; it is rich, theatrical and found mostly in the older restaurants around the Vieux-Marché, including the half-timbered inn on the square that claims to be the oldest in France. Lighter local menus lean on sole and scallops from the Channel coast, cooked à la normande with cream and cider.

The cheese counter is a lesson in itself: Neufchâtel, often shaped as a heart, comes from the Pays de Bray just north-east of the city, alongside Camembert, Livarot and Pont-l'Évêque. Finish with cider, pommeau or a calvados.

Two sweets are pure Rouen. Sucre de pomme, apple sugar sticks wrapped in paper printed with the Gros-Horloge, is sold in confectioners near the cathedral. The mirliton is a small almond pastry tart. For picnics, the covered halles on the Vieux-Marché and the big market on Place Saint-Marc, busiest on Sunday mornings, have farm butter, cheeses and seasonal fruit. Rue Eau de Robec and Rue Martainville are the quieter streets for dinner on weekdays.

Giverny, Jumièges abbey and the Seine loops as trips from Rouen

The best day trips from Rouen are the abbeys of Jumièges and Saint-Wandrille on the lower Seine, Monet's garden at Giverny via Vernon station and a seasonal shuttle, and, with a car, Étretat or Honfleur. Most need a car or a careful timetable; the Côte Sainte-Catherine gives the nearest panorama.

Rouen is a good base for the lower Seine. The river below the city winds through tight meanders lined with chalk cliffs and beech forest, and several of Normandy's great abbeys sit on its banks.

Jumièges, about 30 km west, is the most moving: the roofless twin towers and nave of a Benedictine abbey, wrecked after the Revolution and left as a ruin in a park. Combine it with the still-active abbey at Saint-Wandrille nearby, where the monks sell their own produce, and cross the river on one of the small free ferries (bacs) that still shuttle cars and walkers across the Seine.

Giverny, where Monet lived and planted his water garden, lies upstream near Vernon, roughly an hour away. Vernon has a station on the Paris to Rouen line, and a shuttle bus links it with the village from spring to autumn, when the gardens are open. Go early, as tour buses arrive mid-morning.

With a full day and a car, the cliffs at Étretat or the harbour at Honfleur are each about an hour and a half away. Closer to home, the Côte Sainte-Catherine at Bonsecours gives the best panorama of the city and its river bend.