April 21 – Coastal towns and Étretat

We are on the move again, this time back to the coast.  Our planned first stop was the coastal village of Veules-Les-Roses, a Les Plus Beaux Villages de France (a most beautiful village in France).  And from the images we have seen it is another storybook village to be wandered and savored.  We found short term parking down by the beach.  We were there long enough to take some photos of the pebbly beach,

the flanking massive white cliffs,

and many beach huts. 

Unfortunately, after driving around quite a bit we were never able to find long-term parking.  The village was packed with cars parked everywhere and lots of pedestrians.  Apparently, everyone else wanted to visit the village as well. So we settled for our visit to the beach and headed out again. 

We decided to add Yport as a place to visit.  Another coastal town on our route.  

The town itself wasn’t interesting, but it had a very big pebbly beach and more flanking white cliffs.

We arrived in Étretat by mid-afternoon.  Lovely hotel in an old building but our room was on the second floor with another set of stairs to get to the actual room.  After consulting with the staff they were able to move us to a ground floor room in one of their buildings just across the street.  Huge room and huge bathroom.  And there was parking in a lot just behind our building.  Perfect.

After unloading we headed out to do a bit of exploration.  We found the old market.  Great old building with lots of touristy shops.

It was on a small plaza surrounded by old buildings and lots of snacky eateries (mainly ice cream shops and creperies). 

We also walked down to the beach...

for the great views of the Étretat cliffs. 

On the top of one hill was the Chapel of Our Lady of the Guards. 

The cliffs were the subject in several Monet paintings.  They had a sign posted at the spot where he sat painting and a photo of the painting itself.

Eventually we found a restaurant for dinner.  Paul ordered the eggs and mayonnaise, thinking they were deviled eggs.  They were sort of a “make your own deviled egg”…a hard cooked egg cut in half and topped with mayonnaise. 

Otherwise, dinner was fine.