Honfleur

The town of Honfleur is a fishing port and now a popular yacht harbor.  It has preseved its rich artistic and historic heritage with its picturesque streets, traditional buildings, churches and monuments.  It is about an hour and a half drive from where we are and it was a beautiful day.

First stop the tourist office and then right behind it we started with St. Leonard Church 

Octagonal bell tower constructed in 1760

15th and 16th century

A traditional  open air wash house, still fed by hillside springs.

Strolling toward the harbor

A monument to the washer women

Lots of cider in all of Normandy.  Potent stuff

The heart of the city and oldest part lies within the Vieux bassin, the Quai SaintsCatherine,the LIeutenance and the deconsecrated St-Etienne church.

A fisherman mending his nets

The Lieutenance - The lieutenance building is at the entrance to the old harbour (vieux bassin). It is an old building of the 18th century, and the former home of the Governor of Honfleur. One of the sides of the building is an old gate of the city, the Porte de Caen(17C) , which was to be part of the city's fortifications, and on top has a niche of the Virgin Notre Dame du Port. It was between 1684 and 1789 home to the Lieutenant of the king. It became, in 1793, the commerce tribunal.

On the building is a plaque and bust of Samuel de Champlain the discoverer of Québec, Canada.

In need of facilities we took a coffee/cocoa break at this little cafe

St. Catherine church was built by shipwrights and is the largest wooden church with a separate bell-tower in France.

The bell-tower, also largely built of wood, dates from the end of the 15th century and is now a museum of religious art.

Note the lower chairs for kneeling

Surrounding this 15th and 16th century church are narrow  cobbled streets, lovely art galleries (there was one piece that caught the eye and only 16,000 Euro plus 600 to ship) I think Terry really wanted it.  She tried to get a picture but was chastised by the proprietor (no pictures allowed) 

What a beautiful little harbor town.  No wonder so many painters such as Monet painted here.

We had lunch at one of the little restaurants along the Quai and then headed out to find The Cote de Grace.  Plugged it in the GPS and found it pretty easy up narrow and windy little cobblestone streets.  Way on top of the hill overlooking the harbor.

Notre-Dame-de-Grace founded by Richard II and rebuilt from 1600 - 1615

"The Calvary" built in 1628 at the top of the cliff overlooking Honfleur

After this we made our way down the hill with only one minor hitch with a one way street and headed back to Connelles.  It was just a picture perfect day, just a little cool on the water.