A 6:30am start from home began by sweating on a taxi which was late. Profuse apologies were followed by a higher speed than normal drive to pick up our coach at Cardiff West (J33).

Five minutes to spare, and from that point on… clockwork.

A few other pick-up points and a coffee stop saw us arrive at the Folkstone coach interchange by 12:45pm. Just 15 minutes later we were boarding our tour coach.

Speed is everything. As a result we were boarded on to an earlier ferry (45 minutes saved). A mill-pond English channel cut 10 minutes off the crossing. France at 4:30pm (CET -UK+1).

We arrived in Rouen  before 8pm. A great result.

Fortunately, we’ve stayed in Ibis Hotels before, but this is (sharp intake of breath) an Ibis “STYLES” (breathe out).

Well it is an Ibis. Four walls, a bed, a clean and serviceable bathroom and a wardrobe. Styles? All the furniture is brightly coloured plastic (probably from Ikea). We don’t care; we knew what we were booking.

C’est La France. Porterage for suitcases, mais oui! At the speed of un petit escargot. But they arrived - eventually.

We're here. We’ve unpacked and settled in so all’s well.

The day began with breakfast. I know it’s an Ibis, but really?

The food on offer was limited by choice but, even so, very good quality. Even the orange juice came from a machine that pulped the oranges before your very eyes. Bread, pastries, ham, cheese - excellent.

However, IKEA must have been out of stock when the room was furnished… There were enough tables and chairs for about half the people needing to sit - and just one coffee machine (good coffee!) to serve everyone. Chaos. C’est La France. Vive la difference!

A comfortable 1.5 hour journey took us to Versailles, and the Palace of the Sun King, Louis XIV. I was really expecting so much, having watched the Canal+/BBC production about his life and times. (If you missed it, watch it - I think it’s still on Netflix).

Being France (I know - I’m Francophobic), so much offered, so little delivered. The Palace was “OK”, but so crowded you couldn’t really enjoy it. About 10k French (mostly school kids) and half the population of Beijing filled the place. It’s magnificent (I know from the TV series) but there was no way whatsoever to see or pause to absorb what was there.

In fact, the whole place was “Let’s take as many Euros as we can, and never mind the experience”. We’d pre-purchased entry tickets on-line and it took around 15 minutes to gain access. The queue for ticket purchasing was so long, it probably was taking over 2 hours to reach the front (and this was around 10am).

Again, the gardens. Beautiful: renowned for its fountains. Tuesdays has an extra €7 fee for the “Musical Fountains” performance. There was music, but at around noon, the fountains stopped fountaining.

It’s a disgrace really. It’s a World Tourist Site. There could have been upward of 50K visitors just today (based on the number of tour buses alone). Do they care? Not in the slightest.

If it’s on your bucket list… Delete it.

However, we escaped the Palace after lunch to view the town of Versailles. Far more enjoyable. Charming streets, pretty old and interesting buildings and some top-of-the-range coffee and pastries cafés. 

To be fair, we really enjoyed the day, but it could have been so, so much better.

Today, we sorted the breakfast problem. It’s supposed to start for our tour at 7:30am, but it’s open from 7am according to the room guide. We went down at 7am - just a few people there. Solved!

Our tour took us to Giverny, just outside Vernon, Monet’s home, which inspired so much of his work. The weather gods smiled once again, so just as we arrived the Sun broke through the clouds and it stayed that way until just after we left.

It’s simply beautiful. It was a home, not a chateau, so the proportions are small in comparison, but he wasn’t short of a franc or two, so by home standards they are very large gardens.

What impressed us most was how so much of it looks random - a country garden with flowers and shrubs growing mixed together - and then you realised this is carefully planned chaos. Colours, heights and shades all work in harmony.

The amount of work involved must be tremendous. Many of the plants were not “long lasting” varieties. Most in bloom were late spring plants which will need to be replaced with summer flowering plants. And there are, literally, thousands of them! We saw maybe 8 or 10 gardeners hard at work during our time there.

The house is open and, unlike Versailles, a polite “guard” at the door controls admission on a first come, first served system. We waited no more than 5 minutes, and there was space to see what was there to see.

(Yes, unfortunately, the other half of Beijing’s population were here, so “After me”, not “After you”, was once again needed. Why don’t they know how to join a queue?)

This was, art lover or not, a very worthwhile way to spend some time. However, without a pre-purchased pass or as part of group visit, the entry lines were substantial.

We were back in Rouen by 2:30pm, so there was enough time to explore what looks a really interesting town. Postcard to follow.

What a surprising city!

It’s busy and vibrant. The Cathedral is too big to fit in a camera lens, and there are at least 3 other churches that could easily be mistaken for Cathedrals.

There’s a very large shopping area, some modern, much more that looks medieval. You could spend a lot of time exploring here and still find something you’d missed the day before.

We were very lucky yesterday. We stumbled on a restaurant that happened to be open (most don’t open until 7pm or 7:30pm).

La Walsheim if you’re here - there’s a photo.

It was so good we went back there this evening - just as good, maybe better. I’ve managed to tick off 5 of my “must-haves” in France in just 2 meals and all were well above expectations. (The one thing I’m not Francophobic about is their cooking!).

It’s going to be a long day tomorrow, leaving at 8:30am but not returning until around 7pm. Three venues in Normandy, sampling Camembert, Calvados and Normandy Cider - well someone has to, don’t they?