Picture © Credits to istock/AgenceAnotherOne
Picture © Credits to istock/AgenceAnotherOne

Normandy


A region that has endured the vagaries of history from the Middle Ages and the Hundred Years' War, the age of splendour of its principal city, Rouen, and of the national heroine associated with it : Joan of Arc....

Enjoying a temperate maritime climate, its rugged coastline is marked by windswept cliffs. Its economy, in the past as today, is based on agriculture and livestock breeding and takes advantage of the presence of two of the most important ports in France. The region, and more particularly Giverny, was the home of the famous painter Claude Monet, father of French Impressionism; various museums are devoted to an appreciation of this very distinctive period in the history of painting. Most of the region is a rural zone, sparsely populated, with abundant farmland and pastures; the region is also the birthplace of Camembert cheese. Tourism is well developed thanks to the dynamism of its beach resorts, such as Deauville.