NORMANDY

Within a mile you reach the sea at HOULGATE, a seducing sea resort, attractively sited against a hillside, which tumbles into the sea over a pile of rocks called “Les Vaches Noires”, because they looked to somebody like a herd of black cows and built end 19th along a fine sand beach.. It’s on its beach that M.Caumont erected a pillar to commemorate the departure of William. Behind the pillar of M.Caumont, the chemin de la Cascade leads through a pretty little valley of thatched houses topped by irises, pigeon lofts and a water mill.
It seems a miracle but HOULGATE escaped the real estate “disfiguring” and can be seen as the area with the most beautiful assortment of villas of the Norman coast. Really for all tastes: rococo chateaux, Swiss chalets, small medieval or Moresque inspired palaces, end of century(19th) manors, timber balconies, rafters and balustrades, concave roofs, dormers, domes, witches’-hat towers, etc.. A lot of imagination and fantasy, proving the unconcerned mentality of a certain epoch. Houlgate has about 200 villas worth seeing.
The Grand Hotel, a mammoth Second-Empire building in the railway station style (complete with clock) witnessed the venue of bankers and crowned heads. Napoleon III, Debussy, Saint-Saens, Sacha Guitry and the whole European aristocracy included. Zola rode around in a coach and Proust came here to buy flowers. Today, the Grand Hotel is converted into apartments, though the casino still operates with a bar, a cinema and the Manhattan disco. It has nothing more of its grand days but is still very agreeable.

Villers sur mer

Continue along the D 163, climbing back over the hills, reaching a panorama point wit a “table d’orientation”. There have been a good fossil finds on the beach, and a small collection of them is housed on the second floor of the MUSEUM OF PALEONTOLOGY in the maison des Jeunes behind the market in VILLERS SUR MER, another family resort, with more a feeling of a real town. Packed with people during the summer it has a long (2mk) fine sand beach with its boardwalk. Unfortunately the few old villas are drowned amidst modern constructions. A curiosity: the Greenwich meridian crosses the city at the milestone set up on the dike. Activity is centred around the popular seafront café and restaurant “Mermoz” while the ugly, modern, functional casino is open until the small hours every weekend.
Beyond Villers, a few kilometres from Deauville, are a couple of resorts tucked into the hills, attracting a more familial clientele: BLONVILLE and BENERVILLE. In the centre of Bonneville the church Notre Dame de la Visitation is worth a look. Partly 11th century, it has a beautiful wooden sculpted Christ in its tomb. Visit also the famous hill dominating Blonville: the Mont Canisy with a German blockhaus (used to house a battery). And finally, up behind Benerville is TOURGEVILLE, with a cluster of thatched –timbered houses with a wonderful view down across the bright lights of Deauville. British and German fallen lie side by side in the cemetery here.

Bibliography

A holiday history of France, by Ronald Hamilton (London-Hogarth press), Region Normandie, ses merveilles, ses cicatrices, by Louis Letellier (ed. Cloison, Rouen 1995, La France des petits chemins: Normandie, by J. de la Valléé (ed. Cité presse, Paris 1998), Identity of France, by Fernand Braudel (London, Fontana Press).

Cotentin peninsula

Cherbourg