Caen travel guide

Top 10 sights in Caen

Ranked by Wikipedia language editions — proven fame.

1. 

   1

   Juno Beach

   The eight-kilometre stretch at Courseulles and Bernières taken by the 3rd Canadian Division on 6 June 1944, which pushed further inland that day than any other Allied force. The Juno Beach Centre at Courseulles is Canada's museum on the coast, opened in 2003.

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2. 

   2

   Sword Beach

   The easternmost landing beach, at Hermanville and Ouistreham, where British 3rd Division came ashore and Lord Lovat's commandos marched inland to a piper. Ouistreham is thirteen kilometres from Caen, the objective they were meant to reach on the first day and did not.

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3. 

   3© Viault · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Abbey of Saint-Étienne, Caen

   The abbey William the Conqueror founded in 1063 as penance for marrying his cousin, and where he is buried — his grave marked by a slab, the bones scattered in 1562 except one thigh. Its two-tower west front set the pattern for Norman churches in England.

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4. 

   4

   Castle of Caen

   One of the largest castle enclosures in Europe, begun by William the Conqueror around 1060 on a rock in the middle of Caen. Bombing in 1944 cleared the later buildings from inside the walls, which now hold the fine arts museum and the Normandy museum.

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5. 

   5© Johan Allard · CC BY-SA 4.0

   Abbey of Sainte-Trinité

   The convent Queen Matilda founded in 1062 as her half of the couple's penance, where she is buried in the choir under a black marble slab. The Romanesque church survives; the convent buildings of 1704 now house the Normandy regional council.

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6. 

   6© Ikmo-ned · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Church of Saint-Pierre

   The parish church on Place Saint-Pierre, whose 78-metre spire was cut down by a naval shell from HMS Rodney in June 1944 and rebuilt stone for stone by 1957. The east chapels of 1518 are among the earliest Renaissance work in Normandy.

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7. 

   7

   Caen Memorial

   A museum opened in 1988 on top of the German command bunker for the sector, tracing the descent into war from 1918 rather than starting at D-Day. Its entrance is a fissure in a blank wall, and the last rooms are about the Cold War and reconciliation.

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8. 

   8

   Merville Gun Battery

   A four-gun casemated battery east of the Orne, taken before dawn on 6 June by 150 men of 9 Para who had lost most of their equipment in the drop. One bunker holds a Dakota that flew the mission; the guns turned out to be smaller than intelligence had feared.

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9. 

   9

   HMS Durban

   A Royal Navy light cruiser of 1919 that served in the Far East and the Mediterranean before being scuttled off Ouistreham in June 1944 as part of the Gooseberry breakwater. Her wreck still lies in the shallows off Arromanches with the Mulberry caissons.

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10. 

    10© Ytierny · CC BY-SA 3.0

    St-Étienne de Caen

    The abbey church William the Conqueror founded in 1063 and where he was buried in 1087, though only a thighbone now lies under the choir after his tomb was ransacked. Its twin Romanesque towers set the pattern for Norman building on both sides of the Channel.

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1. 

   1© Burtonpe at English Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Bény-sur-Mer Canadian War Cemetery

   A Canadian cemetery three kilometres inland from Juno Beach, holding 2,049 graves, most of them men killed in the first days of the invasion. The headstones face the sea they came in from, and 335 of the dead were airmen.

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2. 

   2© Tib124 · CC BY-SA 4.0

   Hillman Site

   A German battalion headquarters near Colleville-Montgomery, twelve concrete positions in a wired enclosure that held out for two days against the Suffolk Regiment after Sword Beach. The underground command post is open with its original fittings.

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3. 

   3© Patrbe · CC BY-SA 4.0

   Memorial Pegasus

   A museum at Bénouville on the glider assault that seized the Caen canal and Orne bridges in the first minutes of 6 June — three Horsas landed within fifty metres of the target in the dark. The original bridge stands outside, with a full-size Horsa replica beside it.

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4. 

   4© Burtonpe at English Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Ardenne Abbey

   A Premonstratensian abbey of the twelfth century outside Caen, where the SS Hitlerjugend division shot twenty Canadian prisoners in the garden in June 1944. A memorial marks the spot; the buildings now hold a literary institute.

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5. 

   5© Ikmo-ned · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Church of Saint-Étienne-le-Vieux

   A Norman church in the old town of Caen, wrecked by the bombardment of 1944 and deliberately left unrestored. Roofless walls and a broken tower stand behind railings as the city's plainest statement about what the liberation cost it.

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6. 

   6© Own work · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Musée des Beaux-Arts de Caen

   A fine arts museum inside the castle walls, holding Perugino, Veronese and a strong seventeenth-century French collection, and one of the largest print cabinets in France. The old building was destroyed in 1944 and the present one opened in 1971.

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7. 

   7

   Castle of Creully

   An eleventh-century castle in the Seulles valley from which the BBC broadcast the first war reports out of liberated Europe, from a studio in the tower between June and July 1944. The tower room is kept as it was, with the transmitting equipment.

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8. 

   8

   Bretteville-sur-Laize Canadian War Cemetery

   A Canadian cemetery south of Caen holding 2,957 graves, mostly from the August 1944 push towards Falaise and the closing of the pocket. It stands on a wooded rise near Cintheaux, the largest Canadian war cemetery in France.

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9. 

   9© Copyleft · CC BY-SA 4.0

   Festyland

   An amusement park at Bretteville-sur-Odon on the Caen ring road, themed on Norman and Viking history with longship rides and a wooden coaster. It runs from April to September and is aimed squarely at families with young children.

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10. 

    10© Roi.dagobert · CC BY-SA 3.0

    Venoix

    A western quarter of Caen that was a separate commune until it was absorbed in 1952, on the slope down to the Orne valley. It is residential, with the Prairie racecourse and the river meadows along its southern edge.

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