Much of northern and eastern France is a memorial landscape. The Western Front ran through Picardy and the Argonne: the Somme's cemeteries, Thiepval's 72,337 names, Vimy Ridge on ground still closed for unexploded shells, and Verdun, where the longest battle of the First World War left an ossuary holding 130,000 unidentified men. Twenty-eight years later the Normandy coast took the largest seaborne invasion in history, and its five beaches, cemeteries and museums are visited by millions every year.
Start here
If you only do remembrance once in France.
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Normandy American Cemetery 9,388 graves on the bluff directly above Omaha -
Thiepval Memorial 72,337 names of the missing of the Somme, on one arch -
Douaumont Ossuary The remains of 130,000 unidentified men from both armies at Verdun -
Vimy Ridge Canada's memorial on ground still closed for unexploded shells -
Pointe du Hoc A 30 m cliff scaled under fire, and a clifftop still full of craters -
Hartmannswillerkopf A Vosges summit fought over all of 1915, and a national monument
Region by region
Île-de-France
Paris, Versailles and the ring of royal forests and cathedral towns around them
Hauts-de-France
Flemish belfries, the Opal Coast and the battlefields of the Somme
Grand Est
Champagne cellars, the Alsace wine road and Strasbourg's Christmas markets
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Verdun The longest battle of the First World War, and its ossuary -
The Vosges Rounded granite summits, high lakes and the ridge road along the old front line -
Lorraine Nancy's Art Nouveau, Metz's golden cathedral and the battlefield of Verdun -
Route des Crêtes 77 km of ridge road, built by the army in 1915 to supply the front
Normandy
The D-Day beaches, Mont-Saint-Michel, Monet's Giverny and the alabaster cliffs
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Caen William the Conqueror's abbeys and the Mémorial peace museum -
Bayeux The Tapestry, an untouched old town and the D-Day beaches next door - The D-Day Landing Beaches Utah to Sword — 80 km of coast, the cemeteries above it and the museums behind
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Omaha Beach The bloodiest of the five landing beaches, six kilometres long -
Arromanches & the Mulberry Harbour The concrete caissons of a portable harbour, still out in the bay -
Utah Beach The westernmost landing beach, and its museum built on the dune -
Sainte-Mère-Église The first town liberated — and the paratrooper still on the church tower -
Longues-sur-Mer Battery The only Atlantic Wall battery with its original guns still in place
Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes
Mont Blanc, the world's largest linked ski areas, Lyon's kitchens and a chain of volcanoes
Guadeloupe
A butterfly-shaped Caribbean archipelago — rainforest on one wing, dry coast on the other
Martinique
The flower island — Mount Pelée, black-sand north, white-sand south and agricole rum
French Guiana
Amazon rainforest, a European spaceport, and the prison islands of Papillon
Other things to do
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Culture & heritage 53 UNESCO World Heritage sites, and the cathedrals that invented Gothic -
Food & wine Seventeen wine regions, 1,600 cheeses, and the gastronomic meal on the UNESCO list -
Nature & outdoors Glaciers, gorges, volcanoes and 180,000 km of waymarked footpath -
Sport & adventure Skiing, surfing, climbing, paddling — and the Tour, Roland-Garros and Le Mans -
Cycling Over 25,000 km of signed cycle route, most of it flat and away from traffic -
Pilgrimage & spirituality Four Camino routes, Lourdes, Mont-Saint-Michel and the Romanesque abbeys -
Spa & wellness Around 90 working thermal spa towns, and the coastline that invented thalassotherapy -
Romance The Riviera corniche, a Loire château, a Provençal village, a Paris weekend -
Shopping & savoir-faire Perfume in Grasse, porcelain in Limoges, crystal in Lorraine, couture in Paris -
Nightlife & entertainment Festival season, cabaret, beach clubs and the theme parks