Le Havre is a city of about 170,000 at the mouth of the Seine and the second busiest port in France. It was ALMOST COMPLETELY DESTROYED IN SEPTEMBER 1944, with some 80,000 people made homeless, and the centre that Auguste Perret rebuilt in reinforced concrete between 1945 and 1964 IS A UNESCO WORLD HERITAGE SITE, the only twentieth century European city centre listed as such.
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What Is Here
THE POINT OF LE HAVRE IS THAT IT IS NOT PRETTY AND IS STILL REMARKABLE. Perret rebuilt on a module of 6.24 metres, in poured concrete, with wide boulevards and tall windows, and the result is light, airy and strange: a complete modernist city rather than a few monuments. Visitors who come expecting Honfleur are disappointed; visitors who come to see what the twentieth century could do are not.
SAINT-JOSEPH'S CHURCH IS THE BUILDING TO SEE AND IT IS EXTRAORDINARY. Perret's lantern tower rises 107 metres as a hollow octagon of coloured glass, and standing underneath it is like standing at the bottom of a lit chimney. It is the image at the top of this post and it works as a landmark from the whole city.
The mid-century architecture is the second image, and the Appartement Temoin, a show flat furnished as it was in 1950, is the best way to understand how people actually lived in it.
THE VOLCAN IS OSCAR NIEMEYER'S, a white concrete curve housing a theatre and library, and Les Bains des Docks is Jean Nouvel's swimming complex in the old docks. Le Havre collects twentieth and twenty first century architecture in a way no other French city does.
MUMA, THE ANDRE MALRAUX MUSEUM, HOLDS THE SECOND LARGEST IMPRESSIONIST COLLECTION IN FRANCE after the Orsay, including a great deal of Boudin and Dufy, who was born here. Monet painted Impression, Sunrise in this harbour, which gave Impressionism its name.
The beach is shingle with a row of huts, and the cliffs run north towards Etretat from the far end of it, which is the third image here.
When to Go
May to September. June and September are the best compromise.
Summer brings the beach huts, the terraces and a set of outdoor art commissions along the shore.
Winter is grey, extremely windy and quiet, and the architecture is arguably better in hard light.
Rain and wind in every month. This is the Channel at the mouth of a major estuary and it is exposed.
Getting There
By train, about two and a quarter hours from Paris Saint-Lazare, direct.
By ferry, Portsmouth to Le Havre, taking roughly four to six hours depending on the service.
By car, about two hours from Paris, with the Normandy Bridge to Honfleur.
By air, Paris is the practical airport.
The centre is walkable and flat, with a tram, and the upper town above the cliff is reached by a funicular.
Is Le Havre Safe for Women?
Le Havre is a working French port city and is safe, with the ordinary caution appropriate to any port district late at night. The FCDO publishes no advised-against areas anywhere in France, and its terrorism wording is the strongest it uses: terrorists are very likely to try to carry out attacks in France, with shopping centres, entertainment venues, sporting events, transport hubs and crowded gatherings named as possible targets. The everyday risks are more specific than that sounds. Pickpocketing is organised on the Paris Metro and on trains, typically in pairs with one person distracting you, and the FCDO records SERIOUS ASSAULTS on RER lines B and D, which matters because line B is the train most visitors take from the airports. Drink spiking is named with the drugs rather than hinted at: be alert to the possible use of date rape drugs including GHB and liquid ecstasy. Strikes and demonstrations happen at short notice and can stop trains and close roads, usually peacefully. And wildfires affect the south in hot dry summers.
If you are driving to a Channel port, the FCDO has a specific instruction. It records attempts by people to enter private vehicles in order to reach the UK illegally, that camper vans are targeted while stationary or in slow traffic, and that obstacles are sometimes placed on roads to ports including the Calais port road. Keep your doors locked, keep moving where it is safe to do so, do not leave the vehicle unattended, and if it is not safe to proceed, stop and call 112.
THE VEHICLE-ENTRY CLAUSE ABOVE IS DIRECTLY RELEVANT HERE, because Le Havre is a UK ferry port and the FCDO's instruction describes exactly this situation.
The beach is shingle with a strong undertow and is lifeguarded in season at the central section only. The water is cold year round.
The wind is the daily condition rather than an event, and it is strong on the seafront and the exposed boulevards.
The port and dock areas are industrial and are not places to wander on foot at night; the centre and the seafront are fine.
The cliffs north of the beach are unfenced and are the same soft chalk that kills people at Etretat. Stay back from the edge.
The Le Havre Packing List
Wind off the Channel, rain in every month, and a lot of walking on open boulevards.
Our merino base layers are 100% Australian merino at 17.5 micron, and a long sleeve merino wool base layer for women is the right first layer in a city this exposed: Perret's boulevards are wide and straight and they funnel the wind off the estuary, so the temperature on the street is consistently below what the forecast suggests, and wool holds warmth when the sea air is damp. From October to April add a heavyweight merino base layer.
A Columbia Fast Trek II fleece and a Marmot PreCip Eco rain jacket with a hood that cinches. An umbrella is close to useless on this seafront.
Waterproof walking shoes with Darn Tough merino socks. The city is flat and paved, but SHINGLE IS HARD WORK and the cliff path north is mud and grass.
A set of packing cubes if Le Havre is one stop on a Normandy tour.
Not linked and worth packing: A HAT WITH A CORD for the seafront; SWIMWEAR if you intend Les Bains des Docks, which is indoors and excellent; SUNGLASSES, since concrete and sea both reflect; and A REFILLABLE BOTTLE. France is card-friendly throughout.
Recommended Tours and Experiences
Essential Resources for Women in Le Havre
Emergency numbers: 112 for police, ambulance and fire, free from any phone including a locked mobile, with operators who will find an English speaker. It is the single number across the whole European Union.
Le Havre is a direct UK ferry port, which makes the FCDO's vehicle-entry instruction above operational rather than background: keep your doors locked, keep moving where it is safe to do so, do not leave the vehicle unattended, and if it is not safe to proceed, stop and call 112. THE BEACH IS SHINGLE WITH A STRONG UNDERTOW, lifeguarded in season at the central section only, and the water is cold year round. THE CLIFFS NORTH OF THE BEACH ARE UNFENCED and are the same soft chalk that kills people at Etretat: stay well back. THE PORT AND DOCK AREAS ARE INDUSTRIAL and not for walking at night. THE CENTRE IS A UNESCO WORLD HERITAGE SITE for its 1945 to 1964 reconstruction, which is what you are here to see: visitors expecting a picturesque Norman port are in the wrong town, and Honfleur is thirty minutes away across the bridge. 196 is sea rescue.
US State Department travel advisory: the France advisory. Read the current level there directly rather than relying on a figure printed in any guide.
UK FCDO travel advice: gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice/france, and read the safety and security page rather than only the landing page, because that is where the substance sits.
Main hospital: the Groupe Hospitalier du Havre has a full emergency department and is the main hospital for this part of Normandy. Dial 112 for an ambulance or 15 for the SAMU, and 196 for sea rescue. A pharmacie posts the duty rota. France is in the EU, so a UK Global Health Insurance Card or an EU European Health Insurance Card gives you state-provided medically necessary care on the same terms as a resident, which means you pay the same patient share a French resident pays rather than nothing. That is not the same as free and it does not cover repatriation, so travel insurance sits on top of it. French hospitals are excellent and a pharmacie, marked by a green cross, handles minor problems without an appointment and will tell you where the duty pharmacy is out of hours. Tap water is drinkable everywhere. Dial 15 for a medical emergency or 112 for anything.
Official health authority: Sante publique France, the national public health agency, covers the Normandy regional health agency
US Embassy: the United States Embassy in Paris.
Official tourism authority: Atout France, the national tourism body, publishes the Appartement Temoin and Saint-Joseph visiting arrangements, the MuMa hours and the summer art commissions along the shore
Takeaways
Stand under Saint-Joseph's tower. It is the single best thing in the city.
Visit the Appartement Temoin. A 1950 show flat explains the whole project.
MuMa holds the second largest Impressionist collection in France.
Come for the concrete, not for a picture-postcard port. Honfleur is next door for that.
Solo women safety assessment: Le Havre is a working port city rather than a resort, and for a woman travelling alone that distinction is the whole of the difference: the centre, the seafront and the tram network are entirely ordinary and safe by day and evening, the city has a university and a normal civic life, and the single piece of judgement required is the same as in any port, which is that the dock and industrial zones are not for walking at night. 112 REACHES POLICE, AMBULANCE AND FIRE free from any phone including a locked one, 15 reaches the SAMU, 196 is sea rescue, and the Groupe Hospitalier du Havre is the main hospital for this part of Normandy. ONE PART OF FRANCE'S ADVISORY APPLIES DIRECTLY HERE: the FCDO records attempts by people to enter private vehicles in order to reach the UK illegally, names camper vans as targets while stationary or in slow traffic, mentions obstacles placed on roads to ports, and instructs drivers to keep doors locked, keep moving where safe, never leave the vehicle unattended and call 112 if proceeding is not safe. Le Havre is a direct Portsmouth ferry port, so that is practical advice rather than abstraction. THE ENVIRONMENTAL HAZARDS ARE WIND, WATER AND CHALK. The wind is the daily condition rather than an event: Perret laid the city out in wide straight boulevards that funnel the estuary gale, so the street feels colder than the forecast and a hat without a cord will not survive the seafront. The water is a shingle beach with a strong undertow, cold all year, lifeguarded in season and only in the middle. And the cliffs that begin at the north end of the beach are the same soft, undercut, actively eroding chalk that kills people most years at Etretat along the same coast, so the clifftop is a place to stay well back from rather than to photograph from the lip. ONE EXPECTATION WORTH SETTING: people arrive looking for a quaint Norman harbour and find a concrete modernist city. That is the attraction, not a disappointment, and Honfleur is half an hour away for the other thing.
Reading On
Le Havre is the Seine mouth and Normandy's coast runs both ways. The Normandy packing list covers the region as a whole, the Etretat packing list the chalk cliffs up the coast and the Honfleur packing list and Deauville packing list the estuary and the resort shore, with the Rouen packing list upriver and the Caen packing list, Bayeux packing list, Granville packing list and Cherbourg packing list west. South, the Cancale packing list and Brittany packing list cover the peninsula. For other twentieth century architecture the Chandigarh packing list covers Le Corbusier's planned city. For the country the France travel guide for women and the France packing list carry the transport and the regions in full. For why wool beats cotton in wind, read the guide to merino wool base layers for women. Every destination we cover is indexed at the travel packing guide for women, and the base layers are at the Roman Trail collection.
If the outer journey is calling you, the inner one usually is too. Explore SoulMap at romantrail.com/blogs/soulmap.
