Bayeux

Introducing Bayeux

There’s one reason why several million visitors descend on Bayeux every year – a 70m-long piece of painstakingly embroidered cloth known to the French as La Tapisserie de la Reine Mathilde (Tapestry of Queen Matilda), and to the rest of the world, rather more prosaically, as the Bayeux Tapestry. But there’s more to the town than its impressive needlework – Bayeux was the first town to be liberated after D-Day, and is one of the few in Calvados to have survived WWII practically unscathed. Its winding streets are crammed with higgledy-piggledy period buildings, including a fine Gothic cathedral and lots of wooden-framed Norman houses, and the city is a perfect launch pad for exploring the invasion beaches just to the north.

Last updated: Sep 4, 2008