2 Best Sights in Honfleur, Normandy

This excellent small museum, dedicated to the work of Honfleur-born Eugène Boudin, traces a career crucial to the development of Impressionism. His friendship with, and influence on, Claude Monet is visible in his masterful depiction of the region's skies and seaways.

Soak up the seafaring atmosphere by strolling around the old harbor and paying a visit to the ravishing wooden church of Ste-Catherine, which dominates a tumbling square. The sanctuary and ramshackle belfry across the way—note the many touches of marine engineering in their architecture—were built by townspeople to show their gratitude for the departure of the English at the end of the Hundred Years' War, in 1453.