"Dieppe - Something for everyone" Dieppe by ranger49

Dieppe Travel Guide: 61 reviews and 151 photos

History. castle,towers, belfry and clocks.

At the age of 17 my husband set off with a friend and their bicycles to tour Normandy. They took the boat to Dieppe and for years after we started our travels together he spoke about a return visit to Dieppe.
We always seemed to be in too much of a rush to linger in Dieppe or use different channel crossings because they were more convenient for our departure and destination.

So when an invitation to an opera weekend in Sussex happened to coincide with a “special deal” ferry/hotel break from Newhaven - Dieppe that we eventually made a proper trip to Dieppe.

Around the Port

The harbour

The port, around which the many cafes and restaurants are clustered and where scores of pleasure boats are moored was a magnet. Our hotel was right on the sea front and our very large room had views of the great green expanse of lawns in front and the sea beyond.
Water and boats are always an attraction and it was not difficult to spend too much time wandering around and people watching over a slow coffee or beer.

History - ancient and recent.

View from the castle

As we walked along the promenade to visit the museum in the Castle we saw several small memorials to the hundreds of service personnel from the UK, Canada and the US who lost their lives in the disastrous Allied attack on Occupied Dieppe in August 1942.
The 15th Century castle stands on the cliff at far end of the promenade and has a collection of maritime exhibits and some from WW2.
Our visit was shorted by our encounter, as we climbed the steps, with a kindly local lady who gave us a run down on the history of the castle in rapid French and particularly wanted us to be sure to see the great ivory collection. We did not tell her that would be the last thing on our list but by the time we entered the Museum was almost ready to close