Every four or five years, some fifty tall ships from around the world come up the Seine and moor along seven kilometres of quays at Rouen. The Armada runs for ten days and draws several million visitors, with a grand final parade down to the estuary.
Seven kilometres of quays closed to traffic
The quays on both banks are fully pedestrianised for the ten days, and the Rouen bridges work at reduced capacity.
Parking disappears across the centre, and the park-and-ride sites are far out. The city was not built to take several hundred thousand people a day.
Grand parade day
On the final Sunday the ships sail down the Seine to Le Havre, and the crowd spreads along the banks, from Rouen to Villequier and Caudebec-en-Caux.
Following the parade needs a car: the viewpoints are kilometres apart, often with no public transport.
What we organise during the Armada
We run day returns between Paris and Rouen, transfers from Rouen station and Deauville airport, and days out along the banks.
The van keeps the group together and the chauffeur drops you as close as possible to the open quays, then picks you up at the agreed point.
Around Rouen
The cathedral, the Gros-Horloge, the Place du Vieux-Marché and Jumièges abbey fill the time between visits to the quays.
The car stays at your disposal from one stop to the next, which spares you hunting for a space in a full city.
To organise your visit to the Armada, give us the dates, the address and the number of passengers: you receive a firm price before confirming. See also our private driver in Rouen page.
Photo: Bernard DUPONT from FRANCE / Wikimedia Commons — CC BY-SA 2.0
