Mont Saint-Michel
One street up to the abbey, and a bay crossed only with a guide
- When to go
- October 14° · 15 rainy days
- Per day
- €€€€price 4 of 5
- How many days
- 1days
- For you
- 6 questions →
- Nearest airport
- 65 km Rennes · 98 km Caen
- Right now
Mont Saint-Michel can be seen in a day, and the only question is whether to stay the night: the car stays on the mainland, a free shuttle runs out to the island, and by day the single street up to the abbey is full of day trips. Stay over and you have it in the evening and early morning, before the first coaches.
The Le Passeur shuttle takes about 12 minutes from the car parks and drops you 350 metres from the ramparts; it runs from 7am to 1am in summer and from 8.30am to 10pm in winter. From September to June the car parks are free from 6.30pm to 3am, so an evening walk on the island costs nothing in parking. In July and August there are no free hours.
Without a car, it's a Keolis bus: from Rennes and Saint-Malo to the terminal by the shuttle, or from the nearest railway station, Pontorson, nine kilometres away, to 200 metres short of the village gate. From Paris that means a train to Rennes and then the bus, and a long day each way — the second reason to stay over.
What to see in Mont Saint-Michel
The abbey
Built from the 8th century on, so Romanesque and Gothic layers stack one on another, up to the church on top of the rock. Entry is €16; free under 18, and from 18 to 25 only for EU residents. For anyone who comes for the architecture; for everyone else the street and the ramparts are enough.
The Grande Rue
The main way from the gate up to the abbey, narrow and uphill, with shops and restaurants on both sides. By day it's the slowest part of the visit.
The ramparts
The path along the walls runs apart from the main street, with views over the bay. When the Grande Rue is packed, it's the other way up, and the place to see how far the sea has gone out.
The big tides
Since 2014 the island has been reached by a bridge on piers instead of the 1879 causeway, so on the highest tides, a few days a year, the sea surrounds the island again and floods the approach. The official site publishes the dates; arrive an hour or two before high water, and access reopens an hour to an hour and a half after it.
Crossing the bay on foot
From Genêts (Bec d'Andaine) over sand and shallows, six to seven kilometres, only with a guide certified by the prefecture — because of quicksand and the tide. A short walk takes an hour and a half to two hours, out to the islet of Tombelaine three to three and a half.
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Staying the night
There are hotels both inside the walls and on the mainland, by the Route du Mont bus stop. On the island the night is closer to the abbey; on the mainland the car, the shuttle and the bus are a few steps away.
Two things you probably did not know
The difference between high and low tide here reaches fourteen metres, among the greatest in Europe. The sea withdraws for kilometres and returns at a speed Victor Hugo compared to a galloping horse.
During the French Revolution the abbey was turned into a prison and stayed one for almost a century. Prisoners turned a huge wooden wheel that hauled supplies up the slope. The wheel is still there.
Ready for Mont Saint-Michel?
Within reach from here
Places sorted by straight-line distance from Mont Saint-Michel — day trips or weekends.
France
→From Paris the TGV reaches Lyon, Bordeaux and Strasbourg in about two hours — France is chosen by direction, not by city
Italy
→The cities on the high-speed line are an hour or two apart; the coast, Matera and the Tuscan hills lie off it
Spain
→A country where dinner is at ten and the city wakes up as everywhere else turns the lights off
All 277 places we write about sit on one page — narrow them down by continent, country, price or what you are travelling for.
Within reach from here: Étretat, Brighton and Stonehenge
See how much of that actually suits you — or pin Mont Saint-Michel if you have been.
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