Rouen hands out its best sights for nothing: the cathedral Monet painted 30 times, a 14th-century plague cloister, and 2,000 half-timbered houses. Add €1.80 metro fares, €4 galettes and free museums, and three days here cost less than one in Paris.
Entry is free (open 09:00–19:00 Tue–Sat, from 14:00 Mon). The 151m cast-iron spire was the world's tallest building 1876–80. Monet painted the west façade 30 times from a shop opposite; the Booksellers' Portal carvings cost nothing to study.
A 1348 plague charnel house wrapped in half-timbered galleries carved with skulls, crossbones and gravediggers' tools. Free entry daily 09:00–19:00 (to 18:00 in winter). The courtyard also hides a mummified cat behind glass.
One of France's richest provincial collections — Caravaggio, Velázquez, Géricault, Monet's own Rouen Cathedral canvas — with permanent collections free of charge, every day except Tuesday, 10:00–18:00. Temporary shows cost extra.
A 10-hectare botanical garden south of the Seine, free since 1840, with glasshouses of orchids and giant Victoria water lilies, a rose garden and 5,000 plant species. Open daily 08:00 until dusk; greenhouses 08:00–11:00 and 13:30–16:30.
Rouen's covered market on Place du Vieux-Marché runs Tue–Sun mornings. Camembert de Normandie wedges from €3, Neufchâtel hearts around €4, farm cider €4–5 a bottle and rillettes by the 100g — a full picnic for under €10.
The half-timbered street running east from Saint-Maclou is lined with crêperies serving buckwheat galettes complètes for €7–9 and lunchtime formules with cider and a sweet crêpe around €13–15 — roughly half central-Paris prices.
Housed in the 17th-century Hôtel d'Hocqueville, this holds 5,000 pieces of Rouen faïence, the blue-and-white earthenware that made the city famous from 1644. Permanent collection free, open Wed–Mon 14:00–18:00.
A square east of the centre where students drink; pints run €4–5 and a glass of Norman cider €3, against €7-plus on the tourist stretch of Gros-Horloge. The square also hosts a large flea and food market Tuesday, Friday and Sunday mornings.
The chalk hillside above the Seine's east bank gives the postcard panorama of the cathedral, Saint-Ouen and the river loop. Reach it free on foot in about 45 minutes from the centre, or take bus F1 towards Bonsecours for €1.80.
A vast Rayonnant Gothic abbey church, 137m long and taller inside than the cathedral, with 80 stained-glass windows from the 14th–16th centuries and a Cavaillé-Coll organ. Free entry, typically Tue–Sun afternoons, closed in winter months.
Walk or ride the metro (€1.80 single, €5.30 day pass) to the left-bank quays at Saint-Sever. The riverside promenade, skate park and reclaimed docks run for 2 km, all free, ending at the Hangar 106 and the Pont Flaubert lift bridge.
The last surviving keep of Philippe Auguste's 1204 castle, where Joan of Arc was threatened with torture in 1431. Admission is about €3.50 and free on the first Sunday of the month; the climb ends at a rooftop view over the rooftops.