Normandy, by the tide

Normandy is best understood from its western edge, where the land gives up gradually. At Mont Saint-Michel the sea withdraws as far as 15 kilometres at low tide, leaving wet sand and channels around a granite rock, and then returns. The bay holds the highest tides in continental Europe, up to 15 metres between low and high water. Nothing here is arranged to the clock. It is arranged to the moon.

At the top of the rock, reached through a village that is freely accessible at any hour, stands the abbey. The ticket gives access to all of its rooms, and the entrance opens onto the west terrace, where the whole bay is laid out below. Go early or late, and allow for the climb, up a great many steps.

The crossing of the bay on foot is the oldest way to arrive, in the tradition of the pilgrims who walked the shore to the Mont. It is also the one part of the journey that must never be improvised. The official tourist office is plain about it: it is extremely dangerous to venture alone into the bay, even close to the Mont. Certified guides lead the walk all year round, reading the channels and the quicksand and setting the hour by the tide.

The weather deserves a mention of its own. The abbey itself warns that conditions at the Mont are very changeable, and advises waterproof, windproof and warm clothing in winter. That is not a defect: the same Atlantic air gives the coast its light and silvers the sand at low water. Pack for the changeable version.

East along the coast, Deauville rewards the out-of-season visit. Normandy Tourism notes that the town can be enjoyed all year round, and that in winter the boardwalk and the sunsets come in a quieter setting. Les Planches, the wooden boardwalk of 1923, runs the length of a 2-kilometre beach past 450 Art Deco beach huts carrying the names of actors and directors from the town's American Film Festival. Behind them sits the Pompeian bathing area, all fountains and mosaics. None of it needs summer.

The journey ends at a table in Cancale, at the western end of the same bay. At the end of the port, at the foot of the Houle lighthouse, the oyster market sells direct from the producers' farms, and the oysters can be eaten on the spot, all year round. Order both kinds if both are offered: the cupped oyster, and the rarer flat oyster, with its hazelnut note, farmed in pockets on tables on the foreshore.