Dives Sur Mer

It seems like every little town along the coast claims it was the place from which William set sail to conquer England. But all appear to agree it was Dives sur Mer where he built much of his fleet and amassed supplies and soldiers and horses, etc. So we wanted to see Dives sur Mer.

So there it is, the estuarial harbor as it now looks; to the right
is the opening that leads to the Channel

Driving through Dives, things got more and more interesting,
so we decided to stop for a nosy (Kiwi: look around); we'll
return to the church later

Very old house on a main street

But here was the knock-out: Les Halles, the town's covered
market, built by ship carpenters in the 14th century, in continual
use for five centuries now; never altered; we seriously
considered staying over for the weekly market, but, well, the
markets we've seen on this trip so far have been almost entirely
crap

Les Halles exterior

The Lieutenancy, the harbor's government house (but originally
a fortified residence)

And then another little knock-out: the 16th
century Hostellerie Guillaume le Conquerant

No less than Henri IV and Louis XIV stayed here; plus a few
miscellaneous kings, queens, prime ministers, celebrities

Some of the ornamentation

Ditto

Ditto again

Encore

Lots of other pretty stuff in this town 

Inside the 13th century parish church

The church's story: in the year 1000 (possibly
rounded off...), some fisherman found in their
nets a large statue of Jesus in crucifixion pose;
carvers attempted a cross to match, but to no
avail; and then, some years later, the cross came
up in some other nets; and then it  was decided
to build the church; in any case, either the
Hugenots (French Protestants) or the Revolution
burnt the "relics"; sic transit, Gloria  

Of rather more interest, the 16th-17th century
list of local boys and girls who accompanied
William to England

Basic advice, however, is, if you want to see this
church, visit sooner than later