DAY 1:  DEPARTURE TO PARIS   

Departure from New York International Airport. Meal and Beverage served on board.

 

DAY 2: PARIS

Upon our arrival in Paris, meeting with your tour English speaking guide who will be with you during the entire tour. Free time. For lunch and check-in at hotel. Transfer by coach to Montmartre. Take the funicular to go up and visit the Church of the Sacré Coeur. Celebrate Mass (upon availability), Free time, Transfer to hotel, Dinner and overnight at hotel.

 

DAY 3: PARIS

Breakfast, We celebrate Mass at the Shrine of the Miraculous Medal. We view the incorrupt body of St. Catherine Laboure whose guardian angel led her to the chapel where the Blessed Virgin displayed a vision of the miraculous medal and later the green scapular wherein the Blessed Virgin promised bountiful graces for all that wore this medal. See the Church of St. Vincent de Paul. Then we go around the corner to the chapel where his body rests above the main altar in a solid silver shrine covered by the goldsmith, Odiot, Lunch.

We will enjoy a panoramic sightseeing tour of Paris. On your tour you will see the famous sights of Paris including the Champs Elysees, L’Arc de Triomphe, and the Eiffel Tower. Go up to the Eiffel tower – 2nd floor

Enjoy a dinner cruise on “Bateaux Parisiens” for 1.15 hours

Transfer to hotel, Overnight at hotel.

 

DAY 4: PARIS / LISIEUX

Departure to Notre Dame Cathedral

Public Mass (Sundays 8.30 or 9.30), Drive to Lisieux. (211 km – 2h35)

Lunch. Visit the home of St. Therese of Lisieux whom Pope Pius X called the Greatest Saint of Modern times. Her love for God and service to humanity comes alive as you visit the Basilica Cathedral of St. Peter and Les Buissonets, her family home.

On display are relics, clothing, and personal objects belonging to the Little Flower. View the statue depicting the Blessed Virgin who smiled at St. Therese before curing her illness. Dinner and overnight at hotel in Lisieux.

 

DAY 5: LISIEUX / OMAHA BEACH / MONT ST. MICHEL

After breakfast, visit the Carmel Chapel for prayer/ Mass with the Carmelite sisters, just as St. Therese did before her death in 1897. Drive to Omaha Beach. (15km – 1h40), Visit the museum. The museum is located on Omaha Beach itself where the American naval landing took place on June 6 called Bloody Omaha. The 1200m² Omaha Beach Memorial Museum was founded in memory of all those young men who died in 1944 and whose memory we are duty bound to keep, that future generations may never forget at what cost our freedom came. Lunch. Free time. Drive to Mont St. Michel (150km – 2h00)

Check-in at hotel. Dinner and overnight at hotel.

 

DAY 6: MONT ST. MICHEL / NEVERS

After Breakfast the spectacular sight of Mont St. Michel awaits us this morning.

Visit this famous abbey which seems to rise out of the water off the coast, and is one of France’s most dramatic sights. Mass. Lunch. We depart by motor coach for Nevers. (502 km – 6h00). St. Bernadette lived for 12 years as part of the congregation of the Sister of Nevers after taking the veil in 1867. Throughout her life she suffered and eventually died at age 35.

Dinner and overnight in Nevers.

 

DAY 7: NEVERS / PARAY LE MONIAL

After breakfast, we will celebrate Mass. We will visit the convent of St. Gildard where St. Bernadette’s incorrupt body reposes. We continue to Paray Le Monial, known as the City of the Eucharist.(125km – 2h00). Lunch. This is the site of the Shrine of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and Margaret Mary Alacoque. Dinner and overnight at our hotel.

 

DAY 8: PARAY LE MONIAL / ARS / LYON

This morning we celebrate Mass in the devotion of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Visit the Chapel of the Visitation where Jesus exposed His Sacred Heart to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque during a number of apparitions, and see the chasse of St. Margaret containing her relics. Lunch.  This afternoon we drive to the of Ars (120 km – 1h40) where St Jean-Marie Vianney, the patron saint of parish priests, spent a great part of his holy life giving powerful sermons but most of all by his prayer and his way of life. His notoriety as a holy priest grew slowly, and Father Vianney soon became known as, simply, the Curé d’Ars (priest of Ars). There are reports that during the last 10 years of his life, he spent as many as 18 hours a day in the confessional, and that toward the end of his life, he confessed up to 80,000 penitents a year. Ars became famous all over the Christian world. On June 19, 2009 THE Pontiff chose as the occasion for this jubilee year the 150th anniversary of the death of St. John Mary Vianney, the Year of the Priest. Drive to Lyon (16 km – 30 min) for dinner and overnight.

 

DAY 9: LYON / LOURDES

After breakfast, departure by coach to Lourdes,(705 km – 7h00) the birthplace of St. Bernadette to whom our Lady appeared in 1858 near the Grotto of Massabielle.

Lunch  on the way.

Time at leisure this afternoon before we celebrate Mass in the worlds famous Shrine. Dinner and overnight at our hotel.

 

DAY 10: LOURDES

Celebrate Mass at the Grotto, and walk in the footsteps of St. Bernadette. See Boly Mill where St. Bernadette was born and the ‘Cachot,’ an abandoned prison where Bernadette’s impoverished family lived.

Time at leisure to drink water from the miraculous spring at the base of the grotto. Lunch. 

Walk the Stations of the Cross overlooking the holy Grotto. Kneel in the chapel built on the very rock of the Grotto in obedience to the request of the ‘Immaculate Conception.’ Attend the blessing of the sick and participate in nightly candlelight processions requested by Our Lady.

Dinner and overnight in Lourdes.

 

DAY 11: LOURDES

Today is free for your own private devotions. Possibility to celebrate a Mass. Dinner and overnight in Lourdes.

 

DAY 12: RETURN TO USA

Today we transfer from Toulouse to Paris for our return flight to NY.