Cliffs for those who don't want to read the whole thing.

1. Spend the money and get guided tours.
2. Food wasn't that pricey considering there is no tipping and the service was insanely fast.
3. Don't go overboard with the cathedrals, they start to look the same.

I'm just going to make this short and sweet. We broke our trip up into three sections. I'm going to post some pictures of where we went, and some helpful tips I learned.

1. Alsace
2. Verdun-Normandy
3. Paris

1. Alsace- Stayed at an airbnb in Colmar. This is the view.

Here is where I will give my first tip. Pay for the guided tours. It is pricey, but totally worth it. We rented a little zippy mobile, but I wouldn't have had a good time trying to navigate those roads and park on my own. We went with Orpheus tours out of Colmar. We did the Gems of Alsace tour. If I had to do it over again, I would've done an extra day of a wine tour. We only stopped at one winery on our tour.

We also to a little side trip to Freiburg in Germany. Totally worth it.

This is me having a beer at 10 AM next to insanely gorgeous cathedral in Freiburg.

Pics of Alsace

2. Normandy by way of Verdun

This is where we started planning poorly. We just kind of drove into Verdun and were kind of lost. We did find an old French fort and wandered around it for a while. A guided tour would've been good here.

Old French trenches

American WW1 Cemetery

We also hit up a couple of cathedrals along the way. Reims and Amiens.

Normandy- we used Overlord Tours- very pricey @$100 a person for an all day tour, but totally worth it IMO.

We stayed at a hotel in Bayeaux.

Gold Beach

Cemetery

Pont Du Hoc

Utah Beach- Tip 2, wear a jacket

3. Paris

You've seen all pictures of Paris already. I suggest the excursion to Versailles. It was freaking packed though. Plan on spending an entire day there as the surrounding grounds will take a few hours and are just as beautiful.
Tip 3- Get to Versialles early.

Some extra tips- We went to the art Museum in Colmar and to Monet's house. Both were worth the trip.

Dinner is sometimes a crap shoot as the towns seem to shut down by 7 or so. It's really weird.

The Seine River tour was pricey and I only suggest it for couples, not a family thing at all.

The food wasn't really that expensive considering there is no tipping, taxes are included and the service was really fast. I don't think we ever waited more that 10 minutes for food.

Don't go overboard with cathedrals. They all look the same after a while. Plan on about 4 and you'll be good.

Last pic from the trip