Site advice for South of France and Paris
We’re both in our 60s and looking to book a site in the south of France for the last week in May, first week in June 2017; this is our first time abroad with the caravan. We have a period
of 1 month, so either side of this we will leave Aberdeenshire and stay a couple of nights near Maidstone for relatives, then take the tunnel. I’ve had a good look through all the useful posts on the overseas holidays, and so far have looked in detail only
at the Club-listed sites in Languedoc-Rousillon and Provence-Alpes-Cote d’Azur.
We’re not anti-social, but are looking for peace, privacy and quiet (hopefully the sun is a given- boy do we need to see some sun!); reasonable facilities e.g. launderette and a pitch with
water; and ideally some easy cycling, but the site position below, may not be ideal in terms of flat area? The coastal sites look best for cycling, and the Canal Du Midi area gets good reviews.
I think we are ‘out of season’ so hopefully most sites will be fairly quiet. At the moment we favour the Chateau de Boisson site north of Nimes, good position for visiting most places and
excellent reviews; probably 12 night stay. The sites on or near the coast in the main, look OK, but mainly family orientated with issues of cramped/overlooked/noise/mosquitos/wind. Les Pecheurs looks good, but maybe too near the Cote d’Azur.
We will book an overnight stopover in central France for both directions. Travelling back north, I’m looking for a site, 4 nights, for visiting Paris (not Eurodisney), enroute to Calais;
with a view to catching the train in to Paris on a couple of days. Caravanning Des 4 Vents site east of Paris looks OK for our needs; any views?
Any views and experiences, will be really appreciated
Comments
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We stayed at La Commanderie at Rustiques two miles from Trebes which is actually on the Canal du Midi. It is seven miles from Carcassonne so it may be a bit further than you want to go but for peace and quiet it can't be beaten. They do have a laundrette
on site too. If you are interested there is more information about the area and the site on my blogjennyandjohngocaravanning.wordpress.com
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Camping La Sousta is nice (http://uk.lasousta.com/) but it does not have hedged pitches. It is however only a few hundred metres from the Pont Du Gard. Well worth a visit. We must have been there 8 or 9 times over the
years.Take ear plugs as the Cicardas and Frogs don't half make a racket at night. Personally I love it as it tells me I am back in the South but it can drive some bonkers.
Agree with Another David, don't book anything, enjoy proper touring. If you wake up one morning and want to somewhere else, just go. It used to be like that in the UK .
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I'd agree with Deleted User User and Fysherman- don't book! There is absolutely no need! We've been on sites in May where only ten pitches were occupied, and we had the pool to ourselves for a week. Sites, even on the coast, won't be full, shouldn't be noisy,
and there will be few children (perhaps the odd baby or two)..We always holiday in May/June and then again later in the year, and tend to 'follow the weather', going where the forecast is best, and staying there for whatever period we decide - if the weather's good, our neighbours aren't noisy, and we like the area
we've been known to stay three weeks, but if it rains, we have noise from adjacent pitches, or we've run out of things to do in the area, then we will move elsewhere.We stayed at Chateau du Boisson twice in the past - once about thirty-three years ago and then again probably ten or fifteen years later, when it had undergone a major redevelopment.
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Another one who says don't book at that time of the year, this year the weather was rubbish over most of France so the South was busy, the last thing you want to do is pre-book and then find the site is to full on for you. As its your first time going there
us it as a fact finding exercise for future visits, this is what we did when we retired 5 years ago. We started off going for 4 weeks we are now up to 11 weeks and still have so much to see.0 -
Camping La Sousta is nice (http://uk.lasousta.com/) but it does not have hedged pitches. It is however only a few hundred metres from the Pont Du Gard. Well worth a visit. We must have been there 8 or 9 times over the
years.Take ear plugs as the Cicardas and Frogs don't half make a racket at night. Personally I love it as it tells me I am back in the South but it can drive some bonkers.
Agree with Another David, don't book anything, enjoy proper touring. If you wake up one morning and want to somewhere else, just go. It used to be like that in the UK .
Write your comments here... My favourite -est site ever!
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Thanks to all and Jenny, will have a look at that site; and also ValDa; would appreciate any feedback on Chateau du Boisson, even from your last visit 10 years ago.
Understand regarding not booking, and will consider this, but with a twin axle and our first time, maybe a little concerning.
Any views on time required from the tunnel; if we get an early morning slot, plan would be to make only one stop on way south, using motorways- too ambitious?
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Mark, instead of choosing sites choose where in southern France you want to go - it's 400 miles wide down there and when you have decided you will find there are decent sites everywhere.
And as for booking we are now on a site a few miles from the sea and there are 25 caravans here and 175 empty pitches - and it's July 2nd, so goodness knows how quiet it was in May. The French schools haven't yet broken up - all the OAPs who are out have
motorhomes and they are in the car parks down the road instead of in campsites.0 -
Our regular site is Les Genêts d'or at Bagnols-sur-cèze which is North of Avignon. Delightful site on the banks of the river, popular with the Dutch (and us!). At the beginning of June we stayed for two weeks as the Provence/Gard area had the best weather
in the whole of France, so no need to go too far South.As Val says, don't book.
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I presume you are planning peage to fit that amount of mileage into two days. Calais to Nimes is 622 miles according to Michelin and you can average 50 miles an hour on the peage so you are looking at about 13 hours plus stops. Really, REALLY, don't book.
Just don't tie yourself down and then if you have had enough you can just find a site to stop on. Honestly over there is different to here. It is so geared up for caravanning.0 -
Chateau de Boisson is a nice site but is on two levels, the pool, shop etc being on the upper one, a fairly steep walk up from the lower level. Out of high season you should be able to choose the upper level. Access is via one road up and one down with the down road only suitable for cars , i think, (overhead restriction). When we wanted to take our m'home out we had to contact reception to ensure the road up was clear for us to come down it. Presumably this would be ok with a caravan as you'd only be taking it out once when leaving.
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