Santander/ Bilbao ferries
Comments
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I think on Cap Finistere a lot of people never find the 'call-order' cafe on the semi-open Deck 9. Full breakfast for about £6 and take it back to your cabin. If you take some tea bags, the bar will provide you with hot water if you ask nicely .... or use the microwave
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yes, for us, £884 going tomorrow (i wish) and returning late March on the Pont Aven from Plymouth to Santander. short crossing (less than 24 hrs) each way, 6.4m van.
Newhaven-Dieppe £284.
Portsmouth-Caen £336....(thats a really good price....)
Portsmouth-Le Havre....£419
Poole-Cherbourg £423....our staple crossing, normally the cheapest of the western crossings for us.....bit this is higher than we normally pay
Portsmouth-St Malo...£511....always seems the most expensive...
if i really was going tomorrow Id be taking the Caen route at that price.
newhaven (for us) is just too far to drive for the £50 saving although thats a really good return price, saving plenty of miles on us betting to dover and again over Calais for the western drive down.
obviously, these prices yo-yo a bit and you just have to take a chance and jump in if you think its a good deal.
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David, i guess youd e happy mororing back through france on the return trip?
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The problem with threads such as these, is that they are very personal and emotive. You the consumer weights up was is important to you, and then makes your choice.
You do what you are comfortable with / what you can afford / taking into account time constraints / and the time of year you propose to travel.
For thirty odd years l had been a MoHomer, before switching to being a Tugger this year. During my MoHome years, l had often been puzzled by the attitude of many fellow MoHomers, who having spent £60,70,80,000 on the all singing all dancing newest bestest MoHome, would move heaven and earth to save a fiver a night on site fees. I just didn't get it, but again with a shrug of the shoulders, each to their own.
If l was to do the proposed trip, l rather suspect that l would be following in Another David's shoes, both outbound and inbound.
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we're away around 30 weeks a year, a fiver a night saving would be around a grand which would keep us on the road for......oooh.....ages.
not to be sneezed at (even if you have a cold) however much youve paid for your van....
we actually 'like' staying on an aire or a supermarket carpark bang in the middle of a french/spanish town....if its just a stopover, theres just no point in finding a campsite...
incidently, once we have found 'there' (wherever it is) we are happy to stay put a d pay the 'going rate'.....if this makes you happier
re: the ferries, like most, we tend to go for what we see as the best value distance/time/cost at the time
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So i am not doing anything wrong then
last time we did the Santander crossing we came back Caen. That is ok in the good weather, however this time we would have been going both ways in winter so considered doing Santander both ways, if its for more than 4 weeks the cost is justified but not for less IMO, motorhomes don't seem to get the deals that caravans do on the CC's or i don't seem to get the right crossing at the right time. Hence we are no going to a lovely 3 bed villa with pool for 2 weeks +car hire +flights for around the same cost as the ferry, if you take into account the fuel + campsite fees as well we are cheaper. I know its less time in total but not much difference in how many days we will have in the South of Spain given travelling times.1 -
Yes, Tammy. But many people's attachment to their caravan or Motorhome is hard to shake. Many will go nowhere without it. Have a good trip.
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Yes, I too was puzzled by Another David saying he takes the ferry to Spain because he cannot find overnight sites on the way there. Fake news, as our American ally would say, because there are actually far more sites open than people believe
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I've ferried (by m/h and motorbike + tent) to Santander several times, summer and winter. I look forward to the ferry trip (it's like a mini-cruise!) and it's one of the highlights of my tour.
Fortunately for me the state of the sea is irrelevant.
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AD, How about Camping Les Rulieres at Saint Valerien ? 254 miles from Ouistreham and very close the main road towards Fontenay Le Comte - and open all year
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Our sentiments also. Just the thought of driving from Portsmouth to either the Tunnel or Dover would put me off.
Even if the ferries to Spain are delayed or cancelled (like today
) it's no big deal to us since we don't book anything on the other side anyway.0 -
Yes, I've found the same AD.
In fact during the winter/low season a couple of open sites I've visited have had a high occupancy of itinerant Gens de voyage'. I was told that the local authority pay the site operators for pitches to accommodate these travellers at a special reduced rate. Many of the cubicles and showers doors in the sanitaires show as permanently 'engaged' in order to concentrate usage on those which are available and reduce the number of cubicles to be cleaned. Sadly the open ones quickly get into an awful state, and not just from muddy boots and the children using the building as a covered and heated playground.
I now use aires wherever possible.
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AD, Or Camping Le Cadoret at Fouras - only 220 miles from the St Malo ferry port .
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our six weeks away at roughly €20 would cost around €800 in site fees alone..for regular aires users, this could easily be halved to €400 and theres your ferry cost (just to stay on topic...
).many MHers 'just feel comfortable' using aires (we tend to mix/match) and dont have a hankering for sites, however lovely they are, again we like sites, too
i know of one Carthago owner who was many weeks into his latest tour and he had only spent €6 on site fees.....
this wasnt a 'boast' merely to pass on info regarding the aires he had used and to give feedback on them....
all useful stuff.
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David, also had a quick look and, although this would be a change to your normal route, heding from Caen to Poitiers (would be around 5 hours (non-toll, just to keep the costs similar to your website route) and a night stay at Futuroscope is as follows...
Parking
Direct access from the A10 motorway or the D910 highway. Rates per vehicle: Day 7€ (from 8:30 a.m. to 8:30 a.m. the next day), Evening 3€ (from 5:00 p.m. to 8:30 a.m. the next day).from here, using tolls (again similar to your route) its another 4:30 using the N10 all the way to Urrugne with it being non toll all the way to the Bordeaux ring road...
we obviously dont have the same issues when finding somewhere to stop but Futuroscope is popular with many an no issue with arrival time.
just another angle should finding sites become more tricky.
good luck.
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