Travelling to an area
We are thinking of heading to Aquitaine for four weeks next year.
Do people tend to head to the area asap, using toll roads perhaps, or treat it all as part of the trip ?
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We do both, generally weather dependent. We favour the western crossings, so might spend some time in Normandy and Brittany before heading south. Then we may do a longer run, using autoroutes, to travel through an area of limited interest. However, although we have a general destination and stops in mind, nothing is fixed or booked. Looking at our last tour of 2500 miles there are long jumps, followed by a week or more of short hops, before another jump.
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Much depends on the available time, but I do prefer to take my time and site see on the way there. It is much less stressful. Having a class 3 vehicle, I avoid toll roads where possible which also provides much more interest, albeit a slower trip.
peedee
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We usually had a fair idea by lunch time of where we would stop.
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When we were at work and were restricted to three weeks max we used to make the the journey part of the holiday staying for a few days in one place en route and the same on the way back. When we were able to go for longer we just toured staying a few days here and there and perhaps a week at our main destination. That might be OK for France but if you venture further afield like Germany/Austria/Italy we tended to stay only 4/5 nights in one place and sometime less so it becomes a continuing tour. Another thing of course is stamina. If you are happy to max out the miles each day just get to your main destination as soon as possible maybe that is the way to go but I think you will miss a lot along the way.
David
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When we were touring with the caravan which is the last time we were in Europe and when confined to three weeks during the school summer holiday we would have an area or very rough route in mind. We would probably travel a fairish distance the first day, having usually taken an overnight ferry, and just stay one night. Then we would wander. We never booked and never knew how long we were staying, just depended on what we found in the area, if we liked the site, weather etc. We did this in France, Germany, Sweden, Denmark, plus stops in Belgium and Luxembourg. I would have thought with a Motorhome your journey would be even easier. We always used to aim to stop by about 3 pm.
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Bordeaux is just over 500 miles from Calais so it will take at least 2 days if you limit yourself to 5-6 hours of driving per day.
If you travel via Rouen, Chartres and Chateaudun, you can reach Aquitaine using the N10 via Tours and Poitiers; this is easy motoring along dual carriageway and largely toll-free.
There is only about 40 mins difference in travel time between the N10 route and a route on toll motorways; it is also about 30 miles shorter. The N10 has the advantage of many aires just off route for an overnight stopover.
France is a big country with lots to see and personally, I would take my time to get south and carefully research a few interesting stopovers.
Les-plus-beaux-villages-de-france is a good place to find them, together with the Searchforsites app.
Happy travels.
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Hi, We have done all three-but with a caravan not MH, which certainly helps when making the journey pat of the trip.
For many years we simply headed to Garda, taking three days to get there once landed, and staying for three weeks.
The trip back was when we had a couple of days here and there.
One of the main issues with a caravan is the setting up, something that we didn't think about when using the above routine but, as we have moved to two centre, and more holidays, became more noticeable.
This was very evident last year when, to fit with Jeans desire to travel less per day-our usual distance previously was 300-350 a day in 2 hour stints with a max of 8 hours and we cut this to a max 250-we stayed at 10 sites over near 5 weeks but on our return she felt we were forever setting up and then moving on!
We are now planning our 2024 trip, and are already on about version 4, starting at Lagos in Portugal and finishing at Tarragona-ish app 5 weeks later.
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You have four weeks. There's no rush. We spent a month with principal stops in the Arcachon and Galicia. We spent five days meandering our way to the Arcachon, so you can see we didn't rush anything. That's the joy of a motorhome with the availability of aires. Take your time and give the autoroutes a miss. It's less boring.
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You can do it in one day from Calais. We have done the similar trip from Essex with a caravan when we worked and wanted to make the most of the break, but it was a long and tiring trip. The choice on breaking the journey would be sensible, As a caravan owner we welcome longer breaks due to set up times and would spend a week in The Loire, but I'm guessing a couple of shorter stops would be the preference with a motorhome.
What ever you decide I'd have a long look at the viamichelin website for planning your journey. If you stayed on the toll roads you would be looking at about Euro 150 in tolls each way. When you are only paying Euro 18 a night out of season that is a lot of money.
From Calais across to Rouen the only sensible option is toll roads, but from there onwards you can drop down the N154 via Dreux and on with the N10 as mentioned above. This is a nice route where you can easily travel at 60mph if you wish, enjoy the views, have access to Aires and cheap supermarket fuel.
Colin
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