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Hi,

We have camped for over 12 yrs in Britain, but really fancy taking our kit to France next year.  Have no idea of French camp sites so thought i would bite the bullet and post on here for some advice.  We are 2 adults and our son he will be 9 next year, we have got a dog but he will have to miss that trip as I dont think he will like a long drive and ferry crossing.

We are tent campers but with big tent, gelert zenith 6 love the tent but some sites do have a problem with size especailly the C&C club.

So  this is when I make myself look stupid but I have a few questions.

 How does the electric hook up work in France?

Will i need to reverse the trailer at all it we use a ferry? I can't reverse the trailer!

Where to stay? Any advice please?

Anything else I should know about?

Thanks

Hi, try the Vendee in france, a bit of cornwall in the sun! make sure the site has large pitches, some can be very small indeed, we paid extra this year at village de la guyonnaire for a large pitch and we were not dissapointed, it was massive!

Electric hook up works mainly the same as here but it may need a 2pin adaptor and it will most likely be only 5amps so houshold kettles are out, buy a low wattage one.

The ferry will be drive on/off without turning round, however we do eurotunnel, much easier and faster.

Apart from that everything is pretty much the same as here, bank cards work everywhere I've been using the pin number the same as us, driving is easier and much smoother (400m from vendee to calais no breakages in caravan, 50 miles up the M20 and my wine glass smashed!)

Go and enjoy!

Quote: Originally posted by ali.d on 25/8/2009

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Hi,

We have camped for over 12 yrs in Britain, but really fancy taking our kit to France next year.  Have no idea of French camp sites so thought i would bite the bullet and post on here for some advice.  We are 2 adults and our son he will be 9 next year, we have got a dog but he will have to miss that trip as I dont think he will like a long drive and ferry crossing.

We are tent campers but with big tent, gelert zenith 6 love the tent but some sites do have a problem with size especailly the C&C club.

So  this is when I make myself look stupid but I have a few questions.

 How does the electric hook up work in France?

Will i need to reverse the trailer at all it we use a ferry? I can't reverse the trailer!

Where to stay? Any advice please?

Anything else I should know about?

Thanks

 

 

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The pitches are bigger in France (Unless you are on the med coast).  I have a hartford XXL with canopy and kitchen tent and never had a problem with space.

The roads are nicer to drive on and the motorways are less busy however you do have to pay to use these (well worth it though)

EHU is much the same however some of the older sites have the old 2 pin set up so it is worth buying an adaptor which connects to your current EHU lead.

The further south you go generally the weather is better and I would agree with The Vendee being a good starting point (It's what we did 1st year in France).

Never had to reverse on a ferry so don't worry about that and we usually use the Tunnel using tesco clubcard vouchers to get the discount

http://www.ukcampsite.co.uk/chatter/display_topic_threads.asp?ForumID=7&TopicID=82183&PagePosition=1

Have a look at this thread for lots of good advice.

Camping in France is easy and great fun. You'll have a fab time.

thanks for the advice I am busy reading through all the posts on here, although I still have some questions that I would like some help with please.

 If we stop overnight I am worried about the trailer, although I can use the hitch lock anybody really can get into it and take our stuff, does anybody with a trailer stop at a B&B or do you use camp sites and pitch and unpitch?

What would the weather be like during Easter? I am guessing warmer than over here, but will it be ok at night in a tent?

I really am clueless as you can tell so please any advice welcome.

thanks

We've just returned from France and we went to the Charente Maritime - Marennes which was fantastic - but I wouldn't advise more further north than that to guarantee the sunshine in Summer months.  It got quite cool some nights in August in our tent so I imagine you would need some warm gear in April.

As for reverse polarity its def worth taking two adaptors, rewiring one & labelling it as reverse polarity & taking a polarity checker - I say this because this being our first trip to France we found that on the same hook up point some were reverse polarity and others weren't so we were glad to be well equipped.

We travelled with LD Lines, Portsmouth - Le Havre which was 50% less than Brittany Ferries Portsmouth - St Malo were charging and its only an hour extra to drive on French side.  We drove 6hrs to Marennes from Le Havre with 2 young children and coped fine.

HI we're thinking of doing the same next summer 2010. We've camped in uk many times but when in France usually done Canvas holidays in their tents but we're being brave too.!!  Using this forum we have been advised on what sites to use in the Vendee area of France.  We are also thinking of doing a ferry crossing from Portsmouth to Caen, even over night, so that we can drive to camp site 5 hrs in one day THEN put tent up.  First trip and I don't want to be too tired to put tent up and deal with a 6 and 10 yr old.

My advice is to pick an area you would like and use this forum for advice/feedback it is really good.  Also we've used Canvas and Siblu brochurs to look at the site to get an idea of them - however we are really being brave and booking direct with a site - fingers crossed.

ENJOY x

We did our first trip this year & had exactly the same questions/concerns as you.

After spending hours on this forum we decided to opt for Normandy & Brittany. We drove from Calais to Normandy in approx 2.5 hrs and then on to Brittany with a further 3.5 hr drive.  We chose a site with plenty of facilities in Normandy (Le Brevedent) and stayed there for 2 nights, 7 nights in Brittany (carnac) and back to Le Brevedent for a further 2 nights at the end.  As we didn't have any really long drives we found it wasn't a problem putting our 8 berth tent up each time.   As soon as we arrived on site the kids were off playing so they were happy.  We are going to do similar next year but increase the time we spend at our 'stopover' sites and make these part of the holiday rather than just breaking up the journey. 

We found no problems with elec hook up - we took a 2 pin adapter but didn't need it.

We also did our first trip this year, after having only camped once in the UK beforehand.  Some might call us stupid, but I think we were overdue an adventure!

Re electricity, we also took a 2 pin adaptor and didn't need it, and decided not to worry about reverse polarity as opinion seemed to be divided, to say the least!  We had no problems, other than me breaking the torch and the electric light, but both of these could have happened anywhere, due to my clumsiness!

I would think it would be quite chilly at night at Easter - we found it quite cool at night in the more Northern areas (Loire etc) and even in the southern areas I needed a sleeping bag in the middle of the night, despite it being 40 degrees in the daytime.  And that was in August!  Maybe I'm just a wimp?!

We travelled Dover to Calais, and spent 2 nights near Angers, then 2 nights in Navarrenx near the Spanish border throught the Pyrenees.  We then drove down to Spain for a week (in an apartment).  For the return journey we spent 2 nights near Mazamet, then had 3 nights at Parc De Loisirs in the Loire.

I have to say it wasn't the most relaxing holiday I've ever had, but it was definitely an adventure and with plenty of forward planning and research a very enjoyable trip.

We're looking at staying in Formula 1 or similar next year though, as the putting up and taking down of the tent was quite tiring with such a tight itinerary.  If we were basing ourselves at a campsite for longer though we wouldn't hesitate to take the tent to France again.