Motorhoming through France

Duracel Funny

Duracel Funny

Striker
Morning. Just after some advice / recommendations. We've hired a motorhome next August for 3 weeks to visit France with the kids (3,3,9,11). Our rough plan is to head calais, then east to lake annecy, then move onto the south of France and maybe Barcelona, then back home! Our plan really is as vague as that, at the minute.

I'm looking for inspiration as to where to visit, any great towns or cities to see that maybe have good sites near. I'm happy to pay for sites as opposed to free Aires.

Cheers
 


Duracel Funny said:
Morning. Just after some advice / recommendations. We've hired a motorhome next August for 3 weeks to visit France with the kids (3,3,9,11). Our rough plan is to head calais, then east to lake annecy, then move onto the south of France and maybe Barcelona, then back home! Our plan really is as vague as that, at the minute.

I'm looking for inspiration as to where to visit, any great towns or cities to see that maybe have good sites near. I'm happy to pay for sites as opposed to free Aires.

Cheers
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No advice cos I've never done it but I'm really envious. Hope you have a great time.
 
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Duracel Funny said:
Morning. Just after some advice / recommendations. We've hired a motorhome next August for 3 weeks to visit France with the kids (3,3,9,11). Our rough plan is to head calais, then east to lake annecy, then move onto the south of France and maybe Barcelona, then back home! Our plan really is as vague as that, at the minute.

I'm looking for inspiration as to where to visit, any great towns or cities to see that maybe have good sites near. I'm happy to pay for sites as opposed to free Aires.

Cheers
Click to expand...
If you don’t mind me asking, how much you paid to hire a motor home for 3 weeks? Would love to do this at some point, but the websites I’ve seen ask to fill in forms for quotes and can’t be arsed to pass over details and get hassled.
 
I can recommend heading towards Foix and spending time in that part of the Midi-Pyrenees. Work colleagues of mine regularly travel to the Dordogne area in their caravan and highly recommend it.

The two areas are not too far apart and you could easily link them and spend four days in each, if not more.
 
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wisemensaysteve said:
Motorhomes and kids don't mix
Hope this helps
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Well that's absolute horse shit for starters.

Anyways... These are all really good campsites, you can plot your route by them.

Camping France in France - Les Castels

There's one of them at Calais (La Bien Assise) which is really good and they take single night bookings so it's dead handy for the first/last night. We've done it several times without booking anything else though, there's a really good Michelin guide to French campsites which makes it dead easy to drive as long as you want to and then just find somewhere on the hop. You can stay off the peage quite easily, but they're not that expensive and you can really eat the miles up on them.
 
TheWanderer said:
If you don’t mind me asking, how much you paid to hire a motor home for 3 weeks? Would love to do this at some point, but the websites I’ve seen ask to fill in forms for quotes and can’t be arsed to pass over details and get hassled.
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Me also, considering the option to purchase one or hire.
The ones I’ve seen are around £2.5 k for 3 weeks unlimited European hire.
Assume your hiring a left hand drive camper over in France ?
 
Duracel Funny said:
Morning. Just after some advice / recommendations. We've hired a motorhome next August for 3 weeks to visit France with the kids (3,3,9,11). Our rough plan is to head calais, then east to lake annecy, then move onto the south of France and maybe Barcelona, then back home! Our plan really is as vague as that, at the minute.

I'm looking for inspiration as to where to visit, any great towns or cities to see that maybe have good sites near. I'm happy to pay for sites as opposed to free Aires.

Cheers
Click to expand...
I would (and have in stages) take the rheims, strasbourge route. Take in rheims cathedral City, verdun if you like ww1, strasbourge, medieval pretty colmar, on to Annecy.
Out of the alps going south you could do avignon, arles, carcasson, perpignan. Have a look up to Andorra before the Costa brava Coast and Barcelona. I have got as far down as salou.
On the way back up I would definitely give troyes and the forete d'est region a look, maybe cut in and do a bit of paris.
Depends what you want?
I will see if I can find our campsites, I know I have one for near rheims, colmar, troyes and one in the camargue. Thing is I usually have a car so leave the campsite for the day, bit harder in a big motor home to get about. :(
 
Duracel Funny said:
Morning. Just after some advice / recommendations. We've hired a motorhome next August for 3 weeks to visit France with the kids (3,3,9,11). Our rough plan is to head calais, then east to lake annecy, then move onto the south of France and maybe Barcelona, then back home! Our plan really is as vague as that, at the minute.

I'm looking for inspiration as to where to visit, any great towns or cities to see that maybe have good sites near. I'm happy to pay for sites as opposed to free Aires.

Cheers
Click to expand...
I’ve not stayed at any sites but I have driven round France loads and there are loads of sites of varying quality.
Nearly every town you visit in France is interesting in its own ways
Most have stayed unchanged since medieval times, there are some real gems that you Stumble across
I do love France but sometimes the people aren’t that friendly to the English lol
Not in a horrible way just chip on the shoulder type of way, and to think we saved them from German occupation!
I’ll keep an eye on this thread and mention some places that we have been to over the years when I remember them.
 
Have fancied that sort of trip a few times, but haven't yet tried it because we are happy doing what we do, which is camping and now Gites.

Can second some of the places Skandhalass mentioned. Plus Vichy, lovely riverside and small city. Le Puy, small town with some interesting features, just west of Valence.
 
Just did 7 weeks , in northern Spain and France, followed the west coast up to brittany, then to Normandy for the beaches, brittany is beautiful, we used to just look at the map and think that looks interesting, found some great places. And the locals were friendly.
 
Download campercontact - it has details of aired. Aires are parking areas that you can stop at overnight in a motorhome ( some have better facilities than other) I've been all around France in a motorhome and would advise having a rough route/ itinery, but the benefit of a motor home is that you can make it up as you go along.
 
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TheWanderer said:
If you don’t mind me asking, how much you paid to hire a motor home for 3 weeks? Would love to do this at some point, but the websites I’ve seen ask to fill in forms for quotes and can’t be arsed to pass over details and get hassled.
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If you can afford the outlay you would be better off buying one, keep it for a year and do loads, then sell.
Doubt you would lose 2 grand and would have a year's worth of fun. They hold value well.

Buy second hand of course.
 
France is a huge country and you will soon rack up a fair amount of money in diesel and tolls getting to the south ( in a large motorhome). I tend to get the ferry to Bilbao and then sort of work my way back to Calais in a random route taking in the sights I want to see.

The ferry costs a bit, but it's like a 24 hour cruise and you start your trip in the sunshine- by the time you deduct the cost of how much it would cost to drive to South of France it doesn't work out that much more ( and saves 3 days driving there)
Bob Fleming said:
If you can afford the outlay you would be better off buying one, keep it for a year and do loads, then sell.
Doubt you would lose 2 grand and would have a year's worth of fun. They hold value well.

Buy second hand of course.
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I agree with this- that's what I did ( beware of Ebay- there is a HUGE amount of scammers selling motorhomes- you can spot them easily- REALLY good value but always located in faraway places- Cornwall or north of Scotland etc)
 
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