Ideas for add-on week in France with young DC?

[HouseOwl]

We've got a week in the Dordogne booked at the end of August, me DH & young DC. Been there before a love it, and love France generally.

Plan was to fly to Bergerac and hire a car for a week. However we are now wondering whether to add on a week or a few days beforehand to extend the holiday as it now looks like our work will be quiet. (We have to come home after the week in Dordogne as eldest starts school so the extra days would need to be before then). We could only book 1 week at the Dordogne place so I was thinking we could go elsewhere on the way?

Whilst I know France quite well I was wondering if anyone had any inspiration / ideas for what we could do to extend the trip? Suitable for travelling with small DC.

One idea I had was the Il de Re but I know it's so expensive and gets really booked up over August.

Puy du fou is amazing. Central France.

Are you still flying to Bergerac and hiring a car? Ile de Ré would be a heck of a drive from there and will be absolutely heaving. Plenty of very nice places around Bergerac. Bordeaux itself is worth a visit, the Dune du Pilat is amazing. Lots of nice small towns around the south-west, like Périgueux, Angoulême, Agen. But TBH if you're with small kids I would keep driving to a minimum and find another BnB in the same vicinity. If the plan is now to drive down, Nantes and La Rochelle are nice.

As the area we call the Dordogne is quite big, you could easily do another week maybe towards the South East around Sarlat or The Lot. Alternatively a week around the Loire on the way to the Dordogne would be lovely.

Sorry just realised you are flying into Bergerac.

Puy du foy

Ah sorry, no, to clarify... we haven't booked flights yet. We will be flying back home from Bergerac. We intend to hire a car for the duration. So potentially we could fly to La Rochelle, hire a car, stay on Il de Re, then drive the 3.5hrs to the Dordogne gite and return the car to Bergerac airport.

That's just one idea at the moment.

Honestly I'd just stick with staying around Bergerac, unless the kids are big fans of spending hours on the motorway.

What is Bergerac like as a place to stay for a week with children? Is it quite built up and busy, or is it relatively unspoilt and traditionally French, if you see what I mean? Is there enough to do there for a week without a car?

Small and rural. You would definitely need a car.

Thanks. I did wonder that. I don't mind rural so much - would rather stay somewhere quieter, pretty and more authentically "French", but wonder if there would be enough to keep kids entertained. I'd be quite happy wandering around a market and sitting eating croissants all day in a cafe, but maybe not them!

Another vote for Puy du Fou, it's amazingly bonkers.

La Rochelle is lovely - my kids loved the town, markets and generally mooching around there. Just up the coast is a resort called Saint-Gilles-Croix-de-Vie which is lovely - sort of the French equivalent of a traditional English seaside town. We only spent a couple of days there but thought it was great for young families.

Is La Rochelle easy to get to from Poitiers airport? Would you need a car in La Rochelle or is there plenty to do using public transport?