Help needed from experienced campers in France.

[TINKERBELLE33]

Going to Britanny for first time and need to book ferry. Can't decide whether to go for Portsmouth to Cherbourg or Dover to Calais. Portsmouth to Cherbourg will save around 200 miles but is £280 dearer, but Dover to Calais will cost extra in Diesel, tolls and time. I will have a 7 year old and 31/2 year old plus trailer so will need to drive carefully with lots of stops. Will also have a 260-270 mile drive on this side too. Which would you do?

If you can afford it i would go for the shorter drive. The shorter miles can lead to quite a stressful journey anyway let alone the extra miles you have mentioned.
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We always go by the Eurotunnel. it is further to drive (on both sides of the channel)but I think the short crossing time and frequency of crossings compensates for it.

I don't mind driving in France anyway- it is better thna in the UK.

Are you doing all the driving - or sharing with a partner? If alone, then take the longer ferry crossing- and then you have time to rest up a little before setting off again.

We once did the portsmouth to cherbourg - and due to my lack of planning - hadn't actually realised how long the drive was from cherbourg.

You still hav to drive down the poky up bit and across. We stayed in Perros Guirec and it took us about 4 hours or more - I wasn't expecting it to be quite so far. So to be fair it may not take that much longer from Calais. ??

Hi tinker. From south Yorkshire, we favour the Portsmouth crossings. We can do Portsmouth in under 4 hours, whereas Dover is a much longer journey. If you use the ViaMichelin website and pop in your destination it will estimate the cost of the French tolls for you. From memory, some of the cherbourg crossings are catamarans and not pleasant unless you can sit quietly - pretty impossible with 2 little people . Transmanche ferries used to do a Newhaven Dieppe crossing - not sure if they still do but thats a good compromise. We find the Portsmouth Le Havre crossing to be the best. On phone so struggling for links atm.

If you decide on Dover, we found travelling through the night on the UK side to be the least disruptive and catching an early morning boat. Dover Dunkerque with Norfolk Line always comes up cheap.

Thanks for all your advice, I will pass it on to DH. DH tends to do most of the driving as I'm not that confident, am wary of driving on the opposite side of the road and towing a trailer.

Based on the timings given I think it will take about 41/2-5 hours to Portsmouth (West Yorks) and about 31/2 hours at the other side, so not as bad as I thought.

I don't think DH had realised about the catamarans as he doesn't sail too well, though I prefer crossings to be rough!

Will check out the recommendations and explore other options.

Definitely check the Portsmouth - Le Havre crossing (if you are favouring Portsmouth). You will need to book soon as the ferry is overnight and the cabins go fast, but it is nowhere near as expensive as the Cherbourg crossing, and as supernanny says, the Cherbourg peninsula takes a long time to get down.

From Le Havre you are straight on the motorway - the port is straight onto the main road out of Le Havre.

Which part of Brittany are you going to?

LH-Portsmouth is LD Lines

To calculate distances/times etc. I find www.mappy.com very accurate.

I'm another in favour of tunnel rather than any ferry crossing. Frequency of crossings means that if there are problems and you miss your scheduled one then there is a good chance of being put on another one soon after.

Would second comments about the catamaran. DD1 managed to clear a whole deck with her spectacular travel sickness once!

We have this dilemma every time we go to France Tinkerbelle!! We are in West Yorkshire too, so have a fair old slog just to get to the south coast. If we do Dover - Calais, we either tend to stay over night near Dover and get a very early morning crossing. I do sometimes think that it is actually easier to contain the kids in the car as at least they will (hopefully) sleep some of the way/watch DVDs, so the time you spend on the long crossing trying to keep them occupied, could be spend pressing on down to Brittany! Looking back, I think the best crossing we did down to the Vendee was Portsmouth-St Malo overnight, but there isnt/wasn't an overnighter back, so ended up on a long slog up to Le Havre and then a very crappy crossing with LD Lines.

Sorry, long post, am trying to justify a Portsmouth-St Malo crossing this year .....

We are in Lancashire and last year I really wanted to do a Portsmouth crossing, but couldn't justify the extra money. Instead we went to Dover, stayed overnight then had an early morning crossing to Calais. On the way back had an afternoon crossing and again stayed near Dover overnight. It worked welll with 2 young children.
I would only do a longer crossing if it was overnight and we got a cabin, which we did from Hull the year before and that was great (though obv far from Brittany).
I second the Dover-Dunkirk crossing, we are going in August for £68 return for us 4 and our caravan
How about a longer drive out and a different route back?

tinkerbelle did you decide on a crossing?

I am in Scotland and was scared of driving in France so did Weymouth to St Malo.I since found out was called Vomit Comet.St Malo is a lovely place and worth a visit but always better doing shorter crossing and driving in france. IMO it adds a 2 hr UK drive and and less the drive in france its a 5 hr saving.