am i fooling myself? Can we go to france for similar (less) than UK

[needtoleaveukforsunshine]

Started a thread a while ago because wanted to go france as not confident in weather here for camping again. I know it has been warm this week but I think this could be the beginning and end of summer (voice of experience/doom).

Having said that - I am now thinking that going to northern france/loire/vendee is going to be costly. The campsite prices seem less but when I factor in all the travelling and tolls it is going to go up quite a lot.

Does anybody have any suggestions to keep costs down? I am thinking that if we do cheap dover/calais crossing and then only drive for couple of hours we shouldnt incur too many travel costs - but then the weather could also be awful. Maybe I should just book somewhere in devon/cornwall and spend the next month or two with my fingers and toes crossed. What do you all think??

the thought of paying for a holiday and it raining would make me vicious with rage.
This is our dilemma. We know its going to rain in Wales but if it rains in France and we've paid more to go there... What if it's raining all over France in August?

Gosh you sound EXACTLY like me last year! I guess our lovely holiday has softened me!!! But I agree completely and will just keep my fingers (and toes!) crossed :-)

Just a note on ferries, we're going southern Brittany next week (so expecting warm but changeable weather).... but the ferry crossings have gone up quite considerably since I first looked at prices a few - I totally forgot to book them till last week. .... still only costing 70 odd quid return but it would have been less than 40 uf had booked when planned. ..... so the ferry prices do go up so maybe just book ferry crossings and sort where you go later. ......

Do you have any tesco vouchers? You can exchange them for triple value and use them towards a eurotunnel crossing which could help to reduce the cost

feeling a bit guilty as i started this thread and then forgot about it/got sidetracked/spent too much time looking at uk campsite reviews

Glad to see that others have contributed.

We are still undecided. I have been looking at Treen Farm in cornwall and at a campsite at corfe castle in dorset but with going mid/late august I have a feeling that we could be increasing possibility of being cold and wet.

Now - Hattieboo - your messages are pointing me back to France. How on earth did you do that length of hols for £700 with a caravan? I thought ferry costs rise a lot with caravan. I put a quote in for trailer and that increased prices a lot. Would you be willing to say which site in the Dordogne you went to?

I would leave it to the last minute but I am worried that we wont get anything decent in this country or france. Still dithering

We live in the Loire Valley and we've had exactly the same weather as England all spring and summer. Very depressing!

The Vendee is usually better but not so much this year, at least so far.

But it's been very very changeable so who knows what August will be like? In the past we've indeed had more sun than the UK.

My ILs live near Limoges (Limousin) and they've had lovely weather. I think it's less trendy than some other areas and supposed to be really nice.

We've camped at corfe castle and had a lovely time. Not sure that helps your dilemma though!

Which campsite at Corfe? I can highly recommend Downshay just outside Corfe, it's a great campsite!

We're still hoping to go last minute to France, we're going to sit to book ferry though so we can check forecast.