Driving from Manchester to south of France with a 2 year old, is this possible?

[starberryhortcak]

We will be going to Cannes for 10 days in July. DD will be 2 1/2 at the time. We would rather drive than fly for several reasons, one being we will def need a car while we are there.I know it's a way off yet but we're wanting to start booking everything now. Me and DH will be sharing the driving but we're wanting to avoid driving through the night as neither of us have driven on the continent before. We live in Manchester so we'll have a good few hours driving in the UK.

My plan is:

Get everything packed at ready to go the day before we leave, go to bed. Spend a good part of the day resting. Then around 5pm set off for Dover. It's a four and a half hour drive so we'd probably book the last ferry (23:45). Get on ferry, stretch our legs for the 90 minute cross over. Probably try and wear DD out a bit due to the long drive. Once in Calais head straight for a hotel. Go straight to bed, get up around 8. Back in car and straight driving down, with stops for food and for DD. It's an 11 hour drive from Calais to Cannes but let's add on another 90 minutes to account for stops and traffic etc. Get to cottage 9/10pm.

Does this sound doable? Does anybody have any advice? Thank you

Fly and hire a car
It will work out cheaper probably with the cost of fuel.

Or you could sail to Bilbao, Spain and cross the border into France a lot shorter drive but supposed to be a nice relaxing sail that takes a day and half.

We drove 16 hours across the US when our flight was cancelled and we had no choice because it was either that or forfeit a half of a very expensive skiing holiday. On the way out we did 12 hours, then an overnight stay and the rest the next morning. On the way home we did the lot in one go. 2 and a half year old DD was fine but we’ve done a lot of long haul flights with her so we were confident that she’d be ok during the day with lots of snacks and screen time and then would just go to sleep. We found it tough going though- given the choice I’d definitely fly and hire a car as per our original plan!

We’ve done similar twice now, and both times have been fine. I am not generally a fan of long car journeys - for us the trick has been to make the journey part of the holiday. So - down to Dover and either overnight before or after ferry (have done both), then stop twice on the way down. Leaves enough time for a nice afternoon stroll round a nearby town / play in a park / whatever. Sometimes we’ve stayed in a stopping place for two nights. We usually stay in final destination for just over a week, then go back again in a similar fashion. We have found that audio stories / children’s songs are a must! It’s definitely doable - DC was 1 when we first tried it and we barely had a peep out of them.

Isn’t there a sleeper train you could put the car on? My friend took her car by train to Avignon years ago.

We have driven to the south of France many times with the DC including when they were babies. We don't go to Dover though we head to channel tunnel. Make sure you have plenty of stuff to entertain the little one and on a long journey download lots of stuff onto an iPad for them

Depends if she's happy and good in the car or not. If she is then no problem. We regularly did a trip from the south coast to northern Spain on the ferry then down the length of Spain to end up on the costa del sol. 24 hours on ferry then 11-12 hour drive. Our girls were great little travellers, we first did it with when the eldest was 4 months old. I wouldn't bother spending the day resting, crack on down the motorway and catch a ferry and see how far south you can get before stopping in a hotel (with secure parking - ideally underground garage below the hotel) for the night.

Interesting reading all the comments here as i was planning a similar journey from the north west down to Port Grimaud to stay on a campsite in mid September with what will be 5-6 month old baby. My idea was to drive down to Portsmouth and get a cabin on the overnight ferry to Le Havre then have one stop over around Beaune/Dijon and do the same on the way back(essentially breaking it down to 3 6-7 hour legs with breaks per journey). I've previously done it before as a couple both with no stops and flying in to Nice with a car hire but really wanted to know people's opinions of driving such a long way with a baby in tow?
To be honest i wouldn't consider the no-stops way again and even when we flew in last time a couple of years ago and rented a car i felt like it would have been better to have brought a lot of our home comforts along, so my theory is that it would be so much easier to have all the essential baby equipment from home to hand whilst we are down there.
Cost-wise it's much of a muchness between the two but quite fancied a bit of a road trip adventure as proper family as all my fondest memories as child stem from thse type of holidays as it's without doubt my favourite part of the world.
I suppose the key will be to wait and see how the baby is in the car and possibly try a few trips to the Lakes/North Wales in the meantime to get and idea how the baby will deal with 1.5 hour drives and don't book anything until i have a better idea?

We live in Manchester and have done this. We set off very early morning about 2am and get the ferry around 8am. Drive for 4 or so hours then an overnight stop mid France, in a decent hotel with a pool. Set off around 8am and arrive midday dependent on weather.
We’ve also flown then hired a car which is much less stressful!

I have a 2 (nearly 3) year-old and I've done a lot of travelling with him. Plane, train and car - and long journey by car are by far the worst. So I think your plan is crazy (sorry!) and you should fly then hire a car.

"quite fancied a bit of a road trip adventure as proper family"

With a 5-6 month old baby 🤣

Babies are not supposed to be in car seats for very long at a time, plus you will obviously have to stop regularly to feed and change them.

My DS had reflux and HATED the car seat. We drove from cambridge to Cornwall when he was 5 months old and it was hell!

So good luck with your road trip

With respect, your plan is crazy. I regularly drive from Frankfurt to London (which isn’t nearly as far as you’re proposing) with a 5 and 6yo. I drive, and DH’s full-time task is to keep the DC entertained. We’ve done it in several ways, but my “favourite” is to leave at 9am, get to a Belgian beach around 3, run the children along it like dogs, and stay the night there. I like to make the journey into a holiday of its own. Then we get up, straight into the tunnel (why would you take the ferry?) and up to London (occasionally Nottingham) from there.

The length of your holiday is key here: will you be spending 4 days out of a 10 day holiday in the car? That’s madness. We recently drove to the UK for a week’s holiday. I’d prefer not to do it again. 2 weeks is my cut off, from now. Otherwise, we will fly, and I strongly suggest you do the same!

Its interesting as i've read other threads which have said that up to 6 months is the best time to travel long distances in the car(with regular good breaks obviously) as they tend to sleep a lot of the time, but by the sounds of it your experience is the exact opposite. Even on this thread it seems like a bit of a mixed bag so i suppose its likely to vary from child to child.
Probably best to hold fire and decide last minute i reckon!

I would definitely take the overnight ferry. Brittany Ferries Pont D'Aven is like a mini cruise ship, the travellers are mainly older home owners returning to the Charante and not noisy revellers.... pay the extra for an outside/window cabin and wake up refreshed in lovely St Malo. Budget ferries are exactly that, so beware DFS etc as they are quite basic.
It is so relaxing this way - grab a nice breakfast and then you are on your way. Cannes is a bit of a slog though, so factor in a stay in either Bordeaux, Toulouse, Carcasson.....
If you can, plan the drive for the Sunday as HGVs aren't permitted on the autoroutes unless it is a perishable load so the traffic flow is better.

If you want to ferry it over could you do Portsmouth to Caen and do the overnight ferry so you can get a cabin and sleep? Then spend a night somewhere halfway down before finishing the trip

Another tip - avoid travelling at the start of the French school holidays - it's dreadful - and make sure your cars air conditioning is topped up and running at full strength. If you have a 12 volt charger in the rear, consider an electric cool box for drinks & snacks.

There's no way you'll manage 11 hours of driving with a toddler and only 90 minutes of stops.

It can be done, but personally I'd rather have spiders dance on my eyeballs. Fly, or rethink the plan.

We live in central Europe and have done a LOT of 2/3 days drives across the continent with small kids.

Our main tip would be setting off really early on Day 1, at 6am or earlier if possible. Don't actually wake the toddler - try and get them into the car in pyjamas still sleeping, as long as they're strapped ip in a car seat everything else is irrelevant. Get them changed into clothes at the first or second motorway break. I agree with PP that you need to get driving part-way through France by the end of the first day, with about 5/6 hours left for the second day. We always stuck to the idea of breaks every two hours. But this is not a good time to be doing potty training! If you arrive at your overnight hotel by about 3pm you'll have plenty of time for the toddler to have a run around - we always made sure our overnight stops were family friendly places with eg a playground or nearby park.

Id consider it with a campervan maybe, but honestly, weve done this drive a couple of times, and even though we are used to long drives and can manage it, its unpleasant. We are much closer to the tunnel than you, and id still say that was a 2 or 3 day drive and the tolls are expensive

Id get the train if you dont want to fly and then hire a car the other side

I live in Brittany and have driven to Spain with DS1 & 2 when they were tiny, and back and forth to the UK probably hundreds of time.

I would allow a lot longer for breaks. I would take a ferry from Portsmouth to the western channel (Caen/Cherbourg/St Malo) I have a Brittany Ferries discount code you can use if it helps. I would plan loads of stuff to do in the car - games, songs, dvd player, things on your phone, snacks, anything. Plan your route carefully (viamichelin is good and includes tolls and fuel consumption)

Avoid French school holidays at all costs - everyone goes south. They break up after school on 03 July this year, but most Saturdays in July will be busy. You can check on bison fute what predicted traffic will be like.

Plan for the worst and anything else will be a nice surprise! Certainly it's do-able, enjoyable even, but I'd plan well!

With a two year old I would go by train but you need to book early to get reasonable prices. We have older children and often drive to the south of France. Most enjoyable way is to go on the Santander or Bilbao ferry but it isn’t the cheapest option. If going via Dover I would leave early on the first day of travel and plan To cover 5 hours of journey south of Calais) Then leave hotel at 7am on the Saturday for remainder of journey. Driving in France is easier than uk but you need to do the minimum on Saturdays in the main summer holiday weeks. Ibis styles hotels good for stopovers