Around Calais

[rubyslipperss]

Can anyone recommend a good little town to stay in within driving distance of Calais for two or three night trip for me and my husband in August? We will get the Dover Calais ferry . I'm not familiar with the area . Don't mind travelling for an hour or so off the ferry.

Le Touquet is about an hour away and a lovely spot for a couple of nights.

Bruges in Belgium! Lovely place to visit and very close to calais

Second Le Touquet. Perfect for a short break near Calais.

Le Touquet!

I like Neurf chateau en Bray
its 20 miles from Dieppe and 20 miles from Gournay en bray

all pleasant towns
But further than Tourquet to drive

Came to say Le Touquet but see I've been beaten to it!

Wimereux is a lovely small resort, with lots of lovely small towns nearby to visit, Audreselles, Ambleteuse, Wisant . V close to Calais. Boulogne is lovely to visit too, the old town.

A longer drive (an hour and a quarter) is St Valery , lovely harbour side old town.

Wimereux or Wissant both much nicer than le Touquet and cheaper to boot.

Dunkirk is no more than ok and all the way west to Belgium is a bit meh tbh.

Going the other way Berck is pretty horrible, Boulogne old town is surprisingly nice but most of Boulogne is less so, but almost ever other seaside town from Calais down to St Valéry is ok and driving is easy so I'd look for the nicest accomodation you can find in that area and you can visit them all.

Don't disregard Calais itself. It has real charm and they have really made an effort to get people to stay rather than driving straight through.

Do be aware that a lot of restaurants etc are shut on a Sunday in this area, eat out on Friday Saturday but get picnic stuff or provisions for Sunday

Le Touquet, Fort-Mahon-Plage, Boulogne, Bruges, Lille, St Valery.

Wimereux is nice as suggested. Bergues is also a lovely little town (not seaside though).

Just over the border into Belgium, De Panne is a properly seasidey town.

If you want slightly bigger, Lille is barely more than an hour from Calais, and has a lot more to offer.

le Crotoy is a lovely seaside town.

Thanks great ideas !

Bruges is gorgeous but if you're happy to drive an extra hour, you could visit Rouen which is also lovely and rather bigger than Bruges.

If you are prepared to drive to Brugge (as Bruges is actually called by the people who live there, who mostly don't speak French either 😎), drive on 35km further to Gent (aka Ghent), which is a wonderful town with far fewer tourists.