france next summer - ferry or tunnel?

[sphil]

Which would you recommend? We are in the SW and have been looking at the fast ferry crossing from Poole to Cherbourg, but having seen on here that it's nicknamed the Vomit Comet I'm not so sure...
Tunnel is cheaper, but a long UK drive for us. We are touring in our campervan, going down through the Loire to the Auvergne, so Calais also a bit of a step.

DS2 is autistic, so we'd rather avoid overnight crossings as he doesn't sleep well in strange surroundings.

I hate ferries! And the shuttle is great. From the SW you can easily get to Calais in a day via the shuttle.

We used to live on south coast and go to France (usually towards Alps) via Portsmouth. Now we go via Calais as we are in London. I would always chose ferry over tunnel, esp if you have children who will probably benefit from a bit of a run round on the ferry. And if you are going from SW UK to Loire, it would make no sense to do all that extra time in the car (adds up financially too).

I have been on a few vomit comets, and they have not been bad at all. In the summer chances are that teh weather will be reasonable anway (no promises though!)

The Poole crossing really isn't that bad, although it depends on the sea state. It's a really quick crossing and I would definitely opt for that over the conventional ferries. Having said that, I am someone who calls it the vomit comet and I do have to stay in my seat and look at the horizon! Dh, dd and dsd are all absolutely fine on them though - although dh is a bit of an old sea dog, and used to work on them so is well used to their feel.

We went on the tunnel last year as we could use Tesco vouchers and I have to say I was really imkpressed. We arrived early going out and got on an earlier train, and were late on the way back and changed crossing no problems. I really couldn't fault Eurotunnel - it was so easy.

That doesn't help does it ? I think for me it would depend how far west you are of Poole. A long drive at the end of the crossing isn't fun, and I would probably opt for the ferry if I were you.

What sort of camper do you have? There's a pic of ours on my profile. We drove to the South of France last year in ours and it was brilliant.

Thanks all. I think we've decided on Newhaven-Dieppe ferry - now I know this sounds mad , but we used to live in Lewes, have done that ferry loads of times and can camp nearby the night before. It's £100 cheaper than Poole-Cherbourg (and that's before we've found out whether we can use our air-miles) and, surprisingly, it's quicker from Dieppe to our Loire campsite than from Cherbourg.

Frosty - we have a VW T4 (Celeste) - I think you gave me advice on buying a camper last year! Best thing we've ever done!

Anyone ever taken their rv to south of france- near marseilles
would love to hear tips

We use Norfolk Line, ferries every 2 hours, conveneint to get out of Dunkerque, modern ships. They will let you go on the ferry 2 hours earlier if you get there earlier for no extra