Experiences of driving to S. of France in one go?

[Stinkyfeet]

We've pretty much decided on a Canvas site in the Languedoc for our holiday in June. We also think we'd prefer to do the drive in one go rather than having an overnight stop.

So, I'm just trying to find out tips and advice for the long drive. Things like best time to do it, how often you tend to need to stop and how long for. And any other useful stuff would be much appreciated!

dh and I did NE england to Dordogne without any planned stops, ended up havign to take a break in the car for a few hours' sleep. With DTs we have done NE to BRittany without a stop but woudln't recommend it, bear in mind though that it takes us a good 6-7 hours to reach Calais. This year we are going to the Vaucluse and I am plannign 2 nights in REims as it will be my 40 whilst we're away

We've always made two stops - Riems/Saone (somewhere just to the east/south east of Paris basically), and again just entering Provence (eg Avignon). I can't imagine doing the whole thing in one.

The actual driving time is 10 - 11 hours from Calais, so obviously it is doable, but you have to figure in your check-in time at your resort. I remember when I was a child and travelling with my parents missing the check-in time and having to sleep in the car outside the gates of our campsite.

If you are going to do it in one go, then get a very early tunnel crossing (eg 4am) and keep your stops very brief (so have sandwiches ready to go). The French motorways have lots of aires which have a little playground as well as hole in ground toilet facilities. If you could manage 2 hours of driving and 10 minutes of leg stretching, you would be doing well.

To add, our strategy has been to do our just-south-of-Paris stop at as close to 10pm as possible. Then to stay in a basic (one notch about formule 1) motel just to sleep. The second stop would be more like 4pm where we can do something remotely touristy sit in a bar. I remember stopping in Avignon one year and they happend to have an amazing festival going on.

When we drive to the Languedoc we stop in Vierzon or Bourges region for a night, have a good breakfast and set off by 9am, then we arrive early afternoon and kids can go in pool whilst I unpack.

We used a Campanile last Summer, and have used Novotels as can get 4 in a room with breakfast included (and they tend to have a pool)

We are going to near Barcelona next Summer and DH wants to try that with no stop. There is NO WAY I am agreeing to that!

I would never think of doing it one go. We have driven from Brussels to the south of france, Languedoc and the Riviera. We have stopped of at Macon, and last year got as far as Lyon Nord.

My thinking is that - OK Via Michelin says 12 hours, but that does not allow for traffic, or accidents etc. We spent 3 hours trying to get past Valence once.

Aim for 2/3s of the journey on the way out. Stop, have a nice meal and a good sleep, and arrive at your destination unstressed. I can recommend Novotels which are extremely child friendly, though more expensive than the Etap places. To me the journey is part of the holiday, so I budget for it.

Did it many times when DC were small.. all the way to Pals in Spain, but with ONE overnight stop at Dijon usually. Once we made it all the way to Lyon.

Stayed at Campanile Dijon South (Sud) normally.

Going via Paris is far more hellish, even though it looks shorter on a map.

We used to go early morning.. on Channel tunnel for 6am. Breakfast in St Omer. Then stop every 2 hours to swap drivers and everyone have a wee.

we use novotels too, family friendly, room service breakfast so yuo can eat whilst getting ready/packing and a pool too, plus decent evenign meals

Campanile is my favourite budget chain. They usually have a lovely restaurant serving regional specialities, so you feel your stop-off is valuable.

Thanks for all your advice. We very comfortably got to the Vendee last year in a day, which was 400 or so miles from Calais. So will look for somewhere around the same sort of distance on the way to the Languedoc for an overnight stop, I think.

So it seems Etap, Campanile and Novotel are the ones to look at.

I'm glad this isn't an AIBU - I must admit I thought I'd get more "oh yes, we do this all the time, it's fine" type responses!

Sorry this is a bit long.....

We have been driving to Perpignan for past 3 years as DC's grandparents live there. Last time we went DD's were 4 and 2 and journey was 13 hours. My tips:

Start out early. 5ish (we live South London) We wake DC up when we are just about to leave house and they stay in their PJ's until we get onto eurotunnel. Take a blanket for them to cuddle up with along with favourite cuddly toy. Have breakfast in car and take Eurotunnel not a Ferry. If you collect Tesco clubcard points I think you can exchange it for Eurotunnel vouchers.

Stop every two hours for at least 15mins. I prefer proper service stations to the "Aires" for loo breaks as they don't have proper loos and I was struggling with the whole getting 2 year old to squat in rather smelly loos.

When you stop make sure DC run around. Take a ball\frisbee with you so can get some exercise.

Take a packed lunch and loads and loads of snacks. You can either stop for a good 30mins - 1hour for lunch or if you need to make up time just dish up the sandwiches in the car.

We went in August so was really hot so had air-con on in car. Was very drying so take lots of water\juice. We drunk about 6 - 8 litres between the four of us each way.

In car DVD player - if you don't have one please get one. They are great for occupying little ones. Mine managed to share one last time but next time we may have to get one each. Don't worry about all the TV they'll be watching in one stretch -its worth it!

Take a bag of toys\activities with you in the car so they have other things to occupy themselves with. e.g. Colouring. Also a good idea to take a new toy with you - especially when you near the end of the trip.

Mine were a bit young for this but play games in the car. We sang alot but you can also play things like I Spy, etc.

Try and avoid rush hour in Paris and definitely take the Milau Bridge. Saves about 2 hours.

Sat Navs and google Maps will either take you through Calais, Reims and Lyon or Calais, Paris and Orleans. We tried a different route last time which was good. Had a long stretch of Motorway route National (free) so it was a bit cheaper and also was a nice change of scenery. It went through Paris, Evry follwing E16\A6 to Nevers, Moulins and Clermont-Ferrand.

Make sure you plan your route before you go and you have a written copy of the route if relying on sat Nav - just in case you have probs.

Make sure things you need to have during the Journey are close to hand.

Also, check out RAC website for what you need to take when driving abroad. e.g. you need hi-vis vest, head light relfectors, warning triangle and also car documentation.

P.S. Have fun.

This is such a helpful thread. All my holiday problems solved in one. I heart MN.

That's more like it BusyMummy! So it is possible then! Ds's will be 7 and 4 and not particularly whingy in the car. We live nr Heathrow, so about 1.5 hrs to the tunnel.

Was it 13 hrs door to door, or 13 hrs once in France?

Are you thinking of doing a similar journey, Moodlum? All in one, or stopping off?

It was 13 hours driving door to door. So didn't include crossing. However, we were very lucky and the roads were clear (even through Paris). My DH and I share the driving so every two hours we swap and the other tries to sleep. My DH can sleep for England but I just manage to close my eyes.

Don't get me wrong you will turn up tired but it is certainly doable. I always find 3/4 of the way through is the worst as you really feel like you should be there by then!! This year we will be taking our DS with us (3months) so we'll have another little one to amuse for 13 hours!

Just be careful though, it took us 10 hours just to get from (mid) Brittany to the tunnel!!

We had 7 year old dd, 3 year old ds1 and 5 month old ds2 in the back.

We got stuck in loads of traffic, the likes of which I have never seen in France. We stopped once for 10 minutes and poor ds2 was in his car seat all that time.

The two journeys were probably the two worst days of our lives and we will never ever do it again.

We are going at the very end of august to the Dordogne, and we were going to go ferry - stop for a couple of nights at the Novotel in Amboise - Lot, but hadn't decided on what to do on the way back. DD & DS will be 6 & 5. Last time we did it, we drove down to Tuscany, but that was pre children, and it was a blast. Somehow, I think this will be different

I always pack loads of nibbly food that takes ages to eat. I try to limit sugar for obvious reasons.

We have a fab travel Bingo game in a box in the shape of a car, think it's French. We give them a sheet at the start and they have to cross of things as they see them. We got it from Cox and Cox I think. You could make your own great for kids that chunder as they look out the window.

A roll of foil is good to make models with.

We have those neck rests made by the Trunki people in the shape of aliens. Ours play with them too.

Travel pockets are a must,each kid has their own tied to the seat in front so you don't loose anything.

Top Trumps are good but maybe not for the chunder kids.

Cd story tapes only to be used in traffic jams are good-Horrid Henry saved our life but you have to live with the aftermath when you get there ie The Bottom Song,re-naming teddies Mr Kill and calling siblings 'worm'.

Travel etch a sketch things from ELC are good-who can write an a,draw an apple,write boat etc?

For babies a bin bag or toys you lob over your shoulder is good.Also Evian sprays if you have no air con.Boxes of raisins.

We have avoided car DVD players as I think it makes kids lazy at amusing themselves, I also think it's a shame that they miss the different scenery. Having said that I would have happily given my right arm for one last year on the way down. Having stuck it out though I noticed ours were heaps better on the way back as they were used to the boredom iykwim. Also everybody has different tolerance levels,I'm used to mayhem on journeys and just resign myself to it. I know it can get people down though.

Always over estimate the time you need,keep on the toll roads as much as you can and find hotels just off the main roads. We've made the mistake of booking lovely hotels that look near to our route on the map but when you get off we've literally lost hours in time going down endless country roads,not good when you're at the end of a journey.

Go for hotels with a restaurant,you don't want to be food hunting on arrival.

Eat breakfast as early as you can and get on the road you're always glad of the time gained more useful to use the extra time for wee stops than a lie in.

Plan for travelling on Sundays as shops off the beaten track are often closed. Nothing worse than turning up to a supermarket with an empty car park and tumble weed when it's 12 o clock and you're all starving. Think things are better these days but asume any supermarket off the main road could be closed,if you see one open grab it. Lunchtimes on any day are hit and miss too and were/are Mondays??? Could be wrong re that one.I pack a jar of peanut butter and rolls just incase we can't get bread. I always have bag fulls of snacks,water,oatcakes,fruit somewhere in the car so if we can't get nice bread and cheese we don't starve.

Fill up with petrol last thing Saturday as pumps will often be unmanned on Sunday and British cards don't always work although this is getting better.

If your French isn't great have a dictionary in the car for petrol pump reading emergencies.

Avoid motorway services in August always heaving with queues,overflowing loos(holes in the ground) and general mayhem. If you see anywhere nice to picnic with a climbing frame grab it as the kids get a run around which really helps. Start looking for lunch stops at 11.30.

If you have a chunder kid pack loads of travel sickness pills,triple what you think you'll need. France is so much bigger so you will run out. I only like giving dtwin1 the pills with the ingredient I know he tolerates well,not sure if it's as available in France. Also nothing worse than chunder in your car,you'll be living with the smell the whole holiday which then makes chunder more likely for the other kids.

Hope this helps have more but starting to bore myself now

Oh and 2nd using the tunnel, so much less hassle and you can save a lot of time. If you get there early by some miracle they'll put you on an earlier train. If you get there early on the ferry they stick you in a carpark with no loos for hours [knowing never again emoticon]

lol at milamae

I always take a 'sac magique' which DTs have come to expect on any long journey, with little stocking filler/party bag type things in to entertain them on the way, maybe even a new game for console, plus nibbles - mini chupa chups are good value!

I haven't read all the replies so many apologies if I'm repeating.

However, we regularly drive to the Languedoc in one go from Hertfordshire. The last time we did it was last weekend! We have a villa near Beziers and drove down there 4 times in 2009; always in one go.

I have twins of 6 and a just 4 year old plus 2 dogs and they all travel brilliantly. If we go through the night then we travel via Paris and over the Millau bridge. If we go in the daytime then we go further east (avoiding Paris all together) and take the Autoroute du Soleil which goes via Lyon.

The children have portable DVD players and we stop every 3 or 4 hours but we never seem to have any moaning.

The journey usually takes us about 15 hours (going through the tunnel) but just before Christmas we went on the first day of all the snow and it took us 21 hours!!

The French motorways are fantastic.

Thanks Badpups, many of the earlier replies were saying not to attempt this journey in one go. I'm still undecided, but gladdened to see that other people have done the journey pretty easily.

We can arrive on the site preferably between 4-8, but definitely no later than 10; what sort of time would you aim to get to the tunnel?

Thanks MilaMae - fab tips - no chundering dcs here thank goodness!

As MilaMae said if you get to the tunnel earlier you will get an earlier train. It is also worth noting that if they give you a train but there is another one boarding just drive on!! They want you to go into the shop beforehand. The last time we did this we had no problems and we had a completely different letter on display to the one that was boarding. My FIL has also done this.

We have done both ways several times.

Last time was all in one go but we had a bit of a nightmare journey - 23 hours door to door!We could have flown to Australia!

We got delayed around London in Friday traffic and missed our tunnel crossing time and because it was night and the crossings were less frequent and already full we had to wait 4 hours for another one.

We only stopped infrequently but the roads and services were busy and we had queues as we got further South.We felt terrible by the time we arrived and the children were not happy at all.

We are doing it again this year but with a stopover as it was just no fun at all last time.

So yes it can be done but if it is worth it depends on the journey which often can't be predicted.

That's the thing, nail, the unpredictability - the unknown! So all these experiences, good and bad, are extremely useful.

Still not much closer to a decision though! We like the idea of getting the journey over and done with in one shot, rather than prolonging it over 2 days, but not at the expense of family peace and harmony!!