Driving from Calais to the Dordogne- best route and where to stay?

[jenniferq]

Hi All
We (me, DH, 3 year-old DD and 19 month DS) are off for 2 weeks self-catering in the dordogne from 28th August for 2 weeks. Cant wait!
Am just figuring out routes and where to stay and would really value advice from anyone who has done this.
I am wondering whether it is worth the longer journey to avoid the Paris ringroad? DH has the Friday off work, but it seems whatever we work it, we would be hitting it sometime in the Friday rush hour - unless we stayed north of paris Fri night and then got up ealry and did it on sat morning? Or is it better to avoid Paris - and go via rouen? is that worth the extra travel? in which case, does anyone have any recommendations for where we should stay? I am keen not to have to negotiate any big towns - so anything cheap on the roadside, but bookbale would suit well!
Finally, on the way home - we leave the proeprty on Saturday and will stay over on the way home. but we would rather the chunk of the jounrey was done on the sat in roder for us to get a lunchtime ferry from calais on the sunday - as we are both back at work on the monday. Any tips/suggestions for thatjourney - maybe paris will be OK on that journey if we pass through early sunday morning in Sept?
Far too many questions - I apologise! Any thoughts gratefully received!

I would avoid Paris. We always do. Have you tried a route planner like viamichelin?

I've stayed in Campaniles in France. You can often get online booking offers if you are prepared to be flexible about exactly where you stay.

Hi Jennifer.

Mand's DH here, wheeled out for the usual French travel query!

Where in the Dordogne are you going?

Traffic in general going South could be a bit heavy, but it's not one of the really bad French summer weekends ( www.bison-fute.equipement.gouv.fr/fr/IMG/pdf/Traffic_forecasts_for_2010_cle1dc317.pdf )

In any case Paris is best avoided on Friday evening at any time of year, especially if you're not experienced in doing it and have small children in the car. The extra 30 minutes via Rouen is well worth it, the route is A16 / A28 to Rouen (very lightly used motorways until Rouen) a bit of navigation needed through Rouen itself (still on m/way / dual carraigeway but with a couple of junctions to watch out for- follow signs for Paris A13 m/way.) After a few miles on the A13 take A154 to Evreux which turns into the N154, then follow the signs to Dreux which you go round on a bypass by following signs to Chartres, then you go round Chartres on the bypass following signs to Orleans. I think it's actually signed Orleans all the way form Evreux, and it's all the N154 so pretty easy really. This then meets the A10 North of Orleans, from where you take the A20 all the way down to the Dordogne.

As far as staying goes you won't go too far wrong with any of the French chains, though the cheaper ones can be quite basic, you get what you pay for. The Accor website www.accorhotels.com/gb/united-kingdom/index.shtml is a good place to start as they own several brands (Ibis, Novotel, Etap, Formule1 etc.) so they are all on the same website. Campanile www.campanile.com/en/default.aspx & Kyriad www.kyriad.com/en/hotels/index.aspx (again one group - but 2 websites this time!) are also generally OK in my experience. If you want to be a bit more adventurous try Logis de France www.logishotels.com/en.html Independant but all meeting the Logis standard, more 'real' French and not necessarily any more expensive. Or if you want somewhere special try Sawday's website:www.sawdays.co.uk/

My advice would be:

1 work out roughly where you want to stop (difficult to judge as I don't know where in the UK you are coming from, but Rouen, Evreaux, Dreux, Chartres, Orleans for example might be about 1/2 way?)
2 use the hotel websites shown above to find hotels near your target town (or Google maps - just google 'Hotels + Townname' and a little map will pop up in the results, click on it and you'll see lots of red dots where the hotels are, you can then navigate round it just like Google Earth to find the ones near the bypass)
3 find a hotel near your route and not in the Town centre (many of the chain hotels are in retail park/industrial estates on/near the bypasses / motorways, sounds like that would suit you better) that is in your budget and has a family room (not all do)
4 do a quick check on trip advisor www.tripadvisor.co.uk/ (best overall hotel review website) and booking.com www.booking.com/(most reviews, especially for European hotels) to make sure it's not a total dump (you're not looking for rave reviews, just not loads of bad ones) then

5 book it up directly with the hotel website.

Enjoy!

Mand's DH - you are a total, complete star! Thank you so much for such a long helpful response! Lots of that confirm my gut feeling about it (re avoiding paris etc) so that is just excellent.

In terms of locations - we are SE London, so about an hour from Dover, and we are going to just near to Domme in the Dordogne.

But that is exactly the sort of advice/experience I was looking for on the roads. really that we werent avoiding Paris but in doing so choosing a confusing and complicated route - however simple it looked on the map! Rouen doesnt sound like it is too difficult to navigate.

we have driven to Normandy a few times over the last few years, and had no probles and in fact really enoying travelling on those sorts of French roads (such a pleasure compared to the motorways here!)

Will definitely look into Logis - once I feel OK that the driving is OK, perhaps I will feel able to be a bit more adventurous!

it has only just occured to me that of course we dont have to go the same way there and back (?!?!). but eg on the way home, we might feel OK about going via paris if we are going to hit paris sunday mid-morning. Perhaps not though - perhaps best to just avoid at all costs?

Thanks again, though, for your v v v helpful reply!

Jennifer

No worries, you're welcome.

Happy to share anything that might be of use, it's what the internet is for (or at least ought to be!)

Paris can be busy at almost any time. I don't think Sunday morning would be too bad but I've never driven it at that time myself, I'm sure they are some other MNetters who can advise on that!

In my view the bigger issue on a Sunday is one of confidence/navigation. The one thing Paris DOESN'T have is anything resembling an orbital motorway (like the M25).

There is a series of motorways that kind of make up a ring (or two) 10-20 k from the centre but they are not complete, are inconsistently signed and need quite a few turns and dog legs. The 'rings' are more complete around the Eastern side, there is one about 10k out (A86/A3) and another about 20k out (A104/N104); I'd go for the former under normal traffic conditions and the latter if it's a bit busier. The snag is that neither are simple to navigate, both involve a fair few junctions, twists and turns, leaving and joining etc. You need a good map reader or a lot of faith in your sat nav.

The alternative is what most people would think of as the Paris 'Ring Road', aka the Boulevard Peripherique. This is further in and roughly follows the old city walls (many of the juctions are called 'Porte' i.e. 'gate') in a complete circle around the city.

This is NOT like the M25, it's much more like say the North Circular on steroids. Lots of lanes, and junctions every 1/2 mile. Of course it's quite possible to negotiate (thousands of people manage to do so every day!) but needs a degree of confidence and again good navigation (or Sat Nav). If you do try then just apply usual common sense ; don't leave yourself tight with time, and ensure you are sorted for fuel, food and toilet stops!

Good luck whatever you decide. Domme is beautiful, as are many towns/gardens/castles in the area (and not too crowded 1st 2 weeks September!) Sadly we are now confined to school hols; make the most of it!

You've been given great advice here. just to add my two penneth - we do both routes depending on where we're headed and take whichever is most sensible for our destination - won't take a longer route. We're always nervous going into Paris but almost always come out unscathed the other side and kind of enjoy the challenge and it's an interesting drive, spotting the eiffel tower etc. We have in fact got quite badly lost on the Rouen route more often, there's a complicated little bit there that we've got wrong more than once so if you do take this route, don't relax on your mapreading around this area.
Secondly, the chain hotels (aka bed factories in this house) are good and cheap in France but lack character and I would actually prefer to drive straight through without stopping than stay in one - seems a bit of a waste of money (albeit a small amount!). Instead we go with the Logis de France (good website) and have really enjoyed the experience in these places and therefore this becomes part of the whole holiday experience rather than a chore if you see what I mean.
EB

This is SUCH a useful thread!

We are going (via Calais) to the Dordogne on 14 August for a couple of week and have been planning to get an early shuttle from folkestone then drive straight through in one day. How long does it usually take though? Multimap etc seem to say around 8 hours but I did wonder if that included getting round Paris.

My advise to the family travelling through Paris during rush hour - DONT it very very busy and cars cut in cut up and you spend so much time navigating through the traffic its easy to miss your turn off

very interested in comments on this we have always avoided Paris at any time of the day and although the route via Rouen is longer and boring long motorways they are always quiet. My dilemma this time is that we are arriving in Calais at 1am and plan to drive though the night to sarlat so do i go my usual route or take a chance via paris will t be busy at 2 - 3am on a saturday morning? Husband and i have different views on this so would welcome the help.

so relieved to hear someone else got lost in Rouen - we managed to make same mistake there and back last time, but it was not too bad to undo. i consider it a personal challenge to do it right this year! we use the via michelin route planner too - if you type in eurotunnel or port as the first destination it gives a good route, if you just put calais it is less helpful. and you can choose recommended or quickest and other options. for loire this year the quickest is also the recommended, vi Rouen.....

We always get lost in Rouen, it is now turning into a family tradition! However, heading to the Dordogne I too would prefer that any day of the week (or time of day) to driving round Paris. The peripherique can be a nightmare as the road is so crowded at practically any time of day.

We have stayed in some lovely logis over the years. This isnt a cheap option as you will be expected to eat in the restaurant if there is one.

As an alternative to the accor chain we have stayed in hotels on the www.hotelbb.com chain many times and found them very satisfactory if lacking much in the way of character. They normally have some sort of eaterie nearby.

The only chain I would avoid is Formule 1. They used to be good but have now been overtaken by the others. They tend to be in industrial rather than commercial districts and a bit rough.

Do get booking though. So many times we have seen sad and tired looking families turning up at hotels only to see the complet(full)sign up. The only time we didnt book we ended up sleeping in the car.

The Periph will be pretty empty at 2am.

All you need to know is your Porte, E or A numbered Autoroute and whether to go on the eastern (Interieure) side or western side (Exterieure).

It's worth checking ahead to see if there are overnight roadworks leading to closures.

Personally, I wouldn't be fazed at going through Paris at anytime, especially if the alternative adds on 30 minutes. You'd be really unlucky to lose that much time in Paris (it is only really the Peripherique that has 'bouchons' and it is a pretty short stretch, and it's not as if the traffic past Rouen is always 130km/h.

Either way is a fine choice.

We have gone the Rouen-Evreux-Chartres-Orleans route previously - it's fine, although there is a quite a lot of single lane rural road between leaving the autoroute near Rouen & getting on again S of Orleans, so it's often very slow going (tractors etc).

OTOH you get a fab view of the cathedral at Chartres because the land is so flat

This year we decided we would risk the BP & it was a nightmare - masses of roadworks, traffic jams & closed exits - it took us a lot longer than 30 extra mins to negotiate! That was in June, it may be better now but I wouldn't choose to go that way again

getting on again N of Orleans, sorry!

Thanks for all replies have made the decision to via rouen chartres orleans. I don't mind Rouen we have been through there so many times on the way to Loire Valley and husband reminded me of the one and only time we went via Paris was a nightmare - too stressful.

We have skirted Paris quite a bit outside Le Peripherique, via Versailles. Its all quite do-able with a good Road Map.

So there are routes around and not though Paris!

I know this is a bit of an old post but for people reading it more recently, here’s my tuppence worth.

It amazes me that more people don’t know about the Versailles-side tunnel called the A86 Duplex.

This is a phenomenal piece of engineering, being a double-stacked tunnel under a lot of Paris. For about 8 euros you can cut out about 70% of Paris as you cruise gently under it. And the rest of the surface roads you take are ok.

This route takes you in the eastern side of Paris. We go to the Dordogne a lot and always go this way. It is the fastest and most direct route, while cutting out the sometimes horrific traffic of Paris (which is nothing compared to London traffic in my view.

We usually stay at gitedordogne.co.uk/ which is a top end place with good space for the kids. (That’s where we end up, not the enroute stopover. For that we usually just keep going or sometimes stop at Orleans which is beautiful)

Hope that helps.

K