From the Cote Sauvage to the Cote d’Azur, France offers some of the best beaches in Europe, if not the world. Here are three of our favourite seaside destinations.

Sailing, sand dunes and bicycles in the Ile de Ré

Rock pooling in gourmet Brittany

Family-friendly glitz on the Cote d’Azur

Sailing, sand dunes and bicycles in the Ile de Ré

By Rachel McLeod

We first discovered Ile de Ré five years ago. Browsing the Hip Hotel Guide for somewhere close to London for a quick family break, we came across several entries on the island, and were intrigued. We booked into a hotel with a family room, and took our pre-schoolers there one June.

The journey was mercifully quick. A mere one hour flight from Stansted to La Rochelle, and literally 5 minutes in a taxi over the toll bridge and onto the island. The airport is so close to the island that it’s branded the ‘La Rochelle - Ile de Ré’ airport.

Although the hotel we chose was very attractive, the live-in owners did not make us feel welcome. Any noise, or even eating at the picnic tables in the gardens met with their disapproval. They succeeded in putting us off that hotel, but could not put us off the island. We have returned several times, to charming (and friendly) boutique hotels, to a rented house and now own a holiday home there.

Ile de Ré is all about fresh air and outdoor activities. It’s like a French, sandy version of the Suffolk coast. I heard of a Parisian who briefly owned a house on the island, and was ferried around by his chauffeur. He was described to me as ‘a bit Saint Tropez’. Despite being well heeled (property prices are high by French standards) Ile de Ré is chilled out and dressed down. Nightlife hardly exists at all, other than a quiet dinner in one of the many harbour-front cafés.

Cycling is the popular way to get around. Hire shops are plentiful, and the island is criss-crossed with miles of flat and well signposted tracks. Some run parallel to roads, but many go cross-country or hug the coast well away from traffic. The paths take you past vineyards, oyster farms and salt flats.

There are 10 villages, each equally picturesque, with its own collection of cafés and boutiques. It takes about an hour to drive from Rivedoux at one end to Les Portes at the other. Local regulations are strict, and houses can only be built in the low-slung, local style. You’ll see white washed houses, with red-tiled roofs and shutters in the official island shades of grey and green, hollyhocks growing in the narrow ‘ruelles’.
Our house is in la Flotte, about 10 minutes’ drive from the bridge. Other good bases include the ‘capital’ Saint Martin and the sleepier Ars en Ré at the farthest end of the island.

A typical day for us will start with a trip to the daily food market to stock up on the day’s picnic – fruit, baguettes and a portion of freshly cooked paella. Pile it all in the bike basket and head off to the beach. We take our own sun umbrellas. You can’t rent umbrellas or loungers – it’s not that kind of place. Beaches are unspoiled, backed by tall grasses, and some dunes are fenced off to protect the wildlife that lives there. There are no hotel developments on the beaches themselves. The closest thing to that would be the occasional campsite back from the beaches, some of which have good facilities.

The southern side of the island is one continuous sandy beach. My favourite stretch is at Gros Jonc, where the beach is wide, and rock pools appear at low tide. A surf school operates there (age 8+) in high season.

For younger children there is a windsurfing and sailing school at le Centre Nautique Couardais du Goisil, which is a giant sailing pond. Parents can relax in the knowledge that no one is being swept out to sea. The clubhouse is currently being rebuilt to include a café.

There is a kids’ club on the beach at La Couarde. For someone used to having to book popular clubs well in advance in London, it was refreshing to be able to just turn up and get a place, even in August. For a few euros our children could join in all morning, or even all day if they wanted. The only problem for us was that the staff spoke no English. This was also true of the tennis club. Most tourists to the island are French, so it’s best not to rely on any locals to speak much English.

One word of warning, the last week of July and first two of August are incredibly busy. It can be hard to find a spot on the beach, especially at high tide when there is less beach anyway. But if you aim for low tide, and walk along from the beach’s main entry points, you can always find some (relative) peace and quiet. If you can avoid those peak weeks, do. But even if you can’t, you will find Ile de Ré offers an old-school bucket-and-spade family holiday in beautiful surroundings, with French cuisine and chic boutiques thrown in.

Hotels

Le Richelieu
44 Avenue de le Plage, La Flotte
Tel 05 46 09 60 70

Hotel Le Senechal
6 Rue Gambetta, Ars en Ré
Tel 05 46 29 40 42

Rentals
www.frenchaffair.com
www.homelidays.com

Restaurants

La Bouvette, Le Morinand
Le Bois Plage en Ré
Tel 05 46 09 29 87

La Poissonnerie du Port
4 quai Sénac, La Flotte

Le Bistrot de Bernard
1 quai de la Criée, Ars en Ré

Le Bistrot du Marin
10 quai Nicolas Baudin, Saint Martin

Also not to be missed: the large ice cream stall at Saint Martin harbour – try the local speciality flavour of Caramel Fleur de Sel. Another local culinary speciality worth trying is Mouclade, mussels cooked in their shells in a light curry sauce. It’s always worth browsing in Le Comptoir de L’ile de Ré, 2 Avenue Victor Bouthilliers at Saint Martin, which sells an eclectic mix of clothes, accessories and kitchenware. Very close by is the semi-permanent funfair, complete with antique carousels.

Centre Nautique Couardais du Goisil
Toll bridge: €9 low season, €16.50 high season

Final tip: La Rochelle airport is small scale and simple, with very little to do in the departures lounge. On the way home, buy coffee and ice cream at the café and head outside to the pedestrianised area so the kids can run around until boarding.

 

Rock pooling in gourmet Brittany

By Camilla Hutchinson

If, like me, France or, more specifically, northern France means holidays from childhood, where there were crepes, smelly cheese factories, craft markets and rock pools for shrimping, then Brittany is certainly worth a nostalgic return visit with your children. The weather is not guaranteed even at the height of summer. However one of the many benefits of this part of the world is that it is a ferry ride across the channel and you can therefore load a car with all the necessary and completely unnecessary paraphernalia that holidaying with children can entail.

I hadn’t been back to Brittany for a few years. You cannot spend a two week holiday there and not put on a stone in weight. However, I threw caution to the wind and agreed to go with two other families who had children of similar ages.

We set off on Brittany Ferries from Portsmouth to St Malo on a night crossing. Cabins were well-equipped for travelling with children and, after the initial fun wore off, children went to sleep and the 11 hours passed quickly.

I wasn’t in charge of choosing our accommodation and was somewhat miffed to discover that, no, we weren’t staying in the rambling, old farmhouse similar to the one we stopped at to ask directions but a purpose-built holiday home further down the track.

I was knocked down by this oversight (I shall be the one pouring over the brochures next time) but not knocked out: there is so much to see and do and the beaches are as glorious as ever I have known. One benefit of our large modern build was the spacious communal room, which was great for our meals for 12, which after all are the focus of any holiday in this region. And the house was just 300 metres from the sea on the northern side of Brittany.

The beach is where the holiday really came into its own. The beaches are a perfect mixture of soft creamy sand and interesting rock pools full of crabs, fish and other small crustaceans for the children to play in. The sea goes out for miles and it can be quite a trek up to your belongings. The weeks we were there the weather was varied: sunny one day, colder the next, which meant that, although we spent time on the beach every day we also felt like exploring the towns and villages nearby.

There is a market most days in any one of the local towns. In Lannion, the children were enraptured by the live seafood and we bought wonderful smelly cheeses and fruit and vegetables. I wonder why in Britain we fail to persuade our children to each as much variety of food, particularly fish, fruit and vegetables. Yet the difference in presentation is marked and the flavours and quality are a world away from standard British supermarket produce. We bought a couple of huge crabs and a pot big enough to cook them in. They were delicious and we persuaded the children to help and they all tried some.

Among other crafts, we came across stalls selling the same things I persuaded my parents to buy me many years ago: leather band bracelets in which you get your name engraved, blue and white hot chocolate bowls with your name on the side and Breton jumpers. Eating out by the beach or in the market towns was so easy and everyone was welcoming to our big crowd. You can’t beat simply boiled langoustines fresh from that morning’s catch. A few of us tried the local spider crabs. Most days we headed back to the beach for some healthy rivalry between families in our own beach Olympics.

We had been nervous about travelling back home on the boat during the day with young kids but there was plenty to keep them occupied: an entertainer, face painting and other activities throughout the day.

All in all it was a great holiday; the weather is uncertain, but you plan for that. The mixture of beaches to explore, fresh fish and seafood to eat and the children practising their French made it a success. We will definitely be going back.

Brittany Ferries
www.brittany-ferries.com

 

Family-friendly glitz on the Cote d’Azur

By Emily Turner

Le Club 55 is a St Tropez institution. The restaurant sprawls out under rush matting and canvas roofing onto the white sand of Pampelonne beach. We are shown to our lunchtime table: pale blue tablecloth, white wooden armchairs sitting half in the sand. The children kick off their shoes and head for the beach. My husband orders a bottle of rosé. London, left that morning at 7 o’clock, seems a long way away.

The Cinquante Cinq epitomes St Tropez. Beautiful seaside simplicity sustained (many would say wrecked) by glitzy materialism. I love it. St Tropez is gloriously brash and flash – the surgically enhanced Russian beauty reclines on her boyfriend’s oversized boat in the harbour, happy to be snapped by her poor relation on the pier, resplendent in a cheap copy of her own micro bikini. But the village can cope. The mellow, pastel-coloured houses line what must be one of the prettiest harbours in the world. A couple of streets inland from the massed ranks of glittery logo-d vests, t-shirts and thongs on the marina strip, past the designer boutiques, you will find a poplar-lined square with a bustling French market on Tuesdays and Saturdays, petanque contests at all other times.

We order our fish of the day with sauté potatoes. The children have steak hache and frites. The bronze Euro-couple on the table to our left picking at their enormous platter of crudités is fairly typical of the clientele but so too is the multi-generational family behind us – a five year old boy helping granny with her chair. No one seems fussed by our soaking, half-naked children. We settle in for the afternoon.

Eventually we give in to our offspring’s calls of ‘please can’t we swim now’ and de-camp to the beach. €16 buys you a pale blue covered sunlounger for the day. There is a charming and extortionately priced beach shack for beer and ice creams and a laid back tent selling hippy chic flip flops and bikinis at Bond Street prices. And, because is it May rather than August, there is an out of season feel to the place.

Gathering storm clouds force us back to our hotel. We are staying across the bay in Ste Maxime: Le Beavallon is belle époque grandeur rather than seaside chic but its selling point for us is that its ‘child friendly’ credentials are genuine. My daughters are thrilled with their mini towelling robes and slippers; the baby approves of the rubber ducks and kiddy bubble bath while my son peruses the 500+ DVD library. They order Room Service supper which appears, to their delight, on a ‘proper’ table. Silver domes covering boiled eggs and soldiers are removed with due ceremony. Rob and I go downstairs for grown up supper leaving them happy in the company of Fantasia.

The following morning we head across the water in the hotel’s complimentary speed boat. 10 minutes and we are in St Tropez. A morning buying bikinis is enough for my husband and we are back for lunch in the Beauvallon’s beach restaurant where the Thai-influenced food is delicious. In the afternoon the children can’t make up their minds whether they want jacuzzi, pool or sea so opt for a circuit incorporating all three. In the evening, we head up to the hills and have simple supper in Ramatuelle. The scent of the orange blossom is overwhelming after the earlier rain.

Monday: buffet breakfast on a sunny terrace goes on for ages. My children seem to have developed inexplicably good manners – it must have something to do with the size of the napkins. Table tennis, more swimming, finish my book. The children have discovered the hotel’s playhouse – complete with upstairs and working piano. We drag them away and head reluctantly back to Nice and the real world.

Oh why am I not married to a Russian billionaire?

Hotel le Beauvallon
Boulevard des Collines
Beauvallon-Grimaud
83120 Sainte-Maxime
Tel 33 4 94 55 78 88

Le Club 55
55 Plage de Pampelonne Boulevard
Ramatuelle
Tel 33 4 94 55 55 55