France WITHOUT A CARE

Elaine and Joe Ormerod find their latest trip across the Channel to be trouble-free, with plain sailing and some super cycling

- 

After several incidents on recent holidays, we were apprehensive about our next trip.

Normally, we'd be looking forward to a relaxed, straightforward caravan holiday. Could we have a carefree tour this time?

We boarded the Brittany Ferries ship St Malo, crossing from Portsmouth to St Malo. It’s a new ship with our cabin tastefully decorated and sparkling bright. We thought this augured well! In the restaurant, we had a delicious dinner, then showers and bed.

We arrived at St Malo in the morning and, with us taking turns to drive, we arrived on Île de Ré in the afternoon. We'd stayed at Camping Seasonova before; it’s at the top of the island at Les Portes-en-Ré. We thought it would help if our first campsite was known to us.

We spent our days walking, cycling or swimming, and it was indeed very relaxing. We cycled quite often to Ars-en-Ré, for the marvellous daily market where we bought fresh fish, meat, vegetables, herbs and cheese. It’s a short walk to the village of Les Portes-en-Ré, and there we lunched at Restaurant La Bazenne. The food was very good, with extremely generous portions.

Cycling La Couarde

Having cycled most of the trails at the top of the island, we moved to the middle of the island to Camping La Tour des Prises where there were only two pitches left.

I'd checked when the French holidays were, and I'm aware of Pentecost, but the receptionist informed us that it was Ascension Day on the Thursday, and the French take a mini break from Thursday to Sunday. This meant we had to leave on Friday - just a week.