Starsea

My husband and I are taking our teenage girls to Europe for the first time. We got a cheap fare flying from West Coast to London (Gatwick) roundtrip, and none of my family have been to either country except for me. I was thinking of 3 to 4 days in London so we can walk & use public transportation, then either taking the Eurostar to Paris first for a 3 to 4 day stay, or taking the ferry from Portsmouth to Honfleur, then doing a driving tour before going to Paris, then back to London to fly home. Any thoughts on where to go given 12 days in France, including 3 to 4 days in Paris? I like the idea of Breton coast for the megalithic sites and fewer tourists, and the southwest- the Dordogne which has always intrigued me too. Any suggested routes outside of northern France that are doable? We don't like rushed sightseeing and would rather spend time experiencing the culture, food, history and scenery.

Suggested places to stay in London and Paris for 4 people?

Car rentals?

Thanks!

Starsea

We are traveling June 19 to July 6, 2017!!

WoinParis

I like your idea of staying in Brittany. Makes sense.
Lots to see between the two coats (northern is more natural or wild and southern is more touristy and flatter).

Buy yourself the Fodors' guide for Brittany or Green Michelin Guide (I always use this one, made by French for French, I like the concept).

Of course do drop your car in France before going back to London of better still don't go back to London and fly out of Paris.(meaning since you already have your tickets to get a flight from Paris to London - like Ryanair if they land in London or Easyjet).


Car rentals : lots of US people like AutoEurope, including smart ones (...). Must be a reason.

Stay in London of Paris : would be helpful if you give a budget. I have slept in 156 hotels in Paris and 3 in London (makes me an expert ;-) ) and have sent my listing to ... 2-3 people already.

michelhuebeli

Your plan makes a lot of sense, particularly the idea of the ferry. Could be Portsmouth, or one of the others if you make good progress westward in the UK - Plymouth to St. Malo for example.

About the car in France - I just indicated this address in another post:

Enterprise/CITER
124 Avenue Achille Peretti,
92200 Neuilly-sur-Seine, France

We returned a car there coming from the Dordogne, as you might end up doing. It is a handy location, not hard to find (unlike others in Paris).

From Brest in the Bretagne it takes less than four hours to the heart of the Dordogne - Brive-la-Gaillard for example. So your plan seems workable.

jpie

The Dordogne is really "super-charged" with castles, caves vistas, and things I think you would enjoy with kids that age. There is a British air flight that is very reasonable that flies into Bordeaux from Gatwick where you could rent a car and drive to the Dordogne area. It is only around 2h30m to Sarlat for instance

You could take the Eurostar to Paris then TGV to Bordeaux and pick up the car there, explore down to Sarlat and the rest of the Dordogne/Perigord and then catch the BA flight from Bordeaux back to Gatwick.

We have taken the ferry and it is okay but I think it takes a fair amount of time that I would rather spend in other ways.

Bordeaux is a nice city too and super easy to navigate so your teenagers could be really independent there on their own if they wanted since there is a great tram system.

StuDudley

>>From Brest in the Bretagne it takes less than four hours to the heart of the Dordogne - Brive-la-Gaillard for example. So your plan seems workable.<<

What mode of transportation are you suggesting? It seems that a train is 10 hours, and driving is also 10 hours. Flying through Paris with a connection time of more than 1hr20 mins takes 6 hrs - plus costs $450E per person for the several dates I checked in June. Also I would not call Brive the "heart" of the Dordogne - Sarlat is. So if you are suggesting flying, add in about 2 hrs to go through security/etc at the Brest airport, and 2 1/2 hrs to retrieve luggage in Brive, rent a car, and drive to Sarlat. This makes it a 10 1/2 hr trip door-to-door.

I also don't think Brest is the "heart" of Brittany - I think more people would enjoy sites 2 hrs or less from Rennes.

Stu Dudley

StuDudley

I think the Dordogne would be great for you. But unless Michelhuebeli provides info about getting from Brittany to the Dordogne in 4 hrs (or even 6 hrs) - I think it will take too long to get there and "eat up" an entire day of your too-few days.

How about Provence as a substitute for the Dordogne. Lavender fields, sunflowers, sun, cute little villages, Roman ruins, etc.

A good plan might be:
London, Brittany, Provence, Paris

- London 3-4 days

- Brittany - getting there by one of the methods above

- Rennes/Brittany (one of our favorite cities in France) TGV (fast train) to the Avignon TGV station in Provence. Departs 7:10 and arrives at 12:40 No train changes.

- take one of the many 2 3/4 TGVs back to Paris.

You could do this in reverse also

Stu Dudley

nytraveler

For hotel info you need to give us a specific nightly rate - and state if $, pounds or euros - and if you want 2 double beds in 1 room or to get the girls their own room. (One double bed is the usual in european hotels; you can get rooms with 2 beds but they will be the higher priced rooms.)

Starsea

These are great suggestions, thanks! I was thinking Provence would have too many tourists. I found Brittany and the Dordogne more to our liking, reading from Fodor's pages of course! I like the idea of flying directly to Bordeaux if we go that route. Thanks jpie! I'm somehow drawn to the Languedoc region too. Cathars history... Have you been?

nytraveler, we would prefer $150 to $250 max for accommodations. We could always swing a triple with a sofa or sleeping bag for one of my daughters. 2 rooms seems too expensive unless you have a fabulous solution?

WoinParis, with 4 of us, I was thinking of renting a gite. The hotels are just too small. Any suggestions for which area? I've stayed in St. Germain neighborhood before. Very centrally located for walking around to the major sites, but I'd like to try something different this time. We have to see the Louvre, Eiffel Tower. What are favorites of yours? We love feeling more like locals than tourists, if possible.

StuDudley

>> I was thinking Provence would have too many tourists<<

We've spent 18 of our 20 weeks visiting Provence in June - so that we could visit the lavender fields. Once we departed Provence on July 16. We hate crowds too. We've never felt overwhelmed by crowds. You just need to learn how to avoid them. You have to make sure that you don't visit popular sites (Gordes, St Remy, Roussillon, etc) mid-day. In '14 we stayed for 2 weeks in Goult and arrived in Gordes at 8:30am. We had cafe cremes & croissants with almost nobody else in town. Walked down to the lavoire at the base of town - admiring all the lovely architecture along the way. We then walked back up to the center of town. By 10:00 we were "out of there" - just as the day trippers started to arrive.

We spend 2 months vacationing in France every year. We visit "everywhere". Brittany and the Dordogne are 2 of our 3 "most favorite" destinations in France. But they are not a good combinations for an 8 day trip because of the travel time between each area.

I have itineraries I've written for:
Brittany & Normandy
Provence & Cote d'Azur
Dordogne
Languedoc

I've sent them to over 6,000 people on Fodors - 32 since last Friday. If you would like copies of these - e-mail me at [email protected] & I'll attach a copy to the reply e-mail. Specify which itineraries you would like - I have others.

Stu Dudley

StCirq

The Dordogne will not be, never is, less crowded than Provence, unless you visit in winter.

I agree that Brittany and the Dordogne is not a logistically sound combination. Nor is Brittany and the Languedoc. If you had more time perhaps, but it seems you don't.

Your budget for accommodations is fairly low for 4 people, especially for Paris (where there are no gîtes that I know of, just apartments). Renting an apartment other than from an apart-hotel like Citadines is a risk in Paris these days because of the vast number of illegal rentals and recent crackdowns on them. You cannot just use a sleeping bag for an extra guest in a hotel in France - you purchase a hotel room for X number of people, and that's all you're allowed.

For Brittany, you can search the Gîtes de France website and see what you come up with.

Starsea

Thanks StuDudley,

If you had to choose, would you go to Normandy & Brittany or the Dordogne for your first trip outside of Paris? And yes, I emailed you about your itineraries. Thanks!

As for Paris, I thought VRBO was pretty reliable for an apartment. Not so St.Cirq?? Which hotels, then, would you recommend for $300 under per night?

StuDudley

>>If you had to choose, would you go to Normandy & Brittany or the Dordogne for your first trip outside of Paris?<<

Dordogne. Lots more diverse stuff to do there. You live on the Calif coast like I do. The coast in Brittany is wonderful - but not as great as the Big Sur coast.

>> I thought VRBO was pretty reliable for an apartment.<<

The "agent/advertiser" for the apartment is not the issue. Many - perhaps most apartment owners are offering "illegal" apartments for rent. VRBO is just the "yellow pages" and pass-through for them. I suspect it will be a problem for around 1 to 3 percent of the apartment renters like you. Roll the dice and hope you win.

Stu Dudley

janisj

>>As for Paris, I thought VRBO was pretty reliable for an apartment.<<

No rental sites in Paris are 'reliable'. There are several apartment hotels like Citadines which are totally legal and a very few authorized/legit individual apartments. But the VAST majority of holiday apartments whether on the vrbo/airbnb/homeaway-type listing sites or through a rental agency - are illegal.

jpie

"I like the idea of flying directly to Bordeaux if we go that route. I'm somehow drawn to the Languedoc region too. Cathars history... Have you been?"

Yes we have explored the South and SW of France extensively. I assume since your kids are school age, you will be going in summer some time. The south especially is likely to hot-Languedoc and the Gard for instance. We do love that area-we like to base in Uzes, which is a lovely walkable town. If you decide to follow the Cathars route, you could also fly from the UK to Toulouse and start the journey there. I am sure you can also get good flights to Montpellier or Avignon if you want those areas.

Both Toulouse and Bordeaux are great "second cities" in France where I think you would feel comfortable letting your teens have some freedom to go off on their own a bit and shop for instance. Honestly, I don't think you can go wrong with any of the areas your are considering. It just really depends on the kind of trip you want. I will say if you are interested in the "Cathars trail", that requires a bit more driving back and forth to see more than a couple places, whereas in the Dordogne, it is easy to base in one place like Sarlat and take day trips from there. But honestly we love all those areas.

Here are a couple of links that might be helpful:

Most beautiful villages map-this is a fun one to just look at and dream about where to go

http://www.les-plus-beaux-villages-d...illages-france

If you decide to rent an apartment in Bordeaux, we always use this agency-the manager Jean Christophe is terrific. He lists their properties on airbnb and booking.com too but will give you a better rate if you contact him through the rental agency site. We have rented 3-4 apartments now from him and they have all been nice.

http://bordeauxappartements.com/Appartments

mjs

How many actual nights do you have for this trip? 18? Agree that hotel budget for 4 adults to on the low side for London and Paris. A one bedroom at a Citadines could work if the girls share a sofa bed.

PalenQ

No rental sites in Paris are 'reliable'. There are several apartment hotels like Citadines which are totally legal and a very few authorized/legit individual apartments. But the VAST majority of holiday apartments whether on the vrbo/airbnb/homeaway-type listing sites or through a rental agency - are illegal.>

but zillions of folks -including about a million in airbnb stay in them without any problem -is it the client's job to see if they are illegal or is it the city of Paris' job to close em down? Or has janis overblown the situation based on 2nd-hand knowledge?

<No rental sites in Paris are 'reliable'.>

I think some rental owners in Paris would take deep exception to this - I would and millions have stay in airbnb in Paris (which airbnb says is their largest market I read) without worry. You will not end up in the Bastille as some would have it.

PalenQ

https://bonjourparis.com/apartments/...-rental-legal/

This will give you an objective view of the whole flats-airbnb situation and why you the client has little to worry about. It also mentions the agreement airbnb and City of Paris recently entered into so most of those can be assumed to be legal - as well as other flats.

So don't listen to Cassandras but do your own research and then comfy in the fact that you the consumer will not be rousted out at night as some may imply.

PalenQ

https://www.vrbo.com/info/about-us/protect-yourself

NOTES FROM VRBO itself about protecting yourself.

janisj

>>Or has janis overblown the situation based on 2nd-hand knowledge?<<

Nope -- not a bit.