Are most hotels/B&B's in France booked for June 2008??
 

We have been planning a trip to France for June 2008. We are trying to book some rooms (now that we can actually select "June 2008" from the pull-down menus of some websites, only to be told repeatedly that there is nothing available. Is everything booked already? We can't even check availability on tripadvisor.com because it's more than 330 days away... Should we have been calling/faxing? Is September easier to book than June? We were hoping to see the Provencal Lavender fields in bloom... :(

I have found an increasing number of places don't book this early. My favorite hotel in Paris won't book outside of 6 months. I assume they received too many bookings that were not really serious and then cancelled.

If there are one or two that you really want I suggest that you contact them directly to find out what their policy is.

My guess is that the hotels have not loaded their '08 prices into their web sites yet. Actually, it's early to book for June - but if you know your schedule, do it now to assure that you get the places you want. I would certainly call or FAX the hotels that have web sites that you can't book on yet.

Stu Dudley

So, it's possible that we're getting an automatic response that nothing is available? The website I have been tyring to book through is parishotels.com... I have e-mailed the B&B in Provence that we really want... I will try e-mailing the hotel in Paris, also. Thanks!

Actually, our dates are not entirely set... The only thing we have to consider is airfare. It's generally cheapest to fly on a Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday, yes? We are thinking of leaving around the 17th/18th, coming back 2 weeks later. We were originally going to be gone 3 weeks, but my in-laws can't be gone for that long.

If you have used many French designed web sites, you'll know that they usually don't "work" as well as other sites. This was the subject of an article in "Paris Notes" recently. The SNCF site is a mess (I use the German site - which is excellent). The newly designed & "improved" Gite-de-France site is almost non-functional. Ambiguous & incorrect error messages are a common malady.

I find that we have a hight success rate with calls (my wife speaks French) and then follow-ups with FAXes. Many of our e-mails have been ignored, so now we FAX all the time.

About 8 months ago, I used a web site to book a specific hotel in La Rochelle. The site responded that the hotel was fully booked, and that they automatically booked me into a different hotel. I called the original hotel & they had plenty of rooms availabe, so I booked there & had to use the web site to cancel the "other" hotel. There is a good chance that I have two hotels booked in La Rochelle, so I'll call soon to make sure the one I don't want is really cancelled.

Stu Dudley

Hi Stu! This is our first time booking rooms in France... It is good to know this about their websites. We will call/fax to reserve. Many thanks, as always! :)

@Stu LOL re: French websites! I think they are better now than they used to be. 10 years ago every french website looked like an art school project and took 5 minutes to load with a modem!!

But for the hotels, a lot of the booking sites might not have availabilities assigned yet so far in advance. Try the hotel website or a bigger hotel booking site!

I generally book Accor hotels when I am going elsewhere in France, and you can only book 3 months in advance on their website, which isn't always enough for things like the Avignon festival or major football matches. In such cases, one can book directly through the hotel. However, one important thing to know is that Accor will give up to a 50% discount on some of its brands for internet bookings.

Of course, 98% of my reservations are made in the last 48 hours, generally with no problem whatsoever.

"I generally book Accor hotels when I am going elsewhere in France, and you can only book 3 months in advance on their website"

So you can only book a hotel for this Christmas 3 months in advance? I don't think so, Accor are showing rates and availability on some properties up to August 2008.

I've seen rates on Accor way in advance also, for Paris and for other countries. However, I have also seen some properties that only allow booking 100 days in advance (I think these are generally Ibis or Etap, but some Ibis hotels allow booking way in advance too).

Sous les Figuiers in St. Remy is booked for the days we wanted in June. :( The apts. in Paris we were interested in are booked. But the B&B's in Normandy won't accept reservations until January. Frustrating!!

Now I'm doubting whether we should stay in St. Remy... Seems like a lot of people prefer Gordes or Isle sur la Sorgue as a home base... Anyone have recommendations for another B&B 100 euro or under per night?

Two comments...there are thousands of rooms available all over Europe that don't market themselves using the web or such. The Czech Republic often has householders renting private rooms with on-street solicitation. I have found the same in Poland.
I managed a resort. I quickly learned that early bookings were useless unless full payment was made at the time of booking! We had telephone bookings made months in advance either ignored or canceled on the day of expected arrival. A room is like a football ticket!

The peak holiday season in France is in July and August. There is generally little problem in finding accommodation at short notice in June, unless there is some very special event taking place. Hotels will currently be busy with this season's visitors, and I can't imagine many would want to be bothered with bookings for next year. They won't have worked out prices yet, they may be refurnishing rooms or the hotel might change owners - these may depend on the results of this season.

June is not as busy as July and August.... there should be availability in many B&Bs and hotels.
Here are a couple others in St. Rémy you might try.

- l'Amandiere - Hôtel l'amandière - Saint-Rémy-de-Provence
About 2 kms outside of the town center. With pool and lovely gardens

Villa Glanum (sorry - I don't have their web address)

And you won't see lavender fields blooming until the very end of June and more likely the first to second week of July. In the St. Rémy area you'll see lavender blooming in gardens and such, but not fields of it.

Patricia

August is the 2nd lowest month for hotel accommodation in Paris after February. Many people do not know this. September and October are the worst (even when there isn't a Rugby World Cup taking place).

this is the same as trying to book economy flights way in advance; basically they haven't gotten that far yet.
However you can look for(and book) Paris accomodation for June on http://www.way2stay.com/Paris-apartments-en-109.html

Villa Glanum is not taking reservations until 10/07 because their prices will be changing. I'm considering Gordes/Isla sur la Sorgue, although I don't know much about these towns. We just want something that's located in town so we don't have to drive somewhere to get dinner. Can anyone suggest a good base (and B&B/hotel) for Provence that's less than 100 euro per night?

I'm also worried that the lavender fields won't be in their full glory... We were basing our entire trip around seeing them in bloom. But we can't afford to stay in July. This will be my in-laws' first (probably last) trip to Europe, and I'm doing all the planning. I really want it to be special for them...

I am now considering the following B&B's in the Luberon:

Mas des Deux Puits:

http://www.masdesdeuxpuits.com/

Bastide des Verunes:

http://www.avignon-et-provence.com/s...nes/index.html

Domaine la Pibouliere:

http://www.pibouliere.com/luberon/be...ast/index.html

Bastide de la Savert:

http://www.bastide-de-la-savert.com/en/index.html

Anyone have a preference among this group?

We were in Provence the entire month of June, and there was lavender blooming the last week, and some was blooming the 3rd week. There are different types of lavender, and it blooms at different times. Sometimes a field was dark purple, and another field was still green. This spring was unusually cool, so the lavender bloomed late this year. On some prior visits when it was hotter, it was blooming quite nicely in the 3rd week of June. Lavender seems to bloom earlier in the Valensole plane.

By far the best lavender field we encountered was when Kevin from Mas Perreal drove us up on a back road in the Plateau d'Albion region. The field is off the west side of the D30 just south of St Christol where the D166 hits the D30. Can't guarentee that there will be lavender there next year - it may get re-planted with wheat.

Stu Dudley