AlisaAAM

My husband, our then-14 month old son, my brother, sister-in-law, and parents will be traveling to Champagne in early August. The trip is in celebration of some big birthdays for my folks as well as their 35th wedding anniversary that they celebrated last year. Our trip will be at the time of the Route du Champagne en Fête. We were thinking about renting a place in Epernay for a week to explore the region. And, yes realize that the Route du Champagne en Fête is fairly far south of Epernay, but figure that we can spend one day driving down to that region to enjoy the atmosphere and some of the smaller houses.

My husband, son, and I will spend the next week traveling on our own (at a low key toddler friendly pace). We are open to exploring any region in France (Brittany, Alsace?) but worry how les vacances will affect our trip. Is it just Paris that clears out for the month of August or do we need to worry about other regions being empty as well? Suggestions are certainly welcome!

bilboburgler

You'll love Epernay.

Paris doesn't really empty out any more, too much opportunity to make money, individual retaurants close, that is all.

Other parts of France tend to fill up with the French and loads of other tourists. So you need to book. It also can get pretty hot.

Where to go really depends on what you like to do, if I had to do this sort of thing, I'd stay in the north and either go to the coastal area, Brittany/Normandy or look for river areas, like the Loire, Alsace, Chablis/Auxerre or possibly the mountains of the Jura. August tends to have a fair few wine/harvest festivals that can be fun.

The south just gets too hot and the road fill up, if yoiu google "bison fute" you get the french guide to traffic flows and some ideas about how certain days, the roads block up

AlisaAAM

Thanks! We're huge foodies and LOVE Belon oysters, so Brittany is fairly high on our list and it sounds like it would be a good choice. We're not huge beach lovers, but enjoy wandering and eating our way through small picturesque towns, hiking, museums (though probably less so with the little guy), churches, and historic sites.

bilboburgler

You'll notice that there is a canal down the centre of Brittany which is fine walking away from the coast, plus a few Castles from when Anne was Duchess, or you could go stay on Ile de Brehat for a few days, or the busy touristy town of St Malo in the north or Quimper in the south. You have to drop by Dinan (note spelling) just for the medievel centre. Have fun deciding

WoinParis

Brittany will be cooler and less criwded.
On top of oysters you have crêpes and cidre.
And lobsters and other seafood.
I perso prefer the north - less touristy than south and with more landscape.
With some dolmens and menhirs.

StuDudley

We prefer the north of Brittany also - but the Belon oysters are in the south. We've stayed near Dinan for 2 weeks, in the Pink Rocks section near Penvenen for 2 weeks, plus one week in Pt Aven. We enjoyed the Dinan area the most.

I developed an itinerary for Normandy & Brittany that describes our favorite villages, cities, scenic drives, restaurants, etc. I've sent my various itineraries to over 6,000 people on Fodors. If you would like a copy, e-mail me at [email protected] & I'll attach one to the reply e-mail.

We were in Epernay for 3 nights in 2015. We thought Reims was more interesting.

Stu Dudley