My wife and I are taking our 6 and 8 year old children (good travelers) to France for 3 weeks this July. We plan to start inParis for 4-5 days and are looking for a nice mix of ideas to see what we can of France for the remainder of the trip. My wife really wants to go toMont St Michel so we will be heading in that direction after Paris. Excited and eager to hear your ideas!
Thanks!
My first recommendation is to invest in a good guidebook; it's a tiny fraction of what you'll save during the trip by making wise choices and prioritizing the destinations and experiences that are most of interest to you -- if not RS, then perhaps Lonely Planet, France Eyewitness, or Michelin Green. You can also Google "France travel with kids" to bring up some websites full of advice specifically geared to families like yours.
With 3 weeks, you can really get a feel for France. Paris 4-5 days, then Mont St Michel and surrounding Brittany for 4-5 days ... from there you might want to head for the Bordeaux region, then the western (hence less touristed) end of the Loire Valley.
In Saumur, the Cadre Noir performing horses may be of interest, if they have a show on a date when you can be there (see http://www.ifce.fr/en/cadre-noir/visits-galas/public-performances/ ).
The Fortress of Chinon is a Loire historic site that's very kid-friendly, with sound effects and knights templar life-size cutouts on display.
Just upriver from the Chateau of Chenonceaux, you can go on a boat ride with La Belandre that takes you under the arches of the chateau's famous bridge. http://www.amboise-valdeloire.co.uk/prepare-for-your-holiday/visit/130176-chenonceaux-en-bateau---la-belandre
Mont St. Michel is amazing. My advice is if your wife really wants to go there that you determine which day/nights you would be there ASAP and then try to find a hotel on the Mont. Mont St. Michel is very, very crowded. If you are staying on the Mont you at least get time in the morning and evening without the place being over-run with day trippers. Staying on the Mont is well worth it but you need to move fast if you want to do that.
I don't know if you're planning to go on past Mont St Michel to Brittany, but if you are, there's an unusual kids' amusement park called Village Gaulois in the vicinity of Lannion. It's a throwback, where everything is hand-powered. No electronics, just ropes and pulleys, a parent-powered merry-go-round, close-to-the-ground zip-lines, hand-rowed ships that shoot water at one another, elaborate bean-bag balance games, child-drawn chariots , parent-drawn barrel trains, and so on. We were impressed by how much fun the parents and the children were having.
There's also a planetarium but that's a separate part of the overall complex.
We actually went there by accident (I confused it with Le Village Gaulois Archeosite in southern France) but got a big kick out of it. I wouldn't travel all the way to Lannion just for Village Gaulois, but I'd recommend it if you're already in the area.
We did 2 1/2 weeks in France with older kids last summer (ages 9, 12, and 14 then). I found the DK Eyewitness Family Guide to France useful. It is very directed at your kid's age, with activities in various spots that other guidebooks did not emphasize for when the kids need to decompress. The lay-out is user-friendly too. My kids are older, but it was helpful to consult.
If you go to MSM, go first thing in the morning, or 2 hours before closing. It is so crowded, and anything with a huge crowd and younger kids is much less pleasant. I went at 5 p and it was so empty (in July) that we felt we had the place to ourselves (it closes at 7). The kids could have freedom to explore and move more with fewer crowds.
The Dordogne is great for kids; castles with Trebuche demos, canoeing the river, even wandering villages. We stayed in Vezac at a b&b with a pool, which is another bonus if you can find it on you trip (pools). We sought out water play in most places, whether beach or stream or pool, as one of those decompression times. So in Provence, after we visited the ruins in Vaison la Romaine, we hung out at the river for an hour while the kids swam and played, and they are tween/teens.
Jessica
Thank you all so much for your ideas!! I found a website called Ciao Bambino that also is giving us more food for thought. I will post our draft itinerary once we have it set to get any final feedback. Again, much appreciate your help!
