Paris & Loire Valley with Kids - November

Seeing the Loire first since your flying home out of Paris makes good sense to me. The amount of nights in Paris with kids I would rethink, that seems way too long in a city for kids. Do you like to bike ride with your kids? there are lovely bike trails around Amboise and bike rentals are easy. Leonardo da Vinci home in Amboise has a wonderful garden with toy replicas of his inventions to play on. Every kid in the world loves to explore a castle /chateau so lots of possibilities there. I have taken the train to the Lorie Valley from Charles de Gule airport it worked fine. I recommend staying on the lower level of the train as getting downstairs to exit with kids and bags can be a challenge (grandson left his backpack on the upper level without his name on it so it went to Bordeaux to be blown up). Enjoy your family trip it sounds wonderful.

Thanks so much for your suggestions. Would you recommend three nights in Amboise or just two? Perhaps we could do Amboise and maybe Bayeax and/or Rouen? We could reduce our Paris trip by a night or two. We generally like taking our time in cities and not rushing hence the initial plan of staying there for 7 nights.

Are you going to rent a car? If yes, then I would say train directly to tours (at Pierre des corps) from cog on arrival and spend 4 nights. As long as you have wheels you should be able to keep busy

I’ve done this twice. The first time with a 5 and 8 year old. We stayed on a farm near Amboise (now closed). It was fun and relaxing and a good contrast to Paris. Train was great as was car pickup at the station. Kids liked chamborg, chenonceaux, the Davinci house, and a mushroom cave that offers tours.

If you are not renting a car then I might shift gears.

Yep the plan is to rent a car. Thanks for all the tips! Will look up the mushroom cave. My 8 year old has become obsessed with mushrooms somehow after doing a unit on fungi in school.

As someone who was born in Manhattan, and lived there for 21 years, I take issue with the idea that kids need to be in a rural area to avoid (gasp) boredom. A week in Paris can be very stimulating, with medieval, sculpture, industrial, and decorative arts museums, parks and canals, the Seine, Notre Dame, the Eiffel Tower, ice cream, and much more.

I now live in a wealthy suburb 25 miles from Manhattan, and I can never get over the number of well-off parents for whom sports, tutoring, and the YMCA music concerts are "enough" for their families. My wife grew up near Media, PA, and her Estates and Trusts lawyer father never took the 4 kids to the Philadelphia Orchestra, near his Union Club clubhouse.

Here’s the mushroom cave. For fun, they carved a streetscape into it. My Kids loved it. My wife and I did too.

https://www.le-champignon.com/

https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/la-cave-des-roches-mushroom-caves

Hi
In my opinion the best castle for kids is Brézé castle, in reason of his underground. It's a castle under the castle, as they say. And It's not far from Saumur, where there is a tank museum and a mushrooms museum.

Great suggestion bergoula. Brézé is my all-time favorite. The medieval defensive castle/fort is underground with a Renaissance pretty-palace built above...and a vineyard with a tasting room. Something for everyone.

In fact, this end of the Loire, le Anjou, used to be filled with underground homes, troglodytes. A few still exist for visiting. I've gone to a village and a farm. Your children would love visiting troglodytes.

I think the Loire is a great choice, what kid doesn’t love castles! We enjoyed Amboise as a home base. It’s well suited near the autoroute which can let you see chateau on either side of Tours (which is kind of the default border between the east and west side of the valley). Three nights is good, if you’re trying to see 1-2 chateau a day it adds up fast. You can get chateau-ed out.

I think connecting all the way to Pierre-St-Corps (Tours) where you’re picking up the car, and driving to Amboise with all the kids in tow is too much. You have enough nights to spread around and make this comfortable. I would suggest two nights in Paris to start, and then come back for a few nights. Ideally, in a different neighborhood so you can explore and have a slightly different Paris experience each time.

Hello! How was your trip? We are thinking of doing something very similar with our 2 kids (6 and 8) in the spring - Paris (with a stopover at Disney) and then the Loire Valley. I would love to hear more about what you did and where you stayed in the Loire Valley in particular. My husband isn't super keen on renting a car but seems like it would make things easier- did you take a train out and pick up a car locally?

Also curious about kid-friendly cycling options....

Hey Laura!

Our trip was wonderful. We just got back on Monday. The kids had so much fun and so did we! Your kids ages are perfect and I think you will have a much easier time getting around than me cuz you are toddler free :D A few points:

Loire Valley
- Kids absolutely loved it. I did too but I thought it was too cold. Things closed earlier in November and the sunset was at 5 pm so that shortened the day considerably. You won't have that problem hopefully because you are going in the spring. Because our three year old cramped our style lol, we were only able to do so much each day. First day we arrived were jet lagged. Second day we went to Chenonceaux which they absolutely loved because of their maze and gardens as well as to the mushroom caves. Mushroom caves were a waste of time because the tour was in french and we were underground for an hour. You can't walk around yourself otherwise you would get lost. So definitely skip it! Next day we went to Chambord. For kids I would start at the top floor (beautiful views) and then go to the floor below which has a kids play area. Then you can work your way down. Its huge and the gardens are lovely. After that we went to Château du Clos Lucé in Amboise which the kids really enjoyed.

• I found Amboise a tad bit Disney like. But it was cute, but it served its purpose. The downtown is small enough where you aren't worried if your kids run around. Its close to everything. I loved the hotel we were in but it is closing down next month for an entire year for renovations. There are a bunch of hotels along the river. I would stay in one of those because parking is easy and free.

• Dinner starts at 7 pm everywhere in France and in Amboise there seem to be very little quick food options. I found this a bit annoying with a three year old but I don't think you will have an issue because your kids are older.

• We rented a car from the airport. I found this to be the best option. The drive to the Loire Valley was easy. Also renting a car in the Loire Valley would involve taking the train to Tours (train times are limited). Renting a car in Tours and driving to Amboise. That would have been too much. So I'm glad we didn't do that. On the way back we dropped of the car in Tours and then took the train to Paris. I think if I were to do it again I would go to Paris first (take the train there). And then from Paris take the train to Tours and then rent the car from there. It is easier to do when you are not jetlagged. Would then drive to CDG and drop car off in airport.

• I would definitely rent a car in the Loire Valley. I can't see how you could enjoy it otherwise. There are so many small towns and its nice to just stop in places on the way to wherever you are going. Also with kids its nice to have flexibility. They are too tired for a second castle? You can go have a picnic. With public transportation or with a tour you can't do that. Also if you do end up not renting I would definitely stay in a town with a train station. Otherwise you are dependent on joining one of those bus tours and having your schedule set by the tour.

• We didn't rent bikes because it was freezing when we went but it definitely seems like a bike friendly place. We would have done it if the weather is better.

Paris

• Girls surprisingly really enjoyed the museums and begged us to take them to more. I thought they gave us a good break from the cold. We did the Louvre using the Paris Muse. It was painless since our guide whisked us in and took us everywhere. I would highly recommend it if you have the budget for it. They loved it so much that they begged us to do the one for the Orsay Museum so we obliged. If I were to pick from the two, I think the Louvre was the one where it was the most helpful (because of the crowds and the sheer size).

• For the rest of the museums they really enjoyed the kids audio guides and would beg us to rent them. Their favorite audio guide was for the Opera house. We ended up renting audio guides for the Rodin Museum, Opera House, Orangerie and Versailles. The girls loved the area outside the Pompideau center and the inside has a play area which was nice for my three year old. Rodin has beautiful gardens.

• For Versailles go straight to the gardens, rent a golf cart and drive around. Will make the experience so much easier and so much more fun. My girls absolutely loved it. You can also rent a boat which is really nice. I saw people riding horses but not sure how that is done. I couldn't stand the palace itself because of the crowds. If it weren't for my husband and girls I would have skipped it. The Trianon estates are calmer

• Gallery Lafayette has the best free rooftop views of Paris

• The gardens are a must. They loved the playground in the tuileries gardens the most. Jardin Des Plantes has a really cool maze like thing at the top. Jardin Lafayette is really nice as well.

• Girls obviously liked climbing the Eifel tower. Because we couldn't get tickets online (they sell out months in advance) we did the Fat Tire Tours. I found the "tour" if you can call it that to be a rip off.

• St Germain, Marais, the Latin Quarter, and Mont Matre are great for food and desserts. We would go from place to place trying macarons and chocolates and pastries. They loved it :D Rue Mouffetard in the Latin Quarter is way more interesting and cooler than Rue Cler.

• I thought our hotel was great. It bordered the Latin Quarter and St. Germain. We got the apartment which is a junior suite connected to a double room. Rooms were clean and well decorated. The suite has a bathroom and so did the double room. Suite also has a kitchenette which was helpful. The double room was nice but the suite was huge. For your family of four, the suite would work perfectly. We actually had too much space lol. Only problem is that the rooms have very low lighting. Elevator is tiny as well. If you end up staying there ask them to stay in the building with the breakfast room and not the one across the street. Makes things easier. This is the hotel if interested. https://hotelresidencedesartsparis.com/en/

• I didn't really like the Rick Steves book. I relied more on lonely planet paris and also the paristoptips youtube channel.

Hope this helps! And feel free to ask more questions!

Oh will add that my two older girls loved this book:

https://www.amazon.com/Mission-Paris-Scavenger-Adventure-Travel/dp/0989226743/ref=sr_1_1_sspa?crid=2RN2H3GW1Y6IX&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.tUu5HGPURYtbIqZJg4KlvtT1IiPWx2Sr2DaNldPV2YCk7ztS_6TguBC2XYlbTnwphFTYYblIydB6EX38CxoY9iuwX4sS3mOUwYfTX_T840HtV1fpBgdGNtBdGOHx2RKBO9hhpjT-SY0Z-nbA79Ie34E9MaBpYRMlYT44unei39fvulqtdMGIqSv8xY1wlaNzFE1wkdcLOqjmIkWrsTpw2OC6Dcm0FbL5ByRML5ctNKo.9JGh4E_zSsTy-nvyz4EqnbsBlWQnXYbFXMgIf9_w1DA&dib_tag=se&keywords=paris+kids+guide+book&qid=1731693298&sprefix=paris+kids+guide+book%2Caps%2C210&sr=8-1-spons&sp_csd=d2lkZ2V0TmFtZT1zcF9hdGY&psc=1

Thanks so much !! Sounds like a fantastic trip!

While I don’t have a toddler, my 5yo is much less interested in museums and such than her older brother, who loves all the audio guides, lol!