UK and France May 2025, with some unique accommodation choices

This was our first international sit. Our hosts own a really lovely townhouse in a small village in Suffolk, where they live with a charming 10 year old yellow Lab. They were heading to Normandy to see some of the WWII sites during the 80th anniversary celebrations. We love to settle in for several days, and on our last trip to the UK had a great time in a cottage in an obscure village in the Cotswolds, exploring slowly, walking to the local pubs, and using our home base as an excuse to go grocery shopping and cook up interesting local finds.

Our host were the best kind of hosts. Their home is really, really nice, comfortable, well-supplied, and located with the front door on the high street and the back door on a network of fields and public footpaths. They are experienced hosts and genuinely hospitable—had our first evening meal in the fridge for us, told us to use whatever we found in the cupboard or fridge, and had their cleaner and gardener come while we were there, so the lovely doggo was truly our only responsibility. I wish we’d had a longer overlap before they had to leave, because they seemed to be the kind of people we’d love to have a few pints with.

Mr B, the Labrador, is the best boy. He has some medical challenges, as a senior doggo, and he takes his pills as eagerly as his bonios (i.e., English milk-bones!). I own a 12 year old dog who takes some of the same meds and must be coerced and policed for every dose. Mr B has excellent recall, great manners, and still enjoys his walks, any human attention he can get, and everything that he can eat. (But he doesn’t beg or steal, he’s that well-mannered.) Twice a day we walked him on the adjacent footpaths. He came to the pub with us once and was a perfect gentleman, but it was clear he preferred to stay home. It was lovely. The village lived up to its promise, with good pubs and tea rooms, a couple of good bakeries and a great butcher. We visited some lovely areas including Lavenham, a very well preserved medieval/Tudor village.

If you’re interested in my verdict, I think it was a great stay. Mr B’s parents were very happy with our care, and gave us a good review. (Like other crowd-sourced kinds of platforms, reviews are used to build credibility—both sitters and hosts need good ones to have choices about sitters or stays.) We loved the village, and it was hard to say goodbye to Mr B. We were very comfortable and had everything we needed.

However, we may not do another sit like this for a while. We still work full-time and have a scant 4 weeks a year of annual leave. This was our second sit (we did a local-ish sit last fall to start building reviews), and in both cases, there were things I wouldn’t do with my precious annual leave. Barney is a morning person, I am not. He’s used to food at 7 am and a walk by 8. I would not choose that on my time off, especially for a location I picked to relax, rather than “do stuff”. We had the same experience with our other sit, including a 60-pound setter waking me by sitting on my chest at 6:30 am. (She was otherwise absolutely charming!) Pet owners have a right to expect the sitters to keep their pet’s schedule, and I absolutely did, but it was definitely a trade-off. Also between feeding, walking, timed meds and pee breaks, we had a 4-hour window to go out around lunch time, were free after 7 pm meds, but otherwise didn’t have any big chunks of time we could be away. We considered driving to Cambridge or Sutton Hoo but ultimately felt we shouldn’t leave the yellow gentleman that long.
/...3

There’s also an expectation that you leave the house as you found it, because it’s someone’s home. I really don’t like using my vacay time to do housework, which is one reason I rarely pick airbnb’s. This stay didn’t include any heavy lifting, just dishes and laundry, and a bit of sweeping and vacuuming, but our first gig was more representative I think, and the animals shed A LOT so I felt honor-bound to sweep, vacuum, mop, etc. I don’t think ANY of these are unreasonable as part of the trade, but I just don’t particularly want to do them on vacay.

We are actually looking at another local-ish sit in the fall, because we will be able to work remotely during the week while caring for the dogs, not use vacation time, but get to stay in a house on the coast. It’s less than 2 hrs drive away, gets us a change of scenery and a couple of new canine friends. I would really love to do more international sits, but I think it’s better suited to our retirement in a few years, when we can slow down and not want to do more than enjoy the neighbourhood and occasionally go out for a few hours. Or cat sits! Cat sits are highly prized by sitters on the platform because cats tend to be low-maintenance relative to dogs, but while we think cats are perfectly lovely, we just prefer dogs.

So…that’s a long story to get us through 5 days in Suffolk, but we hope we answered some questions, and we’d be happy to entertain more. On Sunday May 11 we left Mr B to his family, and made our way back to London to get the Eurostar to Paris.

Our first trip to Paris was disappointing, so we wanted to give it a second chance. (I know, so many people are passionate about Paris—don’t come for me, it just wasn’t our fav.) We arrived at Gare du Nord about 9 pm (just before sunset, I love May travel) and used a G7 taxi to get to our hotel in the Latin Quarter/St Germain des Pres. We had 3 nights at that hotel before our next stop. Paris fared better in our experience this time, and I’m glad we gave it another chance.

Highlights in Paris:

• Notre Dame. First timer, and we got in at 9 am with a timed ticket, no line. It was very moving, in part because you know how dear it is to the French people and what they have done to save it.

• Food! We managed to find some not-tourist-trap places, where there was at least as much French spoken as English. Didn’t have a bad meal, and most were much better than “not bad”.
• Wine and cheese class at the “cheese museum” on Ile St Louis, “Paroles de Fromagers L'Art des fromages et vins” with the very knowledgeable and affable Agathe.
• Place des Vosges. As lovely as I had hoped, and the weather was picnic-worthy.
• My French! I tried a bit more this time, beyond “bonjour”, “merci” and “parlez-vous Anglais?”, and while they usually switched immediately to English, a couple of times they didn’t!
• Pastries and boulangeries. Of course this is not unusual, but we had much better luck than our last trip, and 100% Paris has the best desserts anywhere I’ve been.
• And related to the above—Mademoiselle Angelina, at the Luxembourg gardens, for famous hot chocolate and pastries. This was a bit of a pilgrimage, and I was worried it wouldn’t live up to the hype. It totally did. We immediately got seated on a leafy patio, had really nice service, and the hot chocolate was 100% as good as I’d hope.

Lowlights, gotta say the crowds in so many places. We got to Musee d’Orsay and it was wall-to-wall, with 75% of the other patrons on the hunt for a selfie with a famous work. It was difficult to “be”, to catch your breath and enjoy the thing you waited patiently to see. I would love to give it another go someday, but only if I can be assured of significantly fewer other humans. Which is hard.

/...4

Also transit suffered by comparison to London. Not bad, but London was SO easy. There still seemed to be an awful lot of walking, just to get to transit points. Plus knowing you had enough of the right kind of ticket seemed unnecessarily complex, especially after London. But on the upside the G7 taxis and app were great. A bad taxi experience was part of our first trip to Paris, and G7 totally flipped that.

Ok, let's talk about where we stayed in France. Paris is expensive and we are cheap! I follow a bunch of travel groups, and when I see people suggesting €400-500 per night as a reasonable thing in an average neighbourhood, I get hives.

So we scoured reviews etc and adjusted our dates to get a well-reviewed hotel on the border of the Latin Quarter and St Germain des Pres, called Hotel le Clement. The location was AWESOME, one block behind Boul. St. Germain, and a block from St Sulpice, with a ton of places to eat and shop. It was easy to get away from the tourist traps.
The first two nights we were in a standard double, which was the smallest hotel room I've ever been in. You'd have more room on a cruise ship. It was also plain and graceless decor wise. The window looked out on an interior courtyard, which was more like a light chimney than an actual usable space. But here's the thing, it was pretty comfortable and the layout was as useful as they could have made that space. The linens were crisp and fresh, the bed comfy, the outlets well-placed. It was so QUIET and the new heating/cooling unit was perfect. The bathroom--you could wash your hands at the same time as using the toilet, and the shower did not accommodate any need to bend your body from the standing position. But it was SPOTLESS. I mean, not a speck in the corners or grout. The cleaning staff must be very dedicated, and far more agile than I. That's what you get for CA$275/nt in Paris. For the third night we wanted to be in Paris, they only had a Superior double, which was $50 more than the standard. The room we got was actually a triple, with significantly more care to decor, though still in "staying with your grandma who's doing her best" territory. Lots more room for our stuff, and an actual bathtub in the significantly larger bathroom. Just as clean and comfy. But it was at the front, so much noisier. Also we had neighbours who were keeping later hours and I swear I could follow every word of their conversation, except I wasn't sure what language they were speaking. Honestly not sure I'd spend the extra $50 a night now that I've been there.

The other thing about old hotels like this is infrastructure. There was an elevator but it could hold one human + their luggage (and we travel carry-on, so our bags are small), or two humans who like each other a lot. (A "kissing elevator" as it were.) Once or twice I had to take the stairs and they were a Death Trap. Spiral staircases with each step falling lower from the centre to the edge. Plus they were worn and prone to unevenness and dips in unexpected places. Also, infrastructure wise, the rooms have actual physical keys, not cool historical keys, but normal front door keys you can duplicate at the hardware store, but on massive brass fobs. You are required to leave your key with the front desk when going out, and they put them in little labelled mailboxes. Welcome to 1920.

The staff was very nice. We didn't try the hotel breakfast as there were too many amazing boulangeries in walking distance.

/...5

Then we made our way to Chartres, planning 4 leisurely nights...in a retirement home! This place just showed up on Booking-dot-com and we went with it. There's a chain of independent living facilities in France called Residences Montana (in Paris, Chartres, Nice, and a few more), and they keep some units as nightly rentals. They also let a few apts to local uni students, I guess to keep it feeling more vibrant. When I asked for experience with the place in the France forum before we left, I was asked to report back. :) There were some services on site, dominoes in the common room and individual raised gardening beds and a boules court in the courtyard, call bells and grab-bars in the suites. Seems to be decent little apts in a nice building, where slightly less able people can live a rich and fairly independent life.

For us it was a very fresh, airy apartment with a small kitchen, breakfast and parking included, and walking distance to the sights. We paid €500 for 4 nights, including parking and breakfast, which is more than reasonable.

We were kind of hoping we'd get a chance to interact with the residents, because we love that kind of thing, but English was pretty scarce in Chartres as a whole, and among the generation with whom we were sharing the breakfast room. But there were smiles and bonjours, and some obvious curiosity about the visiting youngbloods.

Breakfast...well! We didn't think breakfast was included so were surprised when we were presented with a printed menu to choose for the next morning. Thinking of your typical Euro hotel buffet, we said yes to some cheese, some cold cuts, yoghurt, and bread. DH also selected an omelette, because he's always curious. Well. The next morning when we hit the breakfast room, there were 2 full trays for us, plus spillover. I had a plate with enough cheese and cold cuts to set me up for the full day, plus a plate with croissant (and baguette if I recall correctly), butter and jam, a big glass of yogurt plus a serving of applesauce. And Ron had the same, except he had a huge omelette instead of yoghurt. Then we asked for a couple of Americano coffees with milk and I swear they served it in cereal bowls. We were embarrassed to receive so much food! On the way out I told our young server we didn't expect that much food, maybe half that!

The next day, dh went out for croissants and on return saw there were another 2 trays of food waiting for us! We thought as we hadn't ordered again, we wouldn't be fed, but nope, apparently that was "our order" now. Fortunately the server had passed along that we wanted less, so it was more manageable, but still, it was a bit of a rush as the breakfast service was almost over by then, and we couldn't waste the food and effort!

That night I declared I wanted to sleep in, so before bed we left a note at the (unmanned) reception desk indicating we didn't want breakfast in the morning but would be back for breakfast on Sunday, our check out day.

On Sunday morning our server must have had the day off, and someone didn't get the message. The front desk host was serving instead and again it was so much food that she pulled over a second table to hold the multiple trays of food! There were more residents around than previously and I swear they were whispering about "the greedy Canadians"!

It was a very comfortable place to stay overall, but definitely unusual! I would recommend it for amenities and price—but watch that you don’t get too much breakfast!

Our last night in France, we reserved at a very boring Holiday Inn on airport. Hugely convenient for our morning departure, and no surprises!

/...6

Highlights of Chartres, definitely the Cathedral. Even more beautiful than Notre Dame de Paris in my opinion, with gorgeous glass, more accessible than anywhere else I’ve been. The amazing choir screen was unexpected, and an absolute highlight of the whole trip. The evening illuminations show on the cathedral was the best I’ve ever seen, and absolutely worth an overnight in town. We also found a routiers café for lunch, definitely an experience, and we enjoyed a slow pace in that corner of France. (With no 7 am dog walks!)

So that’s our 2 week break to the UK and France. Thanks for those of you who helped us plan! Happy to take questions about our unusual and frugal accommodations!

Joanne, great trip report, thanks for sharing. I had to laugh in agreement..‘Paris is expensive and we are cheap!’ Soooo true for me as well.

And a pet-sit setup is so different but a great idea if you really want to chill somewhere. Sounds like y’all had a great 2 weeks with lots of different sights and experiences.

JoAnne, This was a very well written and entertaining trip report. I really enjoyed it. It makes me want to go back to Chartres -- I only spent half a day there to see the cathedral, which I agree is nicer than Notre Dame, if less iconic. Thanks for sharing!

Thanks so much for sharing your 'not the usual' stays. I found both the house share & the assisted living experience to be so special. I love Chartres, especially their lumiere. I stayed in a b & b down along the river in the old town when I was there in 2024 and loved it. I got a huge breakfast there, too. So many fresh breads, croissants, jams, fresh butter, yogurt and wonderful coffee.

JoAnne,
Such a great write up of your trip! My daughter was just telling me a couple of weeks ago about the pet-sitting swap program. I had never heard of this before- only just house swapping. You shared some info that definitely needs to be considered - for ex wake up times, walking times, cleaning, etc. I have pet sat for decades for my friends and neighbors and would think this is something I would love to do, but as you said, it would restrict your vacation time. Definitely a trade off, especially if you’re taking care of a senior furry friend or one with special needs. I get so attached to any of these creatures and could see myself feeling the pull to stay with them more than going out and about.

Thanks for the informative post about your trip, including the Paris accommodation, as well. Another interesting, unusual experience that’s worth checking out. I’m looking forward to an early check in at our next Premiere Inn after an overnight flight. They didn’t offer it at the Paddington Station location last October and I would have LOVED to book it if it had been available. I think just having a spot to shower and settle for a bit after not sleeping on the overnight flight would make a huge difference in the start to a vacation, but I was too cheap to book a whole night at London prices.

Again, such great stuff in your report! Thanks for sharing!

Thanks JoAnne for your description of pet sitting with travel. We have been using Trusted Housesitters, first for our dog (in 2017), and then after the dog died and we could live pretty much nomadically, as sitters (since 2022). We are currently in Bodega Bay, California on our 37th sit and have sat many times internationally (we are from the US) in Milan, Marseille, Valencia Spain, Montpelier France, Liverpool plus surrounding, Devon UK and Ottawa. Since we travel almost full time, it is a great way to have pet time since we cannot have any in our current way of life. I agree that it is a great way to get a feel for what it is like to live where we travel, it does, as you said, come with responsibilities that do conflict with travel.
Since we had experience with a sitter for our dog, we just practice the golden rule- treat the dog, cat, llama (yes, we have sat them), as we would want ours to be treated- not gone for more than 3-4 hours, if we eat the food-replace it, clean (leave it cleaner than when we came) and follow their pet rules. This is a system built on trust. If these constraints don't appeal to you, I would not advise it.
So, we work around these self-imposed guidelines by arriving in the area a few days early, staying elsewhere and seeing things that would require more time and scoping out what we can do within our constraints. We are repaid many times over by meeting lovely people, experiencing life in another place, getting to do our laundry while traveling and enjoying some really great cats, dogs and yes llamas.

Pln, that is a beautiful reply. I am just finding out about this practice.I had heard of Rover, but not people who are caring for pets in this manner and through a reciprocal agreement. I volunteered for many years at an animal shelter and saw what animals went through because of horrible human behavior. When I read about the people who want their animals well cared for and the people, like you and JoAnne, who really love doing so, it is heartwarming. There is nothing better than being able to love and be loved by an animal…and yes, especially a llama! :)

Enjoying this report and commentary very much.

I will add the Clement to my lodging possibilities -- it's a trash/treasure situation for me: I love it when you turn your key into the desk (so long as there is a night clerk) rather than carrying it around. And I think a windy staircase forces me to wake up in the morning rather stumble out of bed.

Let me get this straight, they let you stay at their house AND let you play with their dog??? I'm in.

JoAnne, thanks for the trip report. Sounds like you had a great stay.

And you certainly hit the jackpot on your dog sitting stay. I've been looking into this lately.

A word of caution for anyone considering a house sit or pet set in another country, if questioned by immigration as to your plans, do not mention house/pet sitting. Although you are not getting paid, in some countries this is considered work and you could be in violation of their rules and not be allowed entry.

Loved this trip report! Thanks for taking the time to share it. I particularly appreciated your experience with Trusted Housesitters. I’m planning to utilize this service when I retire and spend longer durations in Europe than my current academic calendar permits. I recently signed up (found a discount on Reddit) and have my first nearby sit this summer in the nearby Berkshires of MA. I hope to begin gathering local experiences and reviews that will put me in a positive position in 2026 to be picked for multiple week, or month, sits somewhere interesting . It was great to hear your take!