And the judges votes are in

We recently crossed from France into Belgium, an event marked with not even a notifying sign. It seems Europe really doesn't have borders anymore. During the roughly two months we spent in France we must have stayed in something like 40 different campsites. Unsurprisingly, the quality of these campsites varied quite considerably. The purpose of this post is to describe those that were outstandingly good, and also those that were outstandingly bad.

There is no scientific methodology or objective rationale behind my judgements. The French have a star rating system for campsites, but this has very little relationship to the actual quality of a campsite. The reason for this is that it is based on such things as the presence or absence of lit pathways and pretty flowerbeds rather than on whether the campsite gives you toilet paper or cleans their showers regularly...

Instead, the list below is based only on the experience we had at the places listed. In no particular order:

The worst

Toulouse

See Rowan's post for information about the Frenchmen who were overly proud of their endowment and thought everyone else might be interested too. Noisy, dirty, not particularly safe feeling. Mae bearable by the wonderful Dutch couple we met there.

Orange

Not actually a particularly bad campsite – it had a nice pool on a scorchingly hot day, some nice people to talk to, and a nice grassy pitch for our tents (we stayed here with Michael as well). The problem was the place was gougingly and unjustifiably expensive. As in 30 euro for the night. Even when accounting for the extra person, this seemed too much compared to our average of about 14 euro. The method of calculating the price was particularly aggravating. First charge for the pitch. Fine, the ground needs to be rented. Then charge per person. Also fine, we each put a demand on the (not very clean) facilities. Then charge per tent. Say what? How can it be justifiably more expensive for us to use two small tents rather than one large one???

Arras/ Plouvain/ La Rochefoucauld

The common feature of these three campsites was that they each made us ride 10-20 km further at a time when we really didn't have the energy. For Arras this was because the campsite no longer existed. For the other two, the general feel of the campsites was just not nice - “travellers” or white trash seemed to comprise a significant proportion of the inhabitants, and we were keeping an eye on our wallets just at the front entrance. The bright side of the story is that in all cases we eventually got to very pleasant campsites, just slightly more knackered than was planned.

Bayeux

Our first night in France. Probably not a bad campsite really, but minimal sleep the night before and a very cold day meant we were pretty low on energy. Got the tent pitched in dry,pleasant conditions then went for a trip to see the tapestry, during which it started raining. This lead to a very trying evening cooking dinner in the dish washing area (only available cover), scuttling around trying to stay reasonably dry, and most importantly working out how to keep all our gear dry without getting water into the tent. Questions were asked about why the hell we were doing this for pleasure!

The Best

St Martin d'Aubigny

Our second night camping and almost a disaster due to a complete lack of water in the taps. Once that was sorted this became a great spot. Less like a campsite and more like a small field where we were allowed to stay. Completely empty except for us and just really nice to be at.

St Martin Lalande

The end of a long hot day, and absolutely stunning. Views from the shower blocks to the Pyrenees, and completely deserted except for the two French cyclists who showed us where it was. We almost started planning our route by looking for St Martin's!

Beauvoir en Royans

As close to perfect as we've found – cheap, great grass to pitch tents on and rest on, located high above a river valley for stunning sunset views, and set within the remains of a ruined chateau. Hence right next to the campsite we had photo ops like this!