La Garangeoire, St Julien des Landes

Description of the Campsite 

La Garangeoire at St Julien-Des-Landes is a very popular, spacious campsite set in the countryside of the Vendee in the grounds of a château which has an adjacent lake with pedaloes. The site is a member of the prestigious Castels chain.

The site is surrounded by woodland and green meadows.

The campsite is only one mile from St Julien-des-Landes and fifteen minutes drive from the beach (12 km). It is set in a wooded setting and most of the pitches have some privacy and also some shading.

The site has excellent facilities, including a top quality restaurant and takeaway and a lovely swimming pool. Many of the plots onsite are a good size and the whole site is very spacious.

Each plot was given a name instead of a number by the founder of the campsite, so you may find you are staying in a plot named after a flower or an island.

    

The campsite offers the following :

• a fantastic waterpark with swimming pools of varying depths, including a covered pool and a newly built, colourful 20 cm deep paddling pool for toddlers with a shute and games.  There is also a flume and two slides for older children or adults. Please note that no t-shirts or inflatables are allowed in the pool and parental supervision is required at all times. You can also relax on a sunlounger or go for a refreshing ice cream or drink at the adjacent bar terrace.

 

 

• there is a playground with numerous climbing frames etc for children of all ages. The photograph here shows part of the playground for younger children but there were other parts of the playground for older children right up to teenagers.

 

• there are two full sized tennis courts, six table tennis tables, a five-a-side football pitch, volleyball, archery and boules.
• water based activities which must be paid for include canoeing, pedaloes, rowing boats and diving. There is also fishing and an onsite fishing expert who is English to help you out !
• In High Season (10/05/2010 - 21/09/2010 ), the shop, bar, restaurant and take-away are open
• there is a cycle hire
• there are onsite kids clubs run by the Campsite and also Keycamp and Eurocamp kids clubs - please check latest brochure details to confirm !
• for pony mad children (and adults !), there are ponies and horses on the site and lessons available. You can take a pony on a lead rein for young children or you can go for an organised ride. There were also pony games and "dress a pony" events although I never got to see what those were exactly !
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• there are lots of washing machines, toilets and showers, all kept very clean.
• there are walks from the site and the campsite runs guided walks with a commentary about the history of the site, which has a history running right back to the Roman period.
• during the two weeks when we were there the campsite offered all sorts of activities including A Welcome Drink and Talk, French language lessons for adults and kids, wine tasting, painting, tour of a vineyard, volleyball tournament, crepes evening, children's games evening with bucking bronco, children's disco, a trip to a high ropes course and a Vendeen evening with local Vendeen dancers among many other activities. I am sure the exact activities offered change depending on whether its High Season or not but there was something for everyone !

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Book Your Holiday at this Campsite

Book Your Holiday at La Garangeoire Campsite with Keycamp.

Book Your Holiday at La Garangeoire Campsite with Eurocamp.

These links will take you to the Keycamp and Eurocamp websites where you can find out more about the holiday, get a quotation and go ahead and book your ideal holiday at one of the Best French Campsites !

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Getting There

Hover your mouse over the map for some more information about the various ports and airports.

Ports

There are sailings by ferry with Brittany Ferries and other operators to some of the following ports which are the nearest ones to La Garangoire Campsite and St Julien De Landes  :

• St Malo: 277 km
• Roscoff: 412 km
• Caen: 387 km
• Cherbourg: 421 km
• Le Havre: 480 km

Airports

There are flights by a variety of airlines from the UK and Ireland to the following regional airports. Hover over the map to discover some airlines which fly to each airport (please note that this information was up to date at time of writing but you will need to check details of flights with your tour operator or airline) :

• Lorient airport: 287 kms
• Rennes airport : 220 kms
• Dinard airport: 296 kms
• Tours Airport: 294 kms
• Poitiers Airport: 200km
• La Rochelle Airport: 102km
• Nantes airport: 73km

Public Transport

From Paris Gare du Montparnasse take a direct TGV to La Roche-sur-Yon and Les Sables-d’Olonne.

The local station is La Mothe Achard (8Km)  which has Services to La Roche-sur-Yon, Nantes, Paris, Bordeaux and La Rochelle.

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Things to do in the Area

Sables d'Olonne

is a lively resort fifteen miles to the south of the campsite. There is also a zoo in Sables d'Olonne which is well worth visiting. This zoo is a 44km (52 mins) drive away.  Almost 200 animals belonging to about forty species can be found at the zoo, including some endangered species. You will see flamingoes (flamant rouge, rainbow lorikeets (Loriquet de Swainson), snakes, gibbons, jaguars, lions, tigers (tigres), giraffes, red pandas and meerkats (Suricates) as well as many other animals, birds and reptiles. Click here to see a photo album from the zoo of some of the baby animals born at the zoo in recent years !

 

St Jean-des-Monts

St Jean des Monts is a lively tourist resort to the north.

 

St Gilles-Croix-de-Vie

The pretty fishing port of St Gilles-Croix-de-Vie is well worth a visit.

 

Apremont

You can visit the lake at Apremont where you can explore the castle ruins, laze on the grassy banks with a picnic and try your hand at windsurfing. There is a beach and you can swim or take out a pedalo or boat.  The photographs show the lake and the Château d'Apremont which overlooks the lake.

           

 

Brem Sur Mer

14kms from La Garangeoire, at Brem Sur Mer, there is a small theme park "Parc d'Attractions".  Click here to see their website.

 

La Rochelle

La Rochelle is a 100 km (1 hr 45 min) drive away.  The ancient port of La Rochelle has narrow streets, a fortified harbour and a fabulous aquarium.  There are four ports. The largest, Port des Minimes is home to the Grand Pavois International boat show every September. The Vieux Port has many lovely restaurants around it. The centre of La Rochelle is compact enough to explore on foot. However if you want to get around more quickly you might like to try the self-service Vélo Jaune (city-owned yellow bikes), found at 26 key points across the city. You can also hire the bikes directly from Quai Valin (May-Sept) and all year on Place de Verdun. The first two hours are free, and you pay 1 Euro for every hour after that. You could also use Le Passeur and Bus de Mer (www.rtcr.fr) electric boats to hop between the city's ports. The Tourist Information Office which is only 300m from the train station can provide details of all of the above.

In La Rochelle, you may also like to visit the Musée des Automates, France's largest automated figure museum. This museum is home to around 300 models and some wonderful Victorian-era shop window displays. You may wish to walk around the interesting neighbourhood of Saint Nicolas, a city within a city, where everyone is said to know everyone else. It has cobbled streets and you could visit one of the cool bars, the vintage book shops or the antiques dealers or the Saturday Flea Market "Marche au Puces St Nicolas".

For more information about visiting La Rochelle, click here to visit the tourist information website.

 

The Indian Forest At Moutiers Les Mauxfaits

The Indian Forest is an adventure park with high ropes courses as well as lower level children's courses. In addition there is a picnic area, a woodland, paintball, mini golf, climbing wall. For more information, click here to access their site.

 

Puy du Foy

One hour 10 mins drive from La Garangeoire is this excellent theme park which has an historical theme with vikings, romans and gladiators all featuring as well as French history. There is also an evening spectacle which includes over 100 horses.  It is a "must see" if you are in the area but it is expensive to visit so it is as well to plan in advance. Visit their website for information and they can send you out a brochure as well.  Click here to access the Puy du Foy website.

 

The Extraordinary Vegetable Garden (Potager Extraordinaire)

This can be found at La Mothe Achard which is about a five minutes drive from the campsite. You can wander around the 1.5 hectare lovely garden and see flowers as well as all sorts of interesting pumpkins and gourds etc growing.  There are over 1200 different varieties of plants. There is also an interesting shop and its possible to get coffee and ice cream. www.potagerextraordinaire.com

 

Le Vélo Rail 
This 'vélo rail' runs through the countryside on old train lines from Commequiers to Coex. 10 kilometres of track can be explored for up to 4 hours.  You need to book your trip on the Velo Rail in advance and the campsite reception can help you with this. However, be warned, it can be hard work, particularly if you meet another velo vehicle coming in the opposite direction. You need at least two adults (preferably strong ones !) as you may find you need to lift the vehicle off the single track if you meet another one travelling in the opposite direction as there are no sidings en route ! There are a number of velo rails throughout France and it is certainly "something different !"

Île de Ré  (2 hours drive - 118 kms)

Île de Ré is a low, narrow island about 30km long, with sandy beaches to the southwest and salt marshes and oyster beds to the northeast. The interior is a mix of vine, asparagus and wheat cultivation. All the buildings on Île de Ré are restricted to two storeys and are required to incorporate the typical local features of whitewashed walls, curly orange tiles and green-painted shutters, which give the island villages a holiday atmosphere.  The island is reached by a road bridge with toll payable (off season toll is 9E and high season mid June to mid Sept it is 16.50E. You dont pay on return).

 

The capital is St-Martin (see photo), a north coast fishing port with beautiful whitewashed houses clustered around the stone quays of a well protected harbour.

 

Guide 2 Pays de la Loire Website

The Guide 2 Pays de la Loire website will give you some more ideas about places to visit in this area :

http://www.guide2paysdelaloire.com/information_about_Pays-de-la-Loire

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Disclaimer: The reviews published on the site are intended solely for the purpose of providing general information and comment and are purely our opinions. We cannot guarantee that reviews of descriptions on this site are accurate, up to date or free from error.

We have found that the campsites described are very good but we find that it is difficult to find a campsite which has 100% of what you are looking for.  Also one person may love a busy campsite with lots of activities while someone else may love a quiet campsite with a small swimming pool. Actually we tend to be the latter ! So what we have done is highlight the good points of the sites and maybe point out a few of what we have found as slightly negative points. However we strongly recommend that you make full use of as many internet sources as possible before deciding about your holiday, including other review sites and Google maps etc.