Paris En Famille, Part Deux

We had a wonderful time in Paris with our two children, aged 9 and 5. Paris in the Spring is just lovely, even if in our case the weather was unseasonably cold (read: freezing). I took this as sign that we were meant to spend a lot of time enjoying Paris' cafe culture, warming up with hot drinks and the odd pastry (or three). Thanks to budget-friendly accommodation and travel options we were able to spend three full days in the French capital, recapturing in some small way the thrill me and my other half used to feel as young, carefree 20-somethings, exploring the cities of Europe with just a backpack and Rough Guide as hand luggage. Dipping a toe back into the city break experience felt really good and proved to us that with a bit of forward planning and some careful budgeting, it is entirely possible to do it with children in tow. 

Paris seen from the Seine

Now that our kids are older everything is, of course, so much easier. You can travel relatively light, they're able to walk further distances and they'll happily fall into a laissez-faire, continental attitude to routines and mealtimes without too much fuss. My eldest in particular is a pleasure to travel with these days - he's interested in things like architecture, open to trying out new foods and is at his most happy when boarding an aeroplane. That said, it's important to always work towards a compromise when travelling. Not all of our suggestions in Paris were met with approval and you definitely need to factor in some child-friendly activities, such as trips to the toyshop or a visit to the park.

Here's my mini guide to the things we enjoyed that met our criteria for keeping in budget and keeping the kids cheerful... 

1. A trip on the Batobus

The hop-on, hop-off boat which circles the main sights on loop and is cheaper than other river boat options. A day pass for adults costs 15 euros and 7 euros for children under 16 (children under 3 are free). This offers unlimited travel within the day and you can get to all the top attractions including the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre and Notre Dame. It's a really convenient way to get around and your children will love seeing the city from the water.

2. Le Grande Arche

Seen the movie Mr Bean's Holiday? Then you'll know the Grande Arche. As big fans of Mr Bean our two were desperate to recreate the scene when Rowan Atkinson's hapless character takes the wrong taxi and ends up at this amazing piece of modern architecture rather than the Gare Du Nord. It might sound a weird place to add to your Paris itinerary but it really is quite awe-inspiring and a nice contrast to Paris' more historic landscapes. Take the metro to La Defense and exit the station to be met by a dazzling white cube structure 110 metres high that is twice the size of the Arc de Triomphe and big enough to fit the Notre Dame inside. It's stunning. Walk to the top of the steps and look out towards the Voie Triomphale and the Arc de Triomphe in the distance.

Le Grande Arche

3. The Eiffel Tower

Mais, bien-sur! No trip to Paris is complete without a trip to this iconic structure. However, a word of warning - the queues for the lifts are crazy. I have been to Paris twice in the last couple of years, both in high and low season, and both times the queues were exceptionally long. It was enough for our kids to see the tower and to play in the adjoining Trocadero gardens, which have plenty of green space and a small children's playground. You can book your tickets for the Eiffel Tower in advance - a must if you're desperate to climb to its summit. 

The Thinker at the Musee Rodin

4. The Musee Rodin

A real surprise hit. We wanted to visit at least one museum while in Paris but didn't want to shell out for the Louvre and join the lengthy queues only to find our kids thoroughly underwhelmed by its artistic splendours. Ditto the Orsay - too busy with streams of tourists and trailing kids on school trips. So we opted for the small but absolutely lovely Musee Rodin, a real haven of tranquillity near Les Invalides. The building - former home of the esteemed sculptor - is stunning, and houses world-famous sculptures such as The Kiss. Rather unexpectedly our children were quite enchanted by the place, particularly the gardens which are tranquil and filled with further Rodin masterpieces, such as The Thinker. 

It's a surprisingly un-stuffy, welcoming place for little ones, with friendly security guards that didn't bat an eyelid at the sight of two English boys playing hide and seek behind the sculptures. There's also a lovely cafe in the gardens, where we enjoyed a cafe au lait while the kids played. Tickets cost just 10 euros for a family of four.

5. Laduree

You're never too young to appreciate the French institution that is the patisserie, and there is no patisserie quite like Laduree. Famous particularly for its macaroons, this temple to indulgence had our kids' eyes popping out. It might be posh but we didn't find it particularly snobby. Granted, they don't like it when you take photos but our children were offered free macaroons and there was no sense that its genteel environs were out of bounds to little ones. I'm not sure I'd take them for a sit-down tea here, but our kids enjoyed looking at the amazing window displays and shelves piled high with sugary confections, including macaroons in a spectrum of pastel hues - we bought a box to take away and enjoyed them over a take-out coffee sitting by the boating lake in the Tuileries Gardens.

Amazing cakes at Laduree

6. The Pompidou Centre

Love it or hate it, the Pompidou Centre has one advantage for families - you can ride the outside escalators, fun in itself for a five year old, and get a ticket to the viewing area where you're rewarded with amazing views across the rooftops of Paris. A cheap way to see Paris from up high.

Writing this post has reminded me just what a wonderful time we had - perhaps it's time to start planning another sojourn in this fabulous, family-friendly city.

To read my previous blog post about Paris and how we got there and stayed their on the cheap, click here

Related post: Eurocamp holiday to Spain

Paris En Famille Part One

With the end of the year looming are you starting to think about planning your next family holiday? Although it can seem a bit previous to have things booked up months in advance family holidays and reckless spontaneity don't really mix. There are inconvenient things called school terms that get in the way for one, and the likes of Ryanair et al aren't really thinking 'family market' when they release those cheap flights to 'Stockholm' (by which they mean a former military airport about 50 miles from Stockholm) that leave at four in the morning and return sometime after midnight. No, those days of reckless holiday abandon are gone and careful forward planning is what's called for when holidaying en famille. Planning early even makes it much more realistic to squeeze in a mid-year mini break, too, as we found last year when we enjoyed a fantastic, bargain-busting long weekend in Paris. Here's how we did it...

You probably know that you can get all kinds of things with your Clubcard points, trips across the Channel being one of them. Tickets on the Eurotunnel are pretty reasonable at the best of times, but with a few Clubcard points in your back pocket you can cover your crossing completely free of charge - a great way to claw back some reward on all those miserable hours spent trawling the shelves of your local supermarket.

So why the tunnel and not the Eurostar? Firstly you can't use Clubcard points on the train, though obviously it is much more convenient for reaching the centre of Paris. We were doing Paris on the cheap, and by that I mean super, super cheap! Factoring in Eurostar travel for 2 adults and 2 kids, plus return train tickets from Bristol to London wouldn't have tallied with our minuscule budget. That said, getting to Folkstone is not in the least convenient - in fact the journey there from Bristol was by far the most wearisome part of our journey. We ended up booking a really early crossing (to squeeze the very most out of our sojourn) and staying at the Premier Inn right by the tunnel the night before, which I'd really recommend if you don't want travel stresses boiling over before you've even left Britain.

Once in Calais you’re looking at a three hour journey time to Paris. Part of the reason for us driving to France was that we decided to try out a Eurocamp site that had been recommended to us and which was touted on the website as making a great option for families wanting to explore the capital or Euro Disney. The International is located in a pleasant suburb to the North West of Paris and is open between April and November. We visited in April and stayed in the basic mobile home which was perfectly ample for our needs over the 3 days we were there. We paid just £120 for two nights accommodation - yep, you read that right, £120 for all four of us for two nights and three almost full days in Paris. That's why we went for this option. You'd be hard pushed to find anything in central Paris that comes close to this budget price for a family of four. 

My concern was that cheap might equal totally inconvenient, with Paris temptingly close yet annoyingly difficult to get to. But what they say on the Eurocamp website is true - you really can be in Paris in just over 20 minutes' journey time from the International. It's ten minutes to the local train station on foot and then a super-speedy train ride deposits you at the Champs-Elysee in around 20 minutes. Trains are frequent and run until late at night. It's important to work out how many trips into town you'll be making during your stay as it can work out cheaper to buy a 'carnet' of tickets instead of buying day returns for each trip. 

In terms of the site itself and local surroundings I can't give you much of an in-depth review as we used the International very much as a base rather than exploiting any of the on-site facilities. Furthemore, we stayed out of season - it was the coldest April on record for some years and we spent all our time on site huddled in our mobile home rather than exploring the site and local environs. But from what we did see, it's a well-organised, clean site, with easy access to the supermarkets and restaurants of the local town. Maison Lafitte is a fairly quiet, affluent suburb which I'm guessing would offer cheaper options for eating out than central Paris. Again, we didn't hang about much here but I'd imagine it provides some welcome calm at the end of a busy day's sightseeing in the capital. 

We had an amazing, surprisingly successful time in Paris and bolted on a few extra days in Picardy so we could make the drive to the continent a bit more worthwhile. I'm going to write a second installment about what we got up to in Paris and during rest of our trip in my next post, but in the meantime if you'd like to find out more about the Paris International site visit the Eurocamp website here. 

You can find out more about using your Clubcard points on Eurotunnel crossings here, and check out prices on the Eurotunnel here.

Related post: Paris en Famille Part Deux
Related post: Eurocamp holiday to Spain