Hi does anyone have a suggested route(s) to take through/round France? And good sites or top tips please?

Thinking of going next summer on a 2 week tour, never done this before, so any recommendations appreciated :)

I know this isn't just France, but we went a couple of years ago on a 3 week trip - ferry from Dover-Dunkerque (far cheaper than any other routes) then spent a few days at a campsite in Audinghen just south of Calais, then across to Champagne, into Luxembourg, across the German border to a village called Thornich where we stayed on a lovely little campsite run by a couple who also had a wine making business, then north to Ahrweiler which was absolutely beautiful, then home via a stop near Maastricht in the Netherlands and one in Bruges.
We really enjoyed it all, but if we did it again we'd try and spend more time in each place rather than moving on every few days, as we got a bit fed up of not having time to get to know anywhere properly. If you only have 2 weeks then I'd recommend heading towards the Champagne region and into Luxembourg, as it's all absolutely gorgeous scenery and Luxembourg was a real surprise to us as I hadn't realised how lovely it is, especially in the north and east. If you go further south in France it's likely to be extremely hot (not the best thing in a campervan!) - we found it pretty hot just in the north, and the weather was stunning, only one day of rain on the whole trip.

I know this isn't just France, but we went a couple of years ago on a 3 week trip - ferry from Dover-Dunkerque (far cheaper than any other routes) then spent a few days at a campsite in Audinghen just south of Calais, then across to Champagne, into Luxembourg, across the German border to a village called Thornich where we stayed on a lovely little campsite run by a couple who also had a wine making business, then north to Ahrweiler which was absolutely beautiful, then home via a stop near Maastricht in the Netherlands and one in Bruges.
We really enjoyed it all, but if we did it again we'd try and spend more time in each place rather than moving on every few days, as we got a bit fed up of not having time to get to know anywhere properly. If you only have 2 weeks then I'd recommend heading towards the Champagne region and into Luxembourg, as it's all absolutely gorgeous scenery and Luxembourg was a real surprise to us as I hadn't realised how lovely it is, especially in the north and east. If you go further south in France it's likely to be extremely hot (not the best thing in a campervan!) - we found it pretty hot just in the north, and the weather was stunning, only one day of rain on the whole trip.

Thank you for this, looks good. In the UK when we first started in a campervan we used to move on every couple of days, like you say it's too much :)

It was good to see so many different places, and if we hadn't travelled on every few days then we wouldn't have been able to get into Germany and that was a really good part of the trip, but I'd definitely stick to just a few places if we did it again. The problem is that I'm the only one who can drive, so it's tough on me if we do a really long journey in one go, so we tried to break it up so we weren't doing more than about 3-4 hours at a time. Feel free to ask more specific questions if you decide to go to any of the areas we were in.

We did this a couple of years ago in our motorhome.

Sheffield to Strasbourg in one go. Then into Switzerland and 2 nights at Lake Lucerne. Then into Italy via Milan and 2 nights at one of the resorts on Lake Garda. Then off to Venice for 2 nights. Then down to Rome for 3 nights. Then back up to French border north of Turin for a stopover. Then up to Rouen for a night. Then back over to Uk and up to Sheffield.

Great time but we crammed a bit too much in and I was a bit tired as the missus won't drive the van.

Thinking of boat to Santander, then drive back up France to cut down on driving and give us more time to stop off along the way and relax?!...........
I have been in driver training to make sure I can share some driving, usually I drive back from the pub, hmmmmmm. Got the dog booked in for her rabies jab in January to get her passport :)

Thinking of boat to Santander, then drive back up France to cut down on driving and give us more time to stop off along the way and relax?!...........
I have been in driver training to make sure I can share some driving, usually I drive back from the pub, hmmmmmm. Got the dog booked in for her rabies jab in January to get her passport :)

I've done that before. With the exception of a short stretch of Spanish motorway that is populated by psychotic lorry drivers, it is a lovely trip.

The west coast of France is beautiful. The southern half is hot in the summer and pretty sparsely populated. The northern part is more crowded and less reliable in terms of weather, but still beautiful.

I'd recommend dover- calais (cheapest unless you can get a deal for portsmouth-cherborg) Brittany, going down the west coast of france to Bordeaux, through the top of pyrennese to Carcasonne then back through the alps, lyon, Chamonix switzerland, luxemberg, belgium although two weeks wont allow much time in each place it'd be a great trip!
Tips- fill up in france (diesel) is a lot cheaper
- avoid motorways in france- mostly tolls and are dull but do take good map/ sat nav.
best wishes! Ian
ps- welcome to pm me
I spent 2 years and 200,000 miles travelling all over europe in my van!