Great holiday in good (but not perfect) resort
4 September 2023 at 07:47:51
I'll give an honest a review as possible. This wont be a holiday destination suitable for all people, there is good and bad, but bear with me!
Staff / check in
When we arrived, we went to the reception desk to join a queue of people, and waited a few minutes to be told that we were at the wrong place... for check in, and needed to go to the desk outside of the reception building - which was unattended, this wasn't clear but once someone turned up at the desk, check in was smooth and we were given some free snacks.
In general, we found the staff were good, friendly and responsive.
Accommodation
We stayed in a nature lodge plus tent. It was a decent size, with comfortable beds, kitchen is basic but fine. One negative point was that our tent was at the very outside perimeter of the park and looked out onto a large fence, so we had no nice view, and no community aspect with out fellow campers. Ours also had significantly less outside space than many of the other tents. Avoid perimeter lodges if possible because they are not all equal. We were also next door to a toilet block, this has the advantage that its close - but the toilet doors are not damped in any way so there was almost constant banging from the doors at all hours as people went in and out.
Sanitary facilities
This was a bit of a let down. There are far too few toilets / showers for the number of guests. at times there were large queues of people waiting to use the showers, and there aren't many available. Its a shame because the shower blocks look great! Particularly bad times are during the early evening when people are returning from the beach and getting showered to go for dinner. Late evening much better. Do take your own toilet paper as the small toilet block near us ran out and wasn't replenished for over a full day.
Pools / recreation
The pool facilities are pretty good, one large-ish outdoor pool and an indoor pool too. The slides are good for kids, if a little basic compared to other sites we have visited. We were there during a hot spell (30 degrees +) and the pools were rammed with kids, not possible to do any actual swimming, just possible to cool off and splash around a little. During this busy time the water quality wasn't great, it was so cloudy that we couldn't see our feet on the floor.
There was an early morning dash for loungers, with lots of reserving going on. This wasn't challenged at all by staff who just allow it to happen. On the positive side, there is a large sundeck without loungers, which always had space to place a towel directly on the deck, which is what we chose to do (as opposed to getting into lounger wars)
Restaurants
The central square has a few eating options, - a sit down restaurant which served really quite excellent food (which we found surprising!) at a reasonable price. A takeway pizza restaurant, which was also good, and a little wine bar that serves tapas style platters. Also a crepe stand, and a sweetie shop. All of these were great. no issues at all.
The real gem (for us) was the beach bar which is just at the top of the beach. this was never rammed (apart from a beach party night) and really chilled - selling beer / wine / cocktails & smoothies.
Entertainment
The animation team seem to have limitless energy. Every evening had some kind of entertainment, lots of high energy dancing and they were good at it! Exclusive english speakers will struggle to get into some of the entertainment as its all in French (but you are in France and the vast majority of gusts are french - so get used to it!)
note the entertainment is VERY loud, and most evenings went on until midnight. We could hear it loud and clear from our tent despite being one of the furthest units from the central village. If you go to bed early - then this would be a nightmare!
This is a party resort, so expect lots of noise all the time. There were several nights where we could hear music/ shouting / taking loudly at 3 or 4 AM. these people weren't challenged by staff at any point, and on one occasion I heard a fellow guest having to shut down a party themselves. - I don't think this is good enough from park staff.
Beach
the beach is a short 5 minute walk down a track from the main site. There is a surfshop / school for renting boards and lessons. The swimming area is supervised, and the lifeguards were on the ball and we felt safe.
Note that the sea off the Atlantic coast of France can be rough! expect big waves - great if you like to surf / bodyboard etc... but not a relaxing swimming experience!
Local area
The nearby town of Montalivet can be cycled to in 20 mins or so (at a guess) and was lovely, a small pedestrianized shopping street with the usual holiday tat, and a range of restaurants. Didn't feel like a touristy rip off.
For food shopping, there is a local Aldi which is fine. We ventured to an e-Leclerc some distance away - because we really like the massive french hypermarche type supermarkets
Also worth a trip is Soulac sur mer, which is a beautiful seaside town.
All in all, we would come again, but will insist on a non-perimeter unit. We would look at booking a safari tent next time as they all seemed to be better located and had better facilities.
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4 September 2023 at 07:47:51
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