Lovely campsite
3 June 2024 at 16:57:21
We spent 9 nights at Camping La Palace in Gironde, France over May half term. I travelled with my husband, and children, 14, 12 and 9.
The site is lovely. I would give it 10/10 for how much there is to do and how nice it is. It is a woodland location with access to woodland walks. In the woods are... goats behind a fence which my daughter had a lovely time feeding with branches etc.
The swimming complex is fabulous. It is clean and warm. The inside pools are extremely warm and we were quite comfortable in the outside pools even on cloudy days. The site was very empty when we were there – I swam lengths most days and had the lane to myself every time. There are slides and other fun features in both the inside and outside pools which kept my children occupied for long periods of time. The slides weren’t monitored by life-guards – I mention this as when my children were smaller they always wanted to go on slides and where life-guards were enforcing height restrictions it was a problem. There was regularly only one life-guard monitoring all three pools so you do need to be watching out for your own family. The toddler areas looked lovely but I won’t comment as we didn’t use them.
The main play park says it is for 3-6 year olds which is a bit of a shame as there is only one piece of climbing equipment for older children outside of this park. It is also worth saying that although the main paths on the site are pathed the areas near the caravans aren’t necessarily so children may not be able to scoot up and down however bikes will work 😊
There are various sports facilities including a volleyball net, football, basketball, table tennis and mini-golf. You could collect equipment to play these sports for free from the bike-hire place. There was also a gym onsite and an exercise studio where classes were running (again, I believe they were included in the price).
Despite how quiet the campsite was during our visit there were various activities running, my family went to a few (including volleyball and football) but were generally the only people turning up. My husband and son did an organised bike-ride (again included in the price) through the forests to other beaches which sounded fabulous and inspired us to venture further afield for dinner one day.
My daughter went to kids club a few times and loved it – when we went all the age-groups were in together (because the site was so very quiet) and some days it was her, a leader with very limited English and a couple of French children but she didn’t mind at all.
There was entertainment at 9pm some evenings in the form of a quiz of some form of game – we only really went once for a 15 minute mini-disco and stayed for the music quiz. The staff tried their best but it is difficult with so few people on site.
Ice creams and food. We ate from the take-away and also in the main restaurant. The food was good and the prices fairly reasonable. We bought croissants and fresh bread in the shop every day, it is quite a large shop for the site selling a good selection of toys/ items you might need on holiday and food. The only issue with food at the site was that there was no-where to get food (not even an ice-cream!) all afternoon as both the shops and take-away area closed.
The campsite is well positioned for a short walk to the beach or a short drive (or about half hour walk) into Soulac. The beaches in the area are beautiful and we captured some fantastic sunsets. Soulac was a nice little town/village however when we went hardly anything was open. We attempted to eat there twice, once about 5pm on a Friday and once on a Wednesday at 7:30 and hardly any restaurants were open. However, on our last weekend there was a big festival which may mark the opening of the town for summer as everywhere suddenly seemed to open.
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3 June 2024 at 16:57:21
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