On the road (2) – beaches, castles and chateaux COMPLETED IN THIS FORUM - PassPorter - A Community of Walt Disney World, Disneyland, Disney Cruise Line, and General Travel Forums
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On the road (2) – beaches, castles and chateaux COMPLETED IN THIS FORUM
On the road (2) – beaches, castles and chateaux
Pre-trip report
Dates: Saturday 5 – Friday 11 June Adventurers: Me, Cheryl (37) and DH Mark (44) Destinations: Northern France and Disneyland Paris, taking in the beaches of Normandy and some of the chateaux of the Loire Valley Meets: None planned Celebration: getting a taste of Disney magic for 2010
Isn’t it amazing how plans can change, even for an uber-planner like myself? Originally this week started out as a cruise on the Barcelona to Dover cruise on the Disney Magic. I was so excited when I heard that the Magic would finally be arriving on British shores. I remember the morning clearly – poor hubby was in the shower and all he could hear was me screaming and whooping with delight, when I realised that a Disney cruise ship would be docking at Dover and then setting sail for the wonderful Baltic, something I had always wanted to do. Having already been to Oslo in Norway, Stockholm in Sweden and Helsinki in Finland, I knew it was a beautiful part of Europe.
I excitedly waited for the prices to come out for those cruises – both in terms of cash and Disney Vacation Club points, but when they did, all my excitement turned to devastation. I was horrified at the price being asked and knew there was no way we could afford to pay cash for even one of us, the prices were that high. I had another few days to wait until the amount of points were announced and, when they were, I remember saying to the guy “is that for both of us?” to which he replied “no, that’s each.” I couldn’t resist saying words to the effect of “you’re having a laugh”, because really Disney were at our expense. I’d never seen so many points required for a cruise and it didn’t take many calculations to work out that we didn’t have enough points to make it work.
That realised, I set about looking at the other European cruises. Maybe if the Baltics wouldn’t work, the Mediterranean ones would? Again, a check of points showed that they wouldn’t, but a category 11 inside stateroom on the Barcelona to Dover cruise was doable. I looked into the ports of call and spent a long time convincing myself that it wouldn’t be a bad cruise to do, although in all honesty, it wasn’t something I was wildly keen on and I’d have far preferred a Med or a Baltic cruise, but it wasn’t to be.
I think it was as I was driving into work one day in maybe October or November time that the cruise idea fell apart. I knew all about the new cruise ship, the Disney Dream, and I heard Lou Mongello talking to Beci from Mouse Fan Travel about it on the WDW Radio podcast. Until that point, I’d had a passing interest in the new ship, but this podcast left me desperate to cruise on the new ship. I thought about it all day and came home and checked out how many points that would take. The answer? An awful lot less – and I mean a lot – than it would to do the Barcelona to Dover cruise. My mind was made up. There was no point wasting all those points on something that only half my heart was interested in. We chatted it through and decided to save our points and put them towards a cruise on the Disney Dream in April 2011 instead.
That left us with a week that we’d already both booked off work to ensure that we could get the time off. Changing the time off wasn’t really an option, as the week before was school holidays, so prices would be higher and places would be mad and packed with kids and I couldn’t have the following week off, as we had some major things on at work, so we decided to stick with our original week off and just make different plans.
As our only taste of Disney for 2010 had just gone south, my first thought was replacing it with something else Disney. Now, in Europe, that can only mean Disneyland Resort Paris, so we planned a couple of nights there, staying at the Disneyland Hotel, using our DVC points. There was no way that we could ever afford to stay here on cash, as they charge stupid prices for this resort. Actually, if I’m honest, they charge stupid prices for all the resorts at Disneyland Paris. It’s one of my bugbears with the place.
I knew that Mark had always wanted to see the Normandy beaches, made famous by the D-Day landings in World War Two, so I started to plan a road trip that would allow us to see those. I’ve always wanted to see Mont St. Michel and that wasn’t too far aware, so that was the next logical addition to our itinerary.
At around this time, I’d been working on our plans for a road trip down to Mark’s parents’ villa and had realised that, by the time we saw everything I wanted to in France, we wouldn’t be left with very much time at the villa. So if we were going to do another road trip around Northern France, maybe we could knock off some of those things on that trip instead? The Loire Valley is just beneath the Normandy area of France and there were some places there, particularly some great examples of the famous French chateaux, so I planned those into our trip as well. It worked out well, as that would take us back towards Paris. It was almost as if it was all meant to be...
The first problem we encountered with this trip was booking hotels and, to begin with, I really couldn’t fathom out what the issue was. A lot of hotels I looked at appeared to be fully booked during the first weekend. Certainly, this was the end of school holidays in the UK, but surely that couldn’t be the full story? I thought about it a bit more and suddenly had a horrible realisation..... the date of the D-Day landings had been 6 June 1940. That would be why the hotels were packed, as there were bound to be commemorations around then.
I persevered and finally managed to find an Ibis hotel that didn’t have a bad rating at Port-en-Bessin along the Normandy coast. It wasn’t ideal, as I had been hoping to find something in Bayeux, but that was not to be. The issues continued the next day, with trying to find a hotel near Mont St. Michel. I was originally hoping to find a hotel on the island itself, as I thought that would be very cool, but there was no way that was happening, as everything was either booked up or had pretty consistently bad reviews and I didn’t want to risk staying there. Finally, I found somewhere, the Hotel Altos at Avranches and we were set for that night.
The next couple of nights were a bit simpler, thank goodness. I managed to find a chateau hotel near Chenonceaux. This is right in the middle of the Loire Valley and there seemed to be chateaux everywhere. It was reasonably priced and had good ratings on Trip Advisor, so I went for it. For our next night, I wanted something near to Versailles, as I was desperate to go back to the palace there. You can blame Sharon (Princess Sharon) and Douglas (DouglasE) for that one – having read their trip reports about their visits there, I realised that it was about 15 years since I’d last been there and I was desperate to go back. I knew that it could often be crowded, but hoped that midweek in June wouldn’t be too bad.
Fortunately, there were no such issues when it came to booking the Disneyland Hotel. A quick call to the Disney Vacation Club and it was all fixed. There are a couple of things that you need to know about using DVC points to stay anywhere at the Disneyland Resort Paris. Firstly, you have to book for a minimum of two nights at one of the resort hotels and you also have to buy length of stay park passes when you make your booking. Fortunately, they do explain all of that in the members’ handbook, but it’s worth knowing, as it’s very different to booking at any other Disney park. I actually quite liked it, as it meant that the resort and park passes were all sorted out with one quick phone call.
So here are our plans:
Saturday 5 June:
Take the Eurotunnel across to Calais and drive to Normandy.
Visit some of the Normandy beaches and D-Day museums in the area.
Stay the night at Port-en-Bessin.
Sunday 6 June:
Visit the Bayeux tapestry and then head to Mont St. Michel.
Stay the night in Avranches.
Monday 7 June:
Drive through some of the Normandy and Loire Valley towns and villages.
Visit the Chateau de Chenonceau.
Stay the night at Orzain, near Chenonceaux.
Tuesday 8 June:
Visit the Chateau de Chambord and possibly Chateau de Blois. See Orleans and Chartres.
Stay the night in Bougival, near Versailles.
Wednesday 9 June:
Visit the Palace at Versailles.
Drive to Disneyland Paris.
Stay at the Disneyland Hotel.
Thursday 10 June:
Day at Disneyland Paris.
Stay at the Disneyland Hotel.
Friday 11 June:
Spend the morning at Disneyland Paris.
Drive to Calais and take the Eurotunnel back home in the afternoon.
Look out for the trip report starting sometime next weekend - if I'm able to write it up while we're away!
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Oh boy! More European touring with Cheryl and Mark! I'm going to be very interested to see the D-Day beaches. Not on the beach, but my dad was in the Battle of the Bulge with the 101st Airborne.
Sometimes plan changes work out for the best. When I go to Europe again I am definitely getting you guys to be my tour guides. I'm always way jealous of your adventures. I can't wait to hear more.
can't wait to read this trip report. after the last one, the art history faculty member booked at trip to visit family in Germany. he leaves on the 6th of june.
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I just found this TR after asking you on your "Poconos TR" if you were going to write one for this trip. I don't know why I even asked because you are like the queen of trip reports! I honestly don't know how you do it. I have a hard enough time updating my once-a-week!!!
I can't wait to read this one. I history so I'm really excited to read about the beaches at Normandy plus I can't wait to see the pics of Disneyland Paris!
Sounds like some great plans. My former co-worker was just amazed by Mont St. Michel when she visited, I can't wait to hear what you think of it! It looks like it's out of a movie, just amazing. How exciting - can't wait to hear all about it!!!
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Sounds like another fabulous trip that you have planned! I can't wait to hear all about it!
I can imagine your excitement at hearing that the Magic would be docking on British soil, and then your devastation at realizing the awful prices that they are charging. I would love for a Disney ship to come do a few cruises out of Boston. Then I wouldn't have to fly anywhere!
can't wait to read this trip report. after the last one, the art history faculty member booked at trip to visit family in Germany. he leaves on the 6th of june.
I just found this TR after asking you on your "Poconos TR" if you were going to write one for this trip. I don't know why I even asked because you are like the queen of trip reports! I honestly don't know how you do it. I have a hard enough time updating my once-a-week!!!
I can't wait to read this one. I history so I'm really excited to read about the beaches at Normandy plus I can't wait to see the pics of Disneyland Paris!
All I'll say is it is a lot of work, and usually during our vacation, but it's worth it, as people seem to enjoy them.
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I had another few days to wait until the amount of points were announced and, when they were, I remember saying to the guy “is that for both of us?” to which he replied “no, that’s each.” I couldn’t resist saying words to the effect of “you’re having a laugh”, because really Disney were at our expense. I’d never seen so many points required for a cruise and it didn’t take many calculations to work out that we didn’t have enough points to make it work. 
It’s one of my bugbears with the place. 
I managed to find a chateau hotel near Chenonceaux. This is right in the middle of the Loire Valley and there seemed to be chateaux everywhere. It was reasonably priced and had good ratings on Trip Advisor, so I went for it. For our next night, I wanted something near to Versailles, as I was desperate to go back to the palace there. You can blame Sharon (Princess Sharon) and Douglas (DouglasE) for that one – having read their trip reports about their visits there, I realised that it was about 15 years since I’d last been there and I was desperate to go back. I knew that it could often be crowded, but hoped that midweek in June wouldn’t be too bad. 
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I don't know why I even asked because you are like the queen of trip reports! 
history so I'm really excited to read about the beaches at Normandy plus I can't wait to see the pics of Disneyland Paris!
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