Night ferry to France
This year we decided to take the night ferry to France and we had booked to sail from Plymouth to Roscoff with Brittany Ferries as we only live half an hour from Plymouth.
Our chosen campsite for two weeks was Le Clarys Plage in the Vendee and we decided to travel at night as on a previous trip several members of the family had felt seasick during the ferry crossing and we hoped that sleeping during the crossing would mean that this didn’t happen. It also meant that we could then spend the next day travelling the four and a half hours to the campsite, in our own time, stopping off when we wanted and not rushing for check in.
Well all we can say is that we made the perfect decision. Check in at Plymouth was at around 10.15pm and so we left from home with all three children in their pyjamas ready for bed. We half expected them to be asleep by the time we reached Plymouth at 9.30pm but how wrong we were. Full of excitement and ready for a great family holiday all three were bright eyed and bushy tailed waiting to see and board the ferry.
Brittany Ferries and border control staff got us loaded onto the ferry fairly quickly after check in and we made our way up to the cabin which we had pre booked.
Our cabin was 4 berth but as a family of five we had also had to book a reclining chair, however as we have two younger children (aged 3 and 4) we decided to top and tail them in one of the lower bunks whilst the rest of us took to the remanding three.
The cabin was clean, tidy and very comfortable with 4 bunks and a shower room with toilet, shower and sink.
After all getting ready for bed we settled down for the night. There were various announcements at the start of the journey which although did not last for long were fairly loud.
Within a short time the ferry was off on it’s journey to Roscoff and within minutes all three children were asleep. With a fairly smooth crossing everyone slept well and were woken by music at around 5am which emanated throughout the ceiling mounted speakers.
We had to vacate the cabin half an hour before arriving in Roscoff and so we got up, dressed and went to the restaurant for breakfast before being allowed back to our vehicle to continue with our journey to Le Clarys Plage.
Our return journey was also a night crossing, and even though this time the crossing was much rougher, the children all slept well and there was no travel sickness within our group at all.
Having now experienced both the day and night crossings there are advantages to both, especially if it is a choppy crossing. If the driver of your party is a light sleeper, they may find that the lack of sleep is a hinderance to driving if you have along way to travel on the other side but if like us, you have members of the family who suffer from motion sickness the night crossing was definitely the best crossing we have ever had! You can also take advantage of onboard entertainment…watching a movie, having something to eat or enjoying a drink in the bar.
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