Center Parcs Les Bois-Francs

“A good all round site with great staff”

Having read a lot of not so good reviews, it was with some trepidation that we went. Many reviews had said the lodges were tired and not clean - ours was the opposite of this and I can only presume there has been a refurbishment not so long ago, as there was little sign of wear and tear and the co… more

Having read a lot of not so good reviews, it was with some trepidation that we went. Many reviews had said the lodges were tired and not clean - ours was the opposite of this and I can only presume there has been a refurbishment not so long ago, as there was little sign of wear and tear and the comfort cottage was smart and clean (an identical design to those at Longleat). A pleasure here is that the lodges are all in proper woodland, so although there was intense sunshine throughout the week, the temperature in the cottage remained tolerable. A nice touch was the coffee machine, with 4 coffee pods provided. One roll of toilet paper is perhaps a bit stingy though. The sports hall looked to have recently been revamped and included three padel tennis courts available at a reasonable price. The Aqua Mundo had slightly fewer flumes than some sites, but still a good variety and it was in good condition. Similarly, with a series of small lakes, the water activities are more limited than some other sites. The presence of a golf course is unusual though and we made use of the driving range. The site was a bit under capacity on restaurants - so you must make a reservation or risk having nowhere to eat. For what I can only guess are staffing reasons the restaurants alternate a two day closure, so one is closed at any time - a bit non-sensical. The Carrefour Express was also a bit more limited on selection and whilst it had the fresh orange juice maker, there were never any oranges and the salad bar, which is normally so good, was never stocked. Other staples seemed to be missing too, such as fresh milk (but could get UHT) and, shamefully for France, the croissant were limp and soggy. The staff had varying degrees of English (and there were a lot of Brits there), but with a combination of their English and our spattering of French we got by, and they were all very helpful, friendly and good humoured. It makes such a difference. The nearby small town of Verneuil d'Aver et d'Iton, is attractive and historic and well worth an afternoon . You can pick up leaflets (in English) for the historic trail, which takes about 90 minutes (available from the Tourist Office or the Abbey). We had a really positive experience and enjoyed our time at Les Bois Francs. Congratulations to the team there for their positive and friendly attitude.

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“Overall a very good stay”

I’m going to compare this with similar holidays at a UK Center Parcs, at least a bit. We have stayed at UK Center Parcs 4 or 5 times in the past 6 years and the kids loved it. This year we looked at prices and for the May half term UK Center Parcs were wanting around £1300 for the Mon-Fri stay. Le… more

I’m going to compare this with similar holidays at a UK Center Parcs, at least a bit. We have stayed at UK Center Parcs 4 or 5 times in the past 6 years and the kids loved it. This year we looked at prices and for the May half term UK Center Parcs were wanting around £1300 for the Mon-Fri stay. Les Bois Francs were asking just £500 for the same week (plus 50 Euros of activity credit). Adding in ferry, fuel and road toll costs it was still over £500 cheaper to go to France than a UK CP. Overall, the accommodation was fine. We booked at Pagode Premium cottage, it was quite small, especially the kitchen area, but fine for us. We were lucky with the weather (in fact it was very hot throughout our stay) so we could use the outside space all the time we were there. As part of the deal bed linen was supplied and fitted when we arrived. We took our own towels, which was a bit of a pain due to space taken up in the car, but much better than hiring towels, which was expensive. The kitchen is quite well equipped and had a lot of things you need and quite a few things you probably would never use. Unlike UK CP’s there was no BBQ station at our accommodation, we could smell BBQs around the site but were unsure if people had brought their own or some were supplied with BBQ facilities. It’s well documented that Euro CP's don’t have ovens, which limits what you can cook at the lodges. If you have an air fryer then might be worth packing that to expand your self-catering options. The kitchen "welcome pack" is not as good as the UK one and only contains: 1 x hand towel 1 x Tea towel 2 x cloths 1 x Scrubber 1 x box of matches. Things that are not supplied and you probably/might want to take with you are: Kitchen towel/roll Washing up liquid Dishwasher tablets Decent sharp knife Scissors Grater Salt/Pepper Oil Hand soap There were small niggles with our accommodation, such as a couple of blown light bulbs, TV in the lounge was faulty, 3 full sized brooms were supplied, but no dustpan and brush, the supplied corkscrew was broken. Lodge was clean when we arrived, beds were comfy and shower was good. Dishwasher worked well. Only 1 toilet roll is supplied so worth taking extras with you or adding to your French supermarket shop. As other reviewers have mentioned there is an excellent Intermarche Hyper market only 10 minutes’ drive away and worth a visit en-route to CP. We arrived on a French bank holiday Monday and the supermarket was shut. Because of this the onsite supermarket, which is actually quite good, was stripped bare and dinner on the first night was limited to what they had left. Kids were OK as we had brought something for them from home. There are a few on-site restaurants. We ate at the Italian and had prebooked a spot for just after it opened, which I would recommend. It was a bit chaotic but food was fine, service was very friendly, prices were high but not outrageous. We considered eating at the buffet another evening, it looked good, but it worked out very expensive (around 15 euro per child and 36 per adult), so didn’t bother in the end. I think if you were hungry and made good use of the inclusive drinks offer then you could make it good value. Check out the opening times of the restaurants as they don’t all open every day and don’t open until at least 6:30 in the evening. We hired bikes for the week and it was better value than the UK. You can pre-order bikes, but not extras such as tag-a-longs, kids trailers etc. When we arrived to collect our bikes all the tag-a-longs had gone but our 5-year-old enjoyed being chauffeured around in a trailer, which had a “boot” that was very useful for carrying all the swimming gear, shopping etc. We found the staff generally were very friendly and very helpful, their English if mostly OK, and much better than my French. However, my wife’s French is great, so we had no issues there. Swimming pool is great. Opens at 10 and we found only a small queue each morning. The slides and rapids tended to open around 10:30. Only issue with the pool is the rapids which, unlike the UK CP’s are a bit wild west. No regulation for people going down so be prepared to be crashed into regularly during peak period by other swimmers. They are not as fast or deep as in the UK so a good side effect was that my kids were both allowed on the rapids and it didn’t feel unsafe for them. Also, kids in buoyancy aids are allowed on, unlike in UK. Waves in the main pool were a bit disappointing, not very high and don’t last long. For activities we did the 10-pin bowling which was fun and the kids did the low ropes. Both were paid for using the “free” activity credit we got as part of our booking. To use this credit you have to queue up at the reception desk (opposite the swimming pool entrance) and book with a member of staff, it’s simple to do but not obvious. You cannot use the credit to pre-book activities or book them using the automated terminals on-site, which is a shame. One major issue I do have, and the main reason for the 4-star review rather than 5 (that other reviewers have mentioned also) is the internal roads around CP. This is where UK sites really are better. In the UK cars are banned from entering the site, except for check-in and check-out times. In France there are no car park barriers and cars are allowed to enter the main site at any time day or night. So, it’s not as safe as the UK sites for anyone walking or cycling around the site, especially kids. We didn’t see loads of cars moving around the site, but when we did some of the drivers were racing around at unsafe speeds. Mostly it was French cars as, unlike in the UK, you can book different lengths of stay here. So, there are people checking in and out every day of the week. Also, there were lots of cars parked on the roads for days at a time around the site, again mostly French ones, but not exclusively. There were quite a few warning notices under the car windscreens asking drivers to move the cars back to the carpark, but these are largely ignored it seems. Overall, however we really enjoyed our holiday and maybe more importantly the kids loved it. We would be very happy to return here as a family.

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