Beautiful La Rochelle (La Rochelle, France)

Member Name: lubyloo

Product:	La Rochelle, France
Date:	18/05/09 (8 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: A real insight into France

Disadvantages: can be hard to navigate in the town centre by car.

La Rochelle is beautiful, we have stayed there three times in the last three years on our way to various places in France.

Last year we stayed in the cheap and cheerful B&B hotel it was very close to the station and the town centre. We walked in for a meal by the port. There is so much variety to choose from, it's all out on the front so you can enjoy the view whilst eating.

We took the children to the aquarium the year before, it was excellent and well worth a visit, we went to Biaritz one last year and it was such a disappointment after La Rochelle, it's extremely interactive and very modern. At the end you can go for lunch/coffee in their cafe which is situated right at the very top of the aquarium building and over looks La Rochelle, in the centre of the cafe you can look down on the tropical forest part of the aquarium and hear the birds!

A warning for small children and those frightened of lifts and the dark! to get into the aquarium after paying you need to go into quite a large dark lift, it then feels and looks like you're underwater going down into the sea!! it's quite clever but our daughter was petrified and screamed!! it's not long and it's not that bad. Had we have asked there may have been another way in I don't know! However she enjoyed the rest of it and still remembers it all.

We have also walked along the walled path and looked around the inner part of the old town, it's lovely just to be part of the life there with buskers on the sides of the road and the hussle and bussle of shops! we saw a wedding going by with all the cars hooting at it!

The best part is - even if the weathers been naff in the rest of France for some reason everytime we've gone to La Rochelle the sun has shone!! I can not guarantee that for everyone but it does seem to be a bit of a sun trap although we did have a few showers on one ocassion!

On all ocassions we have driven in to France and like many of the cities it's quite hard to navigate around the inner city part and to find somewhere to park. We found the best parking was around the right hand side by the towers and then walk into the town. Or by the museum has a good car park too and then you can walk into the town from there. We had a sat nav too which does make it a little easier especially for all the one way systems.

Summary: A lovely day out