My airport-free recipe for a foolproof family beach break in France

Times

3 days ago

Sometimes what you want from a holiday is adrenaline — the buzz you get from a cram-it-in, eat-drink-shop-sights-party-sleep-when-you're-dead type trip. No flight time too early, no downtime allowed. But sometimes you want a trip that's more like serotonin. One that instantly has your shoulders dropping and jaw unclenching; one that feels like an actual holiday rather than something that leaves you needing one.
How to cook up a soul-nourishing break like this? Here's my recipe. First, ditch the airport. I'm sorry to say it but there is no easier way to stop your blood pressure spiking. Second, at your earliest opportunity, ditch the car. Maybe it stays at home while you get the train; maybe you don't go far so you also get the carefree joy of 'just chuck it in' packing. Third, book a hotel to minimise exposure to washing-up duties (and, what the heck, let someone else fold your loo-roll ends into points for once). Fourth, maximise exposure to sky and nature and good food. Stir that lot together and — bon appétit! — you have a break that feels restorative, however short, because the serotonin effect kicks in from the get-go.
This recipe might very well take you, as it did my husband, 11-year-old son and me just before Easter, to the Somme bay on the northern French coast. We took the car ferry from Dover so the bikes came too (and the scooter, and the skimboard, and the Carrefour-ready cool bag — we really did just chuck it in), turned right out of Calais and drove less than 70 miles south to St Valery sur Somme. It's a pretty, medieval port with a sort of well-kept boho charm — Rye in East Sussex would make it a good exchange partner.
But really, the bay is the thing here. From St Val's spot on its southern edge you can make out Le Crotoy on the other side but mainly you're looking across a protected tidal expanse of about 30 square miles that excels at wide, empty horizons, seals, seafood and birds — the dawn chorus was a symphony of chiffchaffs and linnets.
We were staying just outside St Val at the Hotel du Cap Hornu, a chilled-out place with a semi-resident boar, Titine, and an excellent breakfast, built around a house where the perfumer Guerlain once lived. He was one of many 19th-century down-from-Paris types who came for the light, the landscape and the newly fashionable sea bathing. Victor Hugo and Edgar Degas were regulars; Jules Verne wrote Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea here; Colette described how the bay 'darkly reflects an Egyptian sky'. Toulouse-Lautrec got his friend to photograph him pooing on Le Crotoy beach (an art movement, I suppose).
• Read our full guide to France
In a flat area of dykes and poldered land, Guerlain found himself a hill and a view — which for us, setting out from Cap Hornu on our bikes on the first morning, meant a scenic start, freewheeling down past crops and cows. The area has 30 miles of cycle paths so, true to serotonin recipe step 2, we didn't get back in our car until we packed up to leave days later.
We made a good 22-mile day of it. First stop along the way was the Maison de la Baie de Somme, a visitor centre that — bear with me — was so compelling and comprehensive and interactive, we almost didn't need to go out and see the real thing. Though of course we did (see recipe step 4), but with heads full of intel to help us understand the landscape and tell our samphire from our glasswort, a shelduck from a hunting decoy (£9; maisondelabaiedesomme.fr).
• 10 of the most beautiful places in France (and how to see them)
Pedalling on, we got to Pointe du Hourdel, the spur of land at the entrance to the bay with its lighthouse, little marina and shingle beach where we had the sandwiches we, ahem, were too full to eat at breakfast. The tide was in so we couldn't go looking for France's largest seal colony. But we did have that step 4 sky. Out here on the edges, I could see how artistic inspiration might strike in terms of colour more than form: the broad grey-blue brushstroke of wind-puckered sea; the horizon's fine line of light and dark that was the Marquenterre nature reserve across the bay; then the billowing blue, smudged with cirrus.
On again along the coastal Route Blanche, past history. Not D-Day landing sites (we were too far north) nor the Battle of the Somme (too far northwest) but Second World War bunkers, part of Hitler's Atlantic wall. We saw them built into dunes, in back gardens and fallen on the beach, concrete giants toppled by time and tide.
Beyond Brighton (which is more lighthouse and campsites than pier and vintage shops) we reached Cayeux sur Mer, a seaside resort that was warming up for the season, with half its signature beach huts still flatpacked on racks by the boardwalk. La Cabine de Mouné was open, though. We sank into colourful sofas on the beach bar's tiered decks, the recipe working its magic with the help of glasses of strong beer (the Belgian border isn't far).
• 25 of the best short breaks in France
The next day took us in the other direction, towards Le Crotoy. But why pedal round the bay when we could cross it on foot? The immense tidal range, one of the biggest in Europe, allows you to set out at low tide and make it all the way across, with muddy feet but without swimming. It's three kilometres as the crow flies, seven as the qualified guide walks. And you do need a guide, not just to help you navigate sand and marsh. Maxim Marzi met us at St Val's sea lock, handing out hazel staffs and binoculars. We'd gone prepared to paddle and squelch in bare legs and old trainers; when we reached the mud Marzi went barefoot, like he said his grandmother did as a girl digging worms for the local fishermen. 'Good for the soul and the circulation,' he said. Maybe so — she lived to 101.
As we walked, Marzi brought the bay to life: its history, its wildlife, its traditions. He described how 50 years ago it was all sand and no salt marshes and now they rise 2cm each year, global warming and Napoleon's canalisation of the Somme River having sped up the silting that in the 18th century cut off the former ports Abbeville and Rue. Marzi pointed out avocets, spoonbills and curlews through the usual end of the bins, then flipped them to improvise a microscope to show us one of the tiny crustacean mud scuds the birds feed on. He led us across marigots, mini canyons in the marsh; held our hands in the slippery mud; and picked salty sea purslane and sea aster for us to taste (the 'crisps' and 'spinach' of the sea). He showed us a century-old duck-hunting hide that floats with the tide and — most popular with the 11-year-old — how to sink into and get out of quicksand (from £17pp; guide-baie-somme.com).
The three-hour crossing felt like an epic adventure. If Marzi was our Moses leading us across the sea bed, Le Crotoy was our promised land, flowing not with milk and honey but moules frites, served 26 ways at Le Bistrot de la Baie (mains from £13; bistrotdelabaie.com). South-facing Le Crotoy looked cute basking in the sunshine but we couldn't linger — we had a train to catch. The Chemin de Fer de la Baie de Somme, the 19th-century network connecting sea-bathing sites, is run today by enthusiasts as a tourist line, with steam engines and vintage carriages, around the bay from Le Crotoy to Cayeux sur Mer (£12 one-way; chemindefer-baiedesomme.fr). We hopped off at St Val after an hour tchou-tchouing past herds of saltmarsh sheep, waving walkers and slightly less amused drivers at level crossings. Maybe they should have ditched their cars too.
The night before we'd pedalled into town for an excellent dinner of asparagus and lamb parmentier at the macramé-and-marble Le Jardin (mains from £17; bienvenueaujardin.fr) but today we had longer to explore the local-produce delis; the steep streets prettified with shells, pot plants and buoys; the medieval part of town through La Porte Jeanne d'Arc (she passed through in 1430 en route to her trial in Rouen so it's not an arc de triomphe — but it should really be called the Arc d'Arc). We didn't need a guide here. St Val is extraordinarily well served with information signs filling you in on all sorts: silting, fishermen's wives and their wheelbarrows, and flint-dressed 12th-century churches. For conversation we had the lady with an open front window and purring windowsill cats, a feline honey trap we didn't mind falling for.
Back down at water level we made the sort of discovery every family holiday needs: the Buvette de Mouton, a bar with sunny tables next to easily supervised sands, a just-cranking-up barbecue and views back to Le Crotoy. We ordered beers from the Silly brewery. Simple pleasures …
More of which we found the next day on our slow coastal route home via Berck (these names!) for kite-flying and Wissant for its dunes and views of Dover's white cliffs. We stopped just south of Calais at Escalles for evening skimboarding and a morning-after walk up to the clifftop obelisk at Cap Blanc Nez, a monument to the Dover Patrol, the Anglo-French maritime unit that defended the Channel in the First World War.
The exchange rate of one history lesson for one skate-park hour seemed fair — there's a huge area of ramps and half-pipes in Calais on the recently zhuzhed-up seafront that's 15 minutes' drive from the port. This completed my serotonin recipe: that we could be scooting and eating ice cream in the sun right up to the last minute before we left the country was the icing on the cake.
This article contains affiliate links, which can earn us revenue
Liz Edwards was a guest of Hauts-de-France tourism (hautsdefrancetourism.com) and Irish Ferries, which has returns for a car and four passengers from £108 (irishferries.com). Hotel du Cap Hornu has room-only doubles from £69 (hotelcaphornu.fr) and Hotel l'Escale in Escalles has room-only doubles from £98 (hotel-lescale.com)