Camping La Pignade

Best be planning a fair amount of beach time – there’s 25 kilometres of beach and sand dunes to explore around Ronce-les-Bains, with accessible stretches for less mobile guests and horse riding or watersports for active sorts. A nudist stretch and a surf school are about 15 minutes’ drive away, and it’s 20 minutes to La Coubre lighthouse. Keeping to the coast, a trip to Île d’Oléron (20 minutes’ drive) comes highly recommended for both beaches and bike riding (with oysters and wine to taste along the way. Yet more beach is down in Royan (half an hour), or you might like to catch up on maritime history at the Corderie Royale naval museum (35 minutes). There’s far more to this area than just the coastal attractions, though – perhaps you’d like to meet the beasts at La Palmyre zoo (15 minutes) or roam along the ramparts of walled town Brouage (20 minutes)? Inevitably, you’ll always come back to the shoreline in the end: maybe to explore the Matata sea caves (35 minutes) or to see sea creatures swimming at the aquarium in La Rochelle (an hour).