Canvas Holidays

Long lazy warm evenings watching your children run around while you sip a nice cool drink! Sounds heaven yes? Or just a holiday at Canvas, camping in the warm French sunshine!

Canvas holidays, who have been offering luxury camping for 40 years, are incredibly flexible on their bookings.  Choose your own travel, days you want to arrive and time you want to stay. Each holiday is tailored to you!

We decided to head towards the large site of Domiane des Ormes in the area of Brittany. Brittany is an underrated part of France offering over 1200km of long sandy beaches and history pouring out of every corner.

First part is of course the contact with the Canvas team. All I can say about this is that I have rarely come across such wonderful customer service from the very first phone call. We dealt with the same person from start to finish over months and numerous phone calls and emails (we had to much them around a lot with changed dates times etc) and each time nothing was too much problem and we were continuously kept in the loop!

The ferry was amazing! Well done Canvas for partnering with the smashing P&O. As its 9 hours a cabin is invaluable especially if you have tinies or just want a little of your own space. The entertainment was outstanding with reception stepping in to keep our kids amused when the queues became too long!

Now although Domaine des Ormes (Michelin 5 red tents) was large I don’t think anyone realised just how large it was! Nor did we realise that although a “family site” it was more for 8-10 years and up! Yes its advertised for all ages but despite an 11pm noise curfew the late night music from the discos went on longer than this and then there were the 2am wakening’s from people coming back from the bar! Not great again when you have early bed times.

For the little ones there was an amazing playground! Huge and great fun and of course there’s all the other extra activities but do be warned you have to pay for anything other than the pool. Although it was unclear from the brochure that you had to pay for these extras they were definitely worth the money! The bike hire unfortunately was booked every day but our top recommendations were the zip wire and the pedalos (life jackets included!) and of course what child doesn’t like a horse ride round the site! Of course the evening activities for the kids are fabulous too! Cowboy parties! And gosh the chocolate party’s!! Don’t bother feeding your kids that night!!!

Domaine des ormes is a beautiful site with a stunningly chateau at the heart. The watermill is now converted and is the bar with the coach house and stable now form the 18hole golf course! There is also an amazing pool complex with 3 pools and chutes and a covered lagoon pool with wave machine. But be warned the pools of course in the heat of summer do become cramped and of course teenage boys and water tend to result in a lot of splashing and showing off which again if you have tinies you might not be so impressed with! And of course do keep an eye on your children as the pools didn’t seem to be lifeguarded at all times and a lot of the chutes were having kids mucking about and coming down them dangerously.

The site does have a hill where the tents are (ours included) which did you give the slight illusion of falling out of bed so make sure you grab a raised bed side again if you have under 4s.  There is an invaluable kitchen gate which I have never seen with other camping brands before.

All in all despite the late night noise and a friendly frequent frog visitor an AMAZING, FUN, FULL ON holiday! Hundreds of memories have been made and although the site was better suited to teens and preteens there was not a minute with enjoyment!