Vendée
with Nantes & Pornic, plus La Rochelle & the Île de Ré
Published on 24. September 2024
Book
Paperback/Softback
1 pages
978-1-80469-221-9 (ISBN)
Description
New from Bradt is the thoroughly updated second edition of The Vendée, the only English-language guidebook to focus on this part of Pays de la Loire. Also covered in this guide to an increasingly popular French region are Nantes, Pornic, La Rochelle and the Île de Ré. Written by Angela Bird, who for almost 50 years has owned a home in the region, and award-winning travel writer Murray Stewart, and updated by adventurer Ed Cooper, Bradt's guidebook offers comprehensive coverage of a beguiling area, detailing everything from family holidays to walks, cycling, local cuisine and history. The Vendée offers all the benefits of a destination that is well established with both French and British visitors, with easy access and short drive times via UK ferries adding to its appeal. Popular with campers and self-caterers, the Vendée's sunny climate and 140 km of sandy beaches, plus its tree-lined canals and open marshland, make for a diverse outdoor playground. Bradt's The Vendée includes suggestions for walks and the best places for birdwatching. This goes hand in hand with a new regional policy of promoting recreation premised on nature and wellbeing. Thanks to the authors' rich personal history with the area, the guide also reveals the quirks and themes which give the Vendée its own distinct character, as well as straying just beyond the area's boundaries to incorporate La Rochelle and Nantes, both entry points for those arriving by air and both offering urban distractions for the occasional rainy day. Although the region has no true cities, or even large towns, the guide includes details of the many local museums which provide easily accessible insights into the bloody history of an area which has, at times, been central to the evolution of modern-day France. New elements in this edition of Bradt's The Vendée include expanded coverage of architecture, the Vendée sections of a 1,300-km Atlantic cycle route (La Vélodysée), France's most dazzling son-et-lumière show and new restaurant listings that reflect the region's growing reputation for wine, collection of Michelin-starred eateries and long history as a paradise for seafood-lovers.
More details
Other editions
Previous edition
Angela Bird | Murray Stewart
Pays de la Loire: The Vendée and surrounding area
with Nantes and Pornic, plus La Rochelle and the Île de Ré
Book
05/2018
Bradt Travel Guides
€22.90
Article exhausted; check for reprint
Persons
During a camping holiday in France in 1970, Angela Bird idly scanned an estate agent's window (as you do) and noticed a whole house on sale for GBP1,200. She and her husband jettisoned their aged tent, equipped themselves with a hefty DIY book, and began a 50-year love affair with the Vendee. Although her children longed to holiday on Vendee beaches, Bird couldn't sit still for long so would drag them to markets, menhirs, castles and windmills. (Her kids learned to dread the words: 'While we're here, why don't we just visit.?') In 1995 Bird wrote her first guidebook to the area, the bestselling English Family Guide to the Vendee, which ran to four editions before transferring to the Bradt stable. For four years she was also Vendee correspondent for the French publication Cote Ouest. In the UK, she has worked for The Illustrated London News and Country Living magazines.
Murray Stewart spent two months living and travelling around the Vendee and its borders, researching and writing the first edition of Bradt's guidebook to the area. When his legs were significantly younger, he enjoyed cycling holidays on the flat coastal terrain along the Vendean Atlantic coast. Murray wrote Bradt's Basque Country and Navarre: France and Spain, which won the British Guild of Travel Writers' Best Travel Guidebook of 2016. He is an experienced guidebook author, having also written Bradt's Basque Country and Navarre: France and Spain (which won the British Guild of Travel Writers' Best Travel Guidebook of 2016) and updated Bradt guidebooks to North Cyprus, Cape Verde and the Azores. He has written for national travel magazines and online publications, and produced copy for French tourist boards and hotels. A near-fluent French speaker, he spends part of the year living in the Minervois in southern France.
Murray Stewart spent two months living and travelling around the Vendee and its borders, researching and writing the first edition of Bradt's guidebook to the area. When his legs were significantly younger, he enjoyed cycling holidays on the flat coastal terrain along the Vendean Atlantic coast. Murray wrote Bradt's Basque Country and Navarre: France and Spain, which won the British Guild of Travel Writers' Best Travel Guidebook of 2016. He is an experienced guidebook author, having also written Bradt's Basque Country and Navarre: France and Spain (which won the British Guild of Travel Writers' Best Travel Guidebook of 2016) and updated Bradt guidebooks to North Cyprus, Cape Verde and the Azores. He has written for national travel magazines and online publications, and produced copy for French tourist boards and hotels. A near-fluent French speaker, he spends part of the year living in the Minervois in southern France.
Content
Introduction
PART ONE GENERAL INFORMATION
Chapter 1 Background Information
Geography, Climate, Natural history, History, Government and politics , Economy, People, Language,
Religion, Education, Culture, Sport
Chapter 2 Practical Information
When to visit, Highlights, Suggested itineraries, Tourist information, Tour operators, Red tape, Getting there and away, Health, Safety, Women travellers, Travelling with a disability, LGBTQIA+ travellers, Travelling with kids, What to take, Money and budgeting, Getting around, Accommodation, Eating and drinking, Public
holidays, Shopping, Arts and entertainment, Sports and activities, Opening times, Media and communications, Cultural etiquette, Travelling positively
PART TWO THE VENDEE
Chapter 3 Northwest Vendee and the Islands
Bouin, Beauvoir-sur-Mer, Ile de Noirmoutier, La Barre-de-Monts and Fromentine, Bois-de-Cene, La Garnache,
Challans, Sallertaine, Notre-Dame-de-Monts, St-Jean-de-Monts, Soullans, Commequiers, St-Hilaire-de-Riez, St-Gilles-Croix-de-Vie, Ile d'Yeu
Chapter 4 La Roche-sur-Yon, Les Sables-d'Olonne and the Bas-Bocage
La Roche-sur-Yon, Nesmy, Chaille-sousles-Ormeaux, Le Poire-sur-Vie, Aizenay, St-Etienne-du-Bois, Beaulieu-sous-la-Roche, La Mothe-Achard, Apremont, Coex, St-Reverend, Bretignolles-sur-Mer, Brem-sur-Mer, Les Sables-d'Olonne area, Talmont-St-Hilaire , Jard-sur-Mer, Avrille, Moutiers-les-Mauxfaits
Chapter 5 Southern Vendee: The Marais Poitevin
The southern coast, Inland: Lucon and the dry marshes, La Venise Verte: 'Green Venice', The Marais Poitevin beyond the Vendee
Chapter 6 Pouzauges, Fontenay-le-Comte and the Haut-Bocage
St-Michel-Mont-Mercure, Pouzauges, St-Prouant, Mouilleron-en-Pareds, Bazogesen-Pareds, Chantonnay, La Chataigneraie, Vouvant, Mervent, Faymoreau, Fontenayle-Comte, Nieul-sur-l'Autise
Chapter 7 Clisson, Les Herbiers and the Vendee Wars
Clisson (Loire-Atlantique), Tiffauges, Mortagne-sur-Sevre, St-Laurent-sur-Sevre, Mallievre, Les Epesses, La Gaubretiere, Les Herbiers, Montaigu, Chavagnes-en-Paillers, Les Brouzils, Rocheserviere, Les Lucs-sur-Boulogne, Les Essarts, Mouchamps
PART THREE NORTH AND SOUTH OF THE VENDEE
Chapter 8 La Rochelle and the Ile de Re
La Rochelle, Ile de Re
Chapter 9 Nantes, Pays de Retz and the Loire Estuary
Nantes, The Pays de Retz, Northwards across the estuary, From the ocean back to Nantes: the Loire's south bank
Appendix 1 Language
Appendix 2 Further Information
Index
PART ONE GENERAL INFORMATION
Chapter 1 Background Information
Geography, Climate, Natural history, History, Government and politics , Economy, People, Language,
Religion, Education, Culture, Sport
Chapter 2 Practical Information
When to visit, Highlights, Suggested itineraries, Tourist information, Tour operators, Red tape, Getting there and away, Health, Safety, Women travellers, Travelling with a disability, LGBTQIA+ travellers, Travelling with kids, What to take, Money and budgeting, Getting around, Accommodation, Eating and drinking, Public
holidays, Shopping, Arts and entertainment, Sports and activities, Opening times, Media and communications, Cultural etiquette, Travelling positively
PART TWO THE VENDEE
Chapter 3 Northwest Vendee and the Islands
Bouin, Beauvoir-sur-Mer, Ile de Noirmoutier, La Barre-de-Monts and Fromentine, Bois-de-Cene, La Garnache,
Challans, Sallertaine, Notre-Dame-de-Monts, St-Jean-de-Monts, Soullans, Commequiers, St-Hilaire-de-Riez, St-Gilles-Croix-de-Vie, Ile d'Yeu
Chapter 4 La Roche-sur-Yon, Les Sables-d'Olonne and the Bas-Bocage
La Roche-sur-Yon, Nesmy, Chaille-sousles-Ormeaux, Le Poire-sur-Vie, Aizenay, St-Etienne-du-Bois, Beaulieu-sous-la-Roche, La Mothe-Achard, Apremont, Coex, St-Reverend, Bretignolles-sur-Mer, Brem-sur-Mer, Les Sables-d'Olonne area, Talmont-St-Hilaire , Jard-sur-Mer, Avrille, Moutiers-les-Mauxfaits
Chapter 5 Southern Vendee: The Marais Poitevin
The southern coast, Inland: Lucon and the dry marshes, La Venise Verte: 'Green Venice', The Marais Poitevin beyond the Vendee
Chapter 6 Pouzauges, Fontenay-le-Comte and the Haut-Bocage
St-Michel-Mont-Mercure, Pouzauges, St-Prouant, Mouilleron-en-Pareds, Bazogesen-Pareds, Chantonnay, La Chataigneraie, Vouvant, Mervent, Faymoreau, Fontenayle-Comte, Nieul-sur-l'Autise
Chapter 7 Clisson, Les Herbiers and the Vendee Wars
Clisson (Loire-Atlantique), Tiffauges, Mortagne-sur-Sevre, St-Laurent-sur-Sevre, Mallievre, Les Epesses, La Gaubretiere, Les Herbiers, Montaigu, Chavagnes-en-Paillers, Les Brouzils, Rocheserviere, Les Lucs-sur-Boulogne, Les Essarts, Mouchamps
PART THREE NORTH AND SOUTH OF THE VENDEE
Chapter 8 La Rochelle and the Ile de Re
La Rochelle, Ile de Re
Chapter 9 Nantes, Pays de Retz and the Loire Estuary
Nantes, The Pays de Retz, Northwards across the estuary, From the ocean back to Nantes: the Loire's south bank
Appendix 1 Language
Appendix 2 Further Information
Index