We arrived at Camping Les Amiaux after a perfect week in the Loire at Parc de Fierbois. We were looking forward to a relaxing beach holiday on a top class campsite. We arrived at the site and it looked totally depressing although to be fair it had been raining - bit of a shock as we had been boiling in the Loire and had been told the Vendee had a sun-sure micro-climate. We were put off by the traffic jam outside the site and the road which had loads of campsites one after the other on both sides of the road as we approached and they all looked old and tired. We were travelling with Canvas holidays to one of their tents - when we saw the pitch we were allocated I almost cried - it was small, dusty and really dark due to the trees. I went to the toilets and they were dirty, smelly, 2 were locked and 1 had a broken loo seat, with no loo roll unlike the previous site. Not a good start. We then decided to get a pizza as we were tired after the drive - the takeaway took over 1hr (I am not exaggerating) to deliver up 3 pizzas! We put the children to bed and settled down to a well earned glass of wine - then we realised that all we could hear was the traffic from a road, we went to bed and we could hear every word said in the static caravan that was sited less than 1ft from our tent, and the bass from the entertainment on the site next door, and then the stomping up and down as people walked about in the static. The people next door finally stopped moving around 12.30am, the noise from the site next door quietened at about 1am, the road at about 2am - but it started again with big lorries at about 5.30am! We tried to get moved on the site or to another site but we couldn't so we had to stick it out - it got better after I bought some ear plugs, but I could still hear the road noise. This was the road at the back of the site between the beach and the site - not the main road that runs right through the middle of the site. It has to be said the indoor pool was nice, although my son and several other people cut their feet on it, and the slides even in the newer pool were rubbish and both outdoor pools needed a refurb. The toilets never improved - to be fair to the campsite I think we were sharing with some very manky people, often you would go in and find faeces on the seats! I complained to the Canvas rep and the campsite but nothing happened. No way would I go back again - and it has convinced us to take out own tent this year so that if we don't like somewhere we can vote with our feet. In its defence the pitches on the other side of the main road towards the front of the site were grassy and well spaced - there was more road noise but because it was constant (the road outside the site is nose to tail traffic jam most of the time) it was somehow less intrusive. There was very little evening entertainment to speak of and the play areas were useless for kids over 4. However, if you just want a base with an indoor pool near to the beach then I guess it was OK. For us it was just a huge letdown compared to the other sites we have visited with Canvas.
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