Chablis with Children
One of the unexpected pleasures of Chablis is how naturally it accommodates families. This is not a place of theme parks or organized entertainment, it is something better. The landscape itself is the attraction: open fields, gentle rivers, animals grazing behind stone walls, and the kind of space that children instinctively know what to do with.
Meeting the Animals
There are donkeys at the end of our street. Walk five minutes toward the campsite, turn right onto the road called les Roches, and about three hundred metres on you will see them. They are fond of carrots.
A second group lives behind the William Fèvre winery on avenue d'Oberwesel, three donkeys, four goats, six sheep, and eight geese. (The geese have strong opinions about visitors. You have been warned.)
For something more unusual, Alpagas Bonheur offers the chance to walk among a herd of llamas and alpacas, a gentle, slightly surreal experience that children adore.
Donkey rides for children aged three to twelve are available through La Cav'Anière, just two kilometres from Chablis. Available daily in April and on weekends from May onward. Reservations by message or phone at 06 18 90 76 22.
The Park
Chablis has a lovely green park, the Parc de la Liberté, at the end of avenue Jean Jaurès, two minutes on foot from the house. There is a playground, picnic tables, and the quiet company of the river.
The Petit Train
The Petit Train Touristique de Chablis offers a forty-five-minute guided tour through the historic centre and out into the vineyards. It is charming in the way that only a small French tourist train can be.
Guédelon: A Castle Built by Hand
About sixty-six kilometres west of Chablis, Guédelon is one of the most remarkable sites in France. Since 1997, a team of forty master-builders has been constructing a medieval castle using only the materials and techniques available in the thirteenth century. You can tour the site, talk with the stonemasons and carpenters, or join a stone-carving workshop. Children leave with a vivid, tactile sense of what the Middle Ages actually felt like.
Tree Climbing
About twenty kilometres west, the Thureau Adventure Park in the forest near Auxerre offers treetop courses for both adults and children, safe, well-designed, and set among beautiful old trees.
More Châteaux to Explore
- Château de Saint-Fargeau: During summer, the château hosts one of Europe's finest historical pageants, with over six hundred actors and sixty horsemen performing by candlelight. The educational farm is a destination in itself: animals roam freely, and children can groom ponies, help feed newborns, watch the forge being lit, and bake bread over a wood fire.
- Château de Tanlay: Renaissance elegance, twenty minutes from Chablis.
- Château d'Ancy-le-Franc: Another Renaissance gem, thirty minutes away.
The Caves of Arcy
About thirty-three kilometres south of Chablis, les Grottes d'Arcy hold cave paintings believed to be twenty-eight thousand years old. It is the kind of place that makes time feel very long and very short at once, and children tend to remember it for years.
