The Landes coast is where we keep going back to. It’s part of our wider guide to the best campsites in France, but this stretch of Atlantic coast deserves its own page. Big beaches, big surf, lakes for when the sea’s too rough, and pine forest cycle paths that go on for miles. It’s the kind of region where you barely need a car once you’re there and the kids can just scoot off on their own.
We first stayed at Camping La Rive one Easter when I was pregnant with our eldest, then went back in 2023 with her as a toddler. Since then we’ve worked our way along this coast: Sylvamar, Le Vieux Port, Natureo, La Civelle, Le Col Vert, Soustons Village, Le Soleil des Landes and Le Ruisseau. That’s 9 of these campsites we’ve actually stayed at ourselves. Bordeaux Lac and Côte d’Argent are just over the border in the Gironde, so they’re on our Gironde page.
Quick picks
- Best for toddlers: Sylvamar, fantastic toddler splash park and small toddler play areas
- Best for pools and slides: La Rive, two indoor kids pools side by side plus a lazy river and wave pool.
- Best for teens: Le Vieux Port football, petanque and table tennis tournaments running most evenings and a surf simulator.
- Best for the beach: Le Vieux Port, the only one on this list with sand right outside the gate.
- Best for a lake holiday: Le Col Vert, private pitch-side access to the 340 hectare Lac de Léon.
- Best for a quiet, car-free stay: Soustons Village, no cars at all so toddlers can ride bikes safely everywhere.
- Best for your own tent on a budget: La Civelle, a municipal site in Capbreton we paid 342 euros for a full week.
Camping La Rive, Biscarrosse (Lac de Cazaux-Sanguinet)
La Rive is still our favourite in the region and the one we’ve been to twice, once at Easter when I was pregnant and again in 2023 with our 3 year old. The indoor pool area has two kids pools side by side (one for babies, one for bigger kids) so I could sit between them and watch both girls. The lake beach is real sand, shallow for a good few metres and the sunsets over it are gorgeous with a picnic. Our Aspect mobile home for 15 nights in August cost around £700, which felt like a genuinely good deal.
It’s about 30 minutes from the coast, so if you want sea rather than lake you’ll need a car. The evening arena shows can carry if you’re on a main walkway, though we found our back-road pitch really peaceful. The lifeguards have a strict 30 minute rule on unattended sunbeds and towels, so don’t wander off for long in high season.
If you’re based around Biscarrosse, whether at La Rive or nearby, it’s worth reading our dedicated guides to where to camp in Biscarrosse and family things to do in Biscarrosse for more on the area beyond the campsite gates.
Sunelia Le Ruisseau, Bidart (Basque coast)
Le Ruisseau was a brilliant find on a last-minute Eurocamp deal, £409 for a week in the school holidays. The main pool area has a lagoon pool, a pirate ship pool with slides sized for little ones, and a treetop climbing course where the kids club even ran a full day with a picnic. We also discovered wallabies on a mini farm, which our daughter got to feed leftover fruit and veg to.
One thing to be really clear on: the lake near Le Ruisseau’s grounds is a small pond kept for looking at and fishing, with carp in it, not for swimming or watersports. The wifi here was genuinely poor, we had to buy a week’s pass and still ended up asking for a refund. The campsite is also hilly, so a pushchair or wheelchair will have a harder time than on flatter Landes sites. We’d still recommend it, scruffy edges and all.
Read our full Le Ruisseau review
Sylvamar, Labenne
Sylvamar’s new volcano pool area is genuinely impressive, an 80 metre water slide dropping you straight into a crater pool with jets and waterfalls, plus a lava river slide with rapids that left our toddler looking a bit dazed. The whole site is built around sport, with football tournaments most evenings, a busy petanque court and a yoga class I joined above the spa. The beach is a 15 minute walk or 5 minute cycle, and the mini disco starting at 9pm (yes, really) was quite the spectacle.
We stayed on a basic camping pitch and it was dry, dusty and really loud at night, with fireworks and music keeping us up till 1am one night. The shower blocks needed a deep clean too. It’s a fantastic campsite for families with kids old enough for the kids clubs, but with a 2 year old we felt like we missed out on half of what it offers. One detail: the Vival shop on site was a good size, we hardly ever found a queue and the staff were lovely for bread and pastries.
Camping le Vieux Port, Messanges
Le Vieux Port in Messanges has the best beach access of any site on this coast, a lovely sandy beach with two surf schools right outside the gate. The aquatic park has seven heated pools including a wave pool that runs every 10 minutes, and a toboggan setup for ages 10 plus. It’s a genuinely huge site, over 1,500 emplacements, so there’s plenty going on: a skate park, six petanque courts, a surf simulator and a big arena for the nightly shows.
We stayed in the premium lodge with jacuzzi here, and I have to be honest, the hot tub was drained on our last day and never warmed back up, and the post-stay customer service from Resasol was poor when we complained. If you book direct, be aware the keyless entry system can fail, ours did late one evening with a baby who needed sleep. The campsite itself and the beach are brilliant, we’d just book through a tour operator like Eurocamp rather than direct next time.
Read our full Le Vieux Port review. We also stayed in the premium lodge with jacuzzi here, worth a read before you book it.
Camping Natureo, Seignosse/Hossegor
Natureo is one of our favourite locations in France full stop, a rustic eco campsite where you’ve got a beach, a huge lake and a forest all within a short walk or cycle. The lake is 1.7km away with four lake beaches that are great for paddling with young children, and we loved that it’s such a unique setup. Mike was out bodyboarding and surfing the famous Hossegor waves while we paddled the shallower lake beaches with the baby.
Our one moan is the bar and restaurant, which was genuinely disappointing both nights we tried it, slow service, a bit rude and the pizza was below average. We loved the campsite enough to say we’d have given it 5 out of 5 if the bar had been better. We stayed in the Premium Cottage for 6 people, well worth a read if you’re considering a bigger family mobile home here.
Sandaya Soustons Village
Soustons Village is entirely car-free, so we parked up and were driven by golf buggy to our mobile home, which meant our 2 year old could roam around the whole site safely. We stayed in August at 40 degrees and the splash area and spa-style outdoor pool were exactly what we needed. There’s a pond outside the pool filled with carp fed by the dechlorinated pool water, a nice touch. We only stayed out for one evening show, the French Polynesian dancers, and they were wonderful.
The honest negatives: the play area is small for the size of the campsite, the pool gets really cramped in high season, and the dusty ground tracked into the mobile home constantly. Everyone has to walk or golf-buggy their luggage in, so pack lightly if you can. Still, it made a lovely, relaxed end to our last holiday as a family of 3.
Read our full Soustons Village review
Camping Municipal La Civelle, Capbreton
La Civelle is a municipal campsite we booked with our own tent purely for its location, Capbreton and Hossegor are our favourite towns in the whole of France, and it’s an easy cycle to both. We paid 342 euros for a week at the end of August. The pool here is Capbreton’s own public pool, a 25 metre lane pool that wasn’t heated and looked a bit tired, but did the job and the swimming lessons were good value.
I have to be honest about the rest. Our pitch flooded before we arrived and had to be swapped, our daughter’s new water bottle and solar lights for her birthday were stolen off our pitch overnight, and the shower blocks have nesting swallows that poo on you while you shower (not the campsite’s fault, they’re protected birds, but it’s gross). We’d still go back for the location, but we’d want to see more security on site for the rowdy late-night groups.
Read our full La Civelle review
Le Col Vert, Vielle-Saint-Girons
Le Col Vert sits right on Lac de Léon, a 340 hectare lake with a quieter private beach entrance inside the campsite gates and a busier public one just outside, which is lifeguard supervised in summer. There’s a free shuttle bus to the nearby town of Léon which meant we managed fine without a car for the week. The new play park here was the best feature, really clean, with ziplines and metal climbing frames that kept our 3 year old entertained for hours.
The outdoor pool was freezing even in peak summer, so we spent most of our pool time indoors instead. Our camping emplacement was also a letdown, dry, dusty and full of concrete blocks and holes, so next time we’d book a mobile home or a lakeside luxury pitch instead. The lake and the facilities impressed us enough that we’d still recommend it, just manage your pitch expectations.
Read our full Le Col Vert review
Homair Le Soleil des Landes, Lit-et-Mixe
I’ll be upfront, this is the lowest scoring campsite here and we won’t be going back. The pool was the most overcrowded we’ve ever seen on a campsite, the waterslide platform felt genuinely unstable with the crowds, and there’s no campsite shop at all, not even a small epicerie, so you’re walking an unpaved road to the nearest supermarket. We were there in August at nine months pregnant and couldn’t even find a seat by the pool.
It’s not all bad. The location right in the centre of the small town of Lit-et-Mixe was lovely, with shops and markets on the doorstep, and the beach shuttle to Cap de l’Homy and Contis Plage was a genuine win. This one suits families who just want a basic, well-located beach base in peak season and don’t mind a packed pool, rather than anyone wanting resort-style facilities. If you’re after slides and space, go for La Rive or Sylvamar instead.
Read our full Le Soleil des Landes review
Getting there
Most families reach this coast by flying into Biarritz or Bordeaux and hiring a car, or driving down through France. If you’re coming by ferry, the shortest driving option is often a Brittany Ferries crossing to Northern Spain (Santander or Bilbao) and driving up the coast, which several of these campsites quoted as around 2-3 hours away. Crossing to Northern France (Caen, Calais, St Malo) means more driving once you’re on French soil, so budget for an overnight stop if you’re coming that way. For more on routes and the nearest airports, see our driving guide and campsites near an airport.
When to go
We’ve camped this coast from Easter right through to late August. Easter and April at La Rive were warm and sunny with a genuinely clean lake that was surprisingly not too cold. June, July and August bring real heat, averaging mid-20s to mid-30s and we hit 40 degrees at Soustons. The Atlantic coast is famously changeable though, mornings can be grey and afternoons glorious, so pack for both. Outdoor pools generally run April to September, with indoor pools open whenever the campsite is.
FAQ
Which Landes campsite is best for toddlers?
Natureo in Seignosse, for the easy access to a shallow lake beach and forest, plus La Rive’s two side-by-side indoor kids pools.
Which campsite is closest to the beach?
Le Vieux Port in Messanges has a sandy beach with surf schools right outside the gate. Natureo is about 600m from the beach at Seignosse, right next to Hossegor’s famous waves, and Sylvamar is a 15 minute walk or 5 minute cycle from Labenne beach.
Is the Landes coast good for watersports?
Yes, especially the lakes. Le Col Vert sits directly on Lac de Léon with pedalos and boats, and La Rive’s lake lets you hire kayaks and paddleboards. See our watersport campsites guide for more. Just remember Le Ruisseau’s own pond is for fishing and looking at, not swimming.
Can you camp with your own tent in this region?
Yes. We’ve done it at La Civelle, a municipal site in Capbreton, and at Le Col Vert and Sylvamar on standard camping emplacements.
Is Le Soleil des Landes worth booking?
It’s a budget, basic option in a great town centre location, but the pool gets dangerously overcrowded in August and there’s no on-site shop. We’d point most families towards La Rive or Sylvamar instead.
Not sure which of these suits your family? Try our find your campsite quiz, it takes two minutes and points you to the right parc for your ages, budget and dates. And if you’re booking for the school holidays, check our summer holiday deals before you pay full price.
Planning your days out? Our things to do in the Landes and Hossegor with kids guide has the places we’ve been from these campsites. Camping somewhere else in France? We’ve also got guides to Brittany, the Vendée, the Gironde and the Dordogne.
