Published in Sunday Times Travel magazine, August 2004

Vive le camping

A campsite in France has spurned sleeping bags and opted for four-poster beds instead. William Ham Bevan pitches up to have a look

IT HAD been a long time since I’d woken up to the patter of rain on canvas. Just as well, perhaps, as the sound held some miserable connotations for me: in particular, memories of being prodded awake, then booted out of a damp tent at six in the morning to fetch firewood by a senior member of the Scouts. Small wonder that since leaving that organisation (in shameful possession of the tea towel awarded to the ‘least enthusiastic Scout’) I had not spent a single night under canvas.

Fortunately, there are no such chores to face at Mille Etoiles, in the Lozère region of southern France – and there can be few better places to overcome 15 years of tent-phobia. This may be camping in name, but there’s not a groundsheet, guy-rope, sleeping bag or billy-can in sight; nor is it necessary to collect soggy kindling for the promise of a tin mug of stewed tea. Indeed, as soon as you become accustomed to the unfamiliar sounds of the woodland – not least the sound of silence – there is no great-outdoorsy fuss to worry about at all.

Lodewijk and Ruth, the young couple behind Mille Etoiles, call their concept ‘canvas chic’. It may be new to this part of the world, the River Cèze valley at the edge of Languedoc-Rousillon, but those who have stayed at a tented safari lodge might well recognise the mixture of luxury accommodation and low environmental impact.

Tents here are actually three luxuriously furnished yurts – replicas of the bell tent-like dwellings traditionally used by Mongolian nomads – standing on wooden platforms up the hillside. Each yurt has its own character. Papillon, the biggest, has a king-size bamboo four-poster bed and Oriental decorations, while Geai has an Indian theme. Ours, Libellule, was furnished in a rural French style. All three can accommodate two further beds for young children.

Mille Etoiles certainly pays more than lip service to eco-friendliness. The showers, half-open to the elements thanks to their porous rattan roofs, make use of rainwater that is heated by solar power, as the lodge has no mains electricity. Each yurt has its own lavatory hut a respectable distance away, with a composting latrine – spotlessly clean, of course. By night, the paths linking the yurts in the chirruping woodland are lit up with candles and lanterns.

On the afternoon of our arrival, we sat with the family on the veranda of their cottage, where guests can join them for a table d’hôtes dinner twice a week. Ruth explained their vision for the lodge: ‘We want to keep this place special. We don’t want to get on the mains, or build any more capacity here. If we expand, as we plan to do, we’ll do it elsewhere, and make sure this place stays unspoilt.’

We cracked open some cold beers and enjoyed the peace and quiet. ‘It’s only when you come to a place like this that you realise how much the city has got under your skin,’ said Lodewijk. That night, I found out just what he meant.

Back home in London, car alarms, police sirens and passing drunks have no more chance of stirring me from sleep than a pin dropping in the street. Yet on my first night at Mille Etoiles, the sounds of the French woodland lulled me into such a gentle slumber that I found myself yanked back to consciousness with a start, springing bolt-upright in bed, at nothing more than the patter of a light shower on our tent roof.

The next morning, we woke early, and devoured the warm croissants, coffee and fresh fruit that were served up in a small clearing by our yurt. Then it was time to explore. The surrounding area, between the Cèze and Ardèche rivers, is a patchwork of rolling plains, bounded by wooded, Toblerone-shaped hills and deep limestone gorges. It remains relatively undisturbed by British holidaymakers and property-hunters. The region is famous for its Neolithic ruins; the nearest sizeable settlement, Barjac, has prehistoric roots, and is now an unfussily pretty small town with a noted Friday market.

The lodge can arrange activities, with kayaking and horse riding two of the most popular. We chose the latter, and at some nearby stables, entrusted ourselves to a laconic Dutch horseman who bore a remarkable resemblance to the 1970s TV detective Van Der Valk. After our two-hour trek, my girlfriend gushed that this was easily the best way to experience the beauty of the French countryside. I was in no position to argue; as a first-time rider, I had been preoccupied with clinging on for dear life, my eyes locked straight ahead, until the swishing tail of Van Der Valk’s grey mare had burnt a ghostly after-image into my retinas.

Many guests choose to do little but relax at the lodge, savouring the chance to get close to nature. The locals spend much of their time doing likewise, though in a different sense: as Lodewijk explained, this landscape is prime hunting territory due to the vast numbers of wild boar. How this came to pass is held up as an environmental cautionary tale. ‘Boar were reintroduced, but then they bred with domestic pigs,’ he told us. ‘The wild boar breeds only once a year, but this hybrid can have two litters – so the place is teeming with them. They can be noisy, but they’re not normally dangerous. We get more of a shock when the nudists from up the valley come ambling on to our land.’

Of feral hogs and wandering naturists, we saw nothing. But by the end of our stay, it seemed as though we’d spent a lifetime dozing on the hammock, to the soundtrack of rustling leaves, chirping insect life and the occasional screech owl.

That’s the real wonder of getting back to nature, even in such luxury as this: being able to surrender to your senses, rather than continually having to block them out. As we left, something told me I’d be somewhat less oblivious of the nocturnal police sirens and car alarms of London for the next few weeks. Time to invest in some earplugs.

Factfile
One week’s hire of a yurt at Mille Etoiles (00 33 446 242181, www.canvaschic.com) costs from £368, including breakfast each day. A table d’hôtes dinner is available twice weekly for £14 per head, including wine.