That morning, I got my trainers out for a refreshing walk in the forest with the children. We had planned to head towards the viewpoint in Saint-Hilaire-de-Riez forest.
An idea for a family outing in Saint-Hilaire-de-Riez forest
I parked my car on the edge of the forest and, with my budding explorers in tow, we set off along the trail ‘la petite randonnée des dunes’ (the little tour of the dunes). My little hikers were delighted.
Kids, we’re following the yellow trail, and as soon as we see pink markings, that’s the way to go.
I explained to them that this is a man-made forest and most of the trees were planted in order to keep the dunes in place. As we were walking, we were on the lookout for the pink markings, to indicate our route for the day.
We discovered the world of the forest with pine needles covering the ground, pine cones dotted here and there. “No, we’re not allowed to take them home with us!” We even saw a squirrel running along a tree branch!
Our goal was to reach the viewpoint and admire the breath-taking view
Along the way, we saw some other walkers heading up a steep path, we decided to follow them to see what we would see at the top. “Come on, not far to go now”.
When we got to the top, we looked around and… Wow, what a view!
The view was breath-taking!
We were looking down across the forest with the Atlantic Ocean in the distance.
The view definitely made the uphill climb worthwhile!
We sat down up there for a few minutes to admire and just take in our magnificent surroundings.
When we got back to the car, we picked up our picnic, and crossed over the road to the fitness trail, so that the children could play at the playground before going for a walk along the beach nearby where we stopped for our lunch. All that walking worked up quite an appetite!
