So if you want a family camping holiday in France, packed with activities, big pool complexes, dynamic children’s clubs, some of the best beaches in France, and the chance to feed popcorn to giraffes, choose a stay at one of these holiday villages with siblu.

Beauval Zoo
Beauval is home to over 4,000 animals and the zoo has been described as one of the world’s 15 best. It has the largest elephant plain in France, an African Savannah with over 80 animals, one of the biggest sea-lion swimming pools in Europe and rare breeds including white lions and white tigers.

Where to stay: Domaine de Dugny is on the northern bank of the Loire river, close to many stunning chateaux. There is a pool complex, free children’s clubs, adventure playground, bike hire and fishing available. Seven-nights from 17 July starts from only £874, including a saving of £88 for bookings made before 28 March.

La Palmyre zoo
La Palmyre zoo is one of the biggest in Europe with 1,600 animals from across the world. It has a strong conservation programme and runs breeding programmes for endangered species, but children will be much more interested by how close they can get to many of the animals.

There are stalls selling snacks which you can feed to the animals, getting you really near to elephants, giraffes and zebras. Children will also love watching the polar bears swimming through their glass-walled tank, the parrot and sealion shows, the baby monkeys and the extrovert meercats who love to play up to an audience.

Where to stay: La Pignade is a scenic siblu village surrounded by woodland stretching to the nearby beach. There is a covered pool, horse-riding school and free children’s clubs. Seven-nights from 24 July starts from only £1,046, including a saving of £116 for bookings before 28 March.

Oceanopolis sea life centre
Oceanopolis, on the outskirts of Brest, is a high-tech sea-life centre with Europe’s largest marine aquarium. It contains polar, tropical and temperate zones dedicated to a huge amount of sealife. The tropical zone is the most impressive and has species including sharks and large sea turtles which you can see at close quarter from walk through tanks.

The polar zone is the smallest but has fascinating attractions including a penguin colony, a pack of ice seals and impressive giant crabs. There’s also an atmospheric movie shot from of a research ship crossing a polar ice flow.

Where to stay: Domaine de Kerlann is a four-star holiday siblu village in southern Brittany. It is a great base for exploring and has free children’s clubs, indoor and outdoor pools, a fantastic splash zone and multi-sports pitches. Seven-nights from 31 July starts from only £1,053, including a saving of £285 for bookings before 28 March.

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Our new brochure features 14 outstanding locations, in destinations as diverse as the heart of Normandy to the sun-dappled Cote d’Azur. You can see the brochure online or request a copy.

New savings include up to £125 off holidays in July and August for early-bird bookings made before 31 January 2011.  Easter seven-night holidays are available from only £265 for a family and Whitsun week holidays from just £340.

Our 14 holiday villages range from the large and lively to beachside and rustic. Every siblu village has free children’s clubs, evening entertainment and lifeguarded pool complexes, with guaranteed full facilities from May 21 to September 11.

Each Siblu village is a great base for exploring the local region, where families can discover France and find incredible beaches and seaside towns, wine routes and fairytale chateaux, historic monuments and dazzling attractions.

Domaine de Kerlann, in southern Brittany. has free children’s clubs, indoor and outdoor pools, a children’s splash zone and a variety of sports. If you book before 31 January, a seven-night holiday departing 16 July 2011 starts from only £583 for a family staying in a standard two bedroom holiday home. The price includes an early-bird discount of £103.

La Reserve, in the south-west region of Aquitaine, sits on the edge of Lake Biscarosse and has its own sandy beach which gently slopes into the waters. There is a vast pool complex with indoor and outdoor swimming, free children’s clubs, sports and bike hire. Seven-nights start from £1,147 per family from 23 July 2011, including an early-bird saving of £121 for bookings made before 31 January 2011.

Le Lac des Rêves is a sun-basked rustic siblu village located close to the cosmopolitan city of Montpellier. The parc has swimming and toddler’s pools, waterslides and a Jacuzzi, all overlooked by a sunny restaurant terrace and bar. Holiday homes are available from only £1,134 for a family, for seven nights from 6 August. This includes an early-bird saving of £123 for bookings made before 31 January.

You can find out more about all of our siblu villages on the siblu website. If you really want to enter the mood, take a look at our French website for added ooh la la!

Entries were submitted in two categories, for newspapers and magazines, and voted for by a panel of travel editors.

The winner of the Newspaper category was freelance journalist Ian Belcher, for his fantastic piece ‘Living high on the hog in the Languedoc’ for The Observer newspaper.  Ian’s victory was a triple celebration – this piece was named overall French article of the year, and he won a siblu holiday to France as part of his prize.

The Magazine category was dominated by articles from the fantastic France Magazine, edited by Carolyn Boyd. The winning article was ‘Flea for all’ by Kate Chappell, about her visit to Lille’s Grande Braderie in Lille – Europe’s biggest flea market.

One bugbear was that the online category was cancelled because of a lack of entries – a real shame when there are so many great blogs and travel writers working online now.

Of course, we are always disappointed when articles we love don’t win, so here’s a roll call of our favourites from 2009, from the Telegraph, Daily Mail and Daily Mirror.

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This grace period is now over and anyone stopped will be liable to an on-the-spot fine, so make sure you are carrying a warning triangle and high visibility jacket when driving in France.

A quick search on the internet under the term ‘road safety equipment’ suggests that these can be bought for under £10.

If the day of rest has already been affected, do these findings have any relevance on how we spend our holiday time?

I can remember an early MD who always installed a fax machine by the pool in his holiday villa (this was in the days before email), so he could issue orders and receive updates from his team back at the office.

Many people I speak to dread the first day back at work after a holiday because of the anxiety they feel about catching up and responding to emails. When I’m away, I often find myself flicking into the email section of my mobile phone to try and keep on top of the latest developments back at the office.

As my wife tells me, that’s not really the point of a holiday.

The Indesit research suggests that responding to emails over the weekend is one of the drivers behind people’s back-to-work anxiety, so the number of messages that drop into inboxes over the course of a holiday is bound to ramp up the worry levels when we’re away.

Perhaps we should follow the lead of one friend who deletes every email she receives while she is on holiday, under the assumption that people will contact her again if their message really is important.

I wonder if a technology-lite holiday, such as camping in France, is more restful because it gives us a complete change of environment?

Back to nature, playing catch with the kids, eating outdoors, no TV – this really is a complete change to our home life.

If we are losing time thinking about work when we are away, should we be booking 8 or 15 night holidays to give us one more ‘buffer’ day between our holiday and the office return, when we can prepare ourselves for that first day back? After all, if the weekend is only 1.5 days long, we need all the rest we can get.

Do you think you’re using getting the most from your holiday or do you spend time worrying about work? What tips do you have for relaxing, and is a buffer day a good idea? Tell us what you think.

So it was with mixed feelings I settled down to a Rhone Alpes sponsored lunch at a recent industry get together, when the host told us that there were three wines to try for the aperitif, three more with main course and another three for dessert.

I was less concerned with picking out the finer points of each wine, more worried about picking my way home afterwards.

Each wine was enthusiastically presented by a sommelier from one of the three vineyards taking part, and each sommelier obviously lived and breathed the bottle they were talking about.

It’s fascinating to hear people bringing to life the community and culture behind the different varieties of wine, in this case from Beaujolais to Côtes du Rhône.

And considering I am such a wine heathen, with a little direction even I could appreciate the differences in flavours.

Yet despite this input from the Rhone Alpes team, and even a recent course at the excellent Vinopolis wine tasting attraction in London, I’m still overawed by the choice when faced by the hundreds of different brands on the shelves of our local supermarket.

How do I know when I’m selecting a vintage that has been lovingly crafted or mass-produced cheap plonk? Does dearer mean better, or are there bargains to be had for under £10?

When you go on your holiday to France, do you try the local tipples and bring back ideas for your future purchases in the UK, or, like me, are the names of local vineyards and varieties forgotten as your holiday ends?

There are several really good blogs about wine in France, with my favourites including Sharon’s Wine Blog and Wineterroirs.

What tips do you have for choosing the perfect wine?