Cruising with children rewrites the anchorage checklist. The grown-up criteria (deep water, bombproof holding, a view) still matter, but they slide down the list below the things that actually keep a six-year-old happy: a beach you can land a dinghy on without surf, water shallow enough that you can stand up in it, and somewhere flat enough that nobody is seasick at anchor. We have cruised both French coasts with our two, and the bays that work for a family are a specific and slightly different set. These are the ones we go back to.
What "family-friendly" really means at anchor
Before the spots, a quick word on the criteria, because they are not obvious until you have spent an afternoon ferrying tired children through chop. A good family beach anchorage has gently shelving sand, so the kids can paddle and you can beach the tender without a wrestling match. It has shelter from the prevailing afternoon breeze, because that is when everyone wants to be in the water. And it has holding good enough that you are not glancing at the anchor every five minutes instead of watching the children. Get those three and the rest is detail.
Mediterranean: warm water and short crossings
The Med is the easy win for a family, because the water is warm by June, the tide is negligible, and the crossings between anchorages are short. The downside is the seagrass rules and the August crowds.
Plage d'Argent on Porquerolles is our favourite kid anchorage on the whole south coast. It is a broad sweep of pale sand on the sheltered north shore, shelters from the mistral, and the bottom shelves gently so the swimming is safe close in. You anchor off the beach buoys in sand and dinghy the children ashore to a beach that has a snack kiosk in season. For the wider island, the rundown of anchorages at Porquerolles and the Hyeres islands covers the alternatives when the wind goes the wrong way.
One rule you cannot bend on the Med: drop on sand, never on the dark Posidonia seagrass, which is protected and which fouls an anchor anyway. We run the free DONIA app and aim for the pale patches, which has the happy side effect of giving the kids the clearest water to snorkel over. Fines for the over-24-metre yachts that flout this run to 150,000 euros; for the rest of us it is simply how you anchor responsibly, as the Posidonia anchoring ban in France explains.
Atlantic and Brittany: white sand and big tides
The Atlantic gives you some of the most beautiful beaches in France, in exchange for taking the tide seriously. With children aboard, the tide is not just a pilotage problem, it is a logistics one: a beach that is gorgeous at high water can be a 200-metre walk across mud at low water, and a dinghy left on the sand at high tide floats away or strands depending on which way you got it wrong.
The Glenan archipelago, about 10 miles off Concarneau, is the dream. The white maerl sand and turquoise water genuinely look tropical, and the central La Chambre anchorage between Saint-Nicolas, Bananec and Cigogne is a near-lagoon of clear shallow water that children adore. The pilotage among the rocks is the catch, so we only ever go in and out around the same state of tide, and we treat it as a settled-weather destination. There are no facilities, so it is a self-contained day: pack the picnic, watch the tide times, and have an enormous afternoon.
On Houat, Treac'h er Goured is a 2.2-kilometre arc of fine sand backed by dunes, one of the finest beaches in Brittany, and it shelves into clean sandy holding with room to swing. It is open to the east, so we use it in westerly weather, and the walk over the dunes to the little village is a proper expedition for small legs. Belle-Ile and the wider Quiberon bay islands give you more of the same: sandy bays, but most of them fair-weather, so the forecast dictates the choice.
A blunt safety note for the Atlantic: with the spring range running 6 to 10 metres, a depth that looks fine on arrival can dry under the dinghy in a few hours. We always work out the low-water depth in the swinging circle before we let the children off the boat, and we drag the tender well above the high-water line. That habit has saved us more than one frantic chase down a beach.
Lerins islands: a fort and easy water
For a family cruising the Riviera, the Lerins islands off Cannes deserve a special mention, because they combine safe swimming with somewhere for the children to explore ashore. Sainte-Marguerite lies just 1,300 metres off the Cannes shore, and the moorings in the organised zone are free to use by day, between 0800 and 1800, so you can lie there for nothing while the kids swim in the clear shallows. Ashore, the Fort Royal where the Man in the Iron Mask was held gives an afternoon of pirate-grade excitement, and there are easy waymarked paths through the pines. Across the channel, Saint-Honorat with its monastery and vineyard is calmer and good for older children who can walk.
The water here is shallow and sandy in patches but shoals to under 2 metres at the north-west tip, so sound your way in and keep the children's swimming to the buoyed beach areas where motorboats are kept out. As everywhere on the Med, drop on the pale sand and keep off the seagrass, which also happens to give the kids the clearest water to snorkel.
Making a beach day work with kids aboard
A few things we learned the expensive way, offered so you do not have to:
- Anchor with more scope than you think you need, and dive or feel the anchor before anyone swims. A dragging boat with the parents ashore is the nightmare scenario.
- Rig a boarding ladder the children can use unaided, so getting in and out of the water does not need an adult every time.
- On the Atlantic, write the next low water on the back of your hand and check the dinghy against it. On the Med, watch for the afternoon sea breeze, which can build to Force 5 or 6 and end a calm swim fast.
- Keep the crossings short. A two-hour beat is a long time for a child; we string together anchorages a few miles apart and let the days be slow.
Keeping a long swim day pleasant
Beyond the safety basics, a few small comforts turn a beach anchorage from a chore into the best day of the holiday. We rig a shade awning over the cockpit before lunch, because a Mediterranean afternoon at anchor with no shade is misery for small children, and we keep the boarding ladder down all day so nobody needs help to climb out after a swim. A cheap inflatable kayak or a couple of paddleboards earn their stowage space tenfold: they give older children the freedom to potter around the anchorage within sight while the adults read. And we never anchor so far off the beach that the dinghy run becomes a slog, because the third trip ashore for a forgotten bucket is when patience runs out. None of this is expensive, and together it is the difference between children who beg to anchor again and children who would rather be in a marina with wifi.
The family shortlist
If you are planning a first family cruise in France, the Med is the gentler introduction: warm water, short hops, negligible tide. Plage d'Argent on Porquerolles is where I would start. If your children are a little older and you fancy the wilder, emptier beauty of the Atlantic, the Glenan is unforgettable, just respect the rocks and the tide. Either way, the trick is to let the anchorage, not the mileage, set the pace. When you are weighing whether to anchor or take a berth for the night with the kids aboard, the honest comparison of anchoring versus a marina cost in France helps, though with children we often pay for a marina every third night simply for the showers and the safety of pontoons underfoot.
