Guide contents · Chapter 1 of 14
French daily life for travellers
The shops that shape the day
French towns still run on small specialist shops, and learning the four main ones will transform your trip.
- Boulangerie. The bakery is the heartbeat of every village. Go before 10am: the best bread sells out by late morning, and on Sundays the queue starts early because everyone is buying for family lunch. Order simply: "Une baguette, s'il vous plaît" gets you the standard loaf; "une tradition" gets the better, crustier version for a few cents more. A baguette runs around €1.10–1.60 depending on type and region. Greet with "Bonjour" before anything else. Skipping it is genuinely rude in France. Most boulangeries close one day a week (often Monday); when one is shut, another in town is usually open.
- Boucherie. The butcher is where French cooking starts. Everything is cut to order, so point, hold up fingers for quantity, and don't be shy: butchers are used to visitors. Many also sell prepared dishes (stuffed tomatoes, marinated brochettes) that are ideal for the camp barbecue.
- Pharmacy. Look for the flashing green cross. French pharmacists are highly trained and act as a first port of call for minor ailments: insect bites, sunburn, stomach upsets, blisters. They will examine, advise, sell you the right thing, and tell you plainly if you need a doctor. Many can now treat certain minor infections under protocol without a doctor's appointment. Most medicines are kept behind the counter, so describe the symptom rather than hunting shelves. Every area has a rota of duty pharmacies (pharmacie de garde) open outside normal hours. Any pharmacy door will display the nearest.
- Tabac. The red diamond sign marks more than a tobacconist: tabacs sell stamps, phone top-ups, lottery tickets, and often serve coffee. Handy to know, rarely essential for travellers.
Supermarkets: the van traveller's ally
France's big supermarket chains are exceptionally van-friendly. E.Leclerc, Intermarché, Super U and Carrefour hypermarkets sit on town edges with huge flat car parks, cheap fuel stations, and frequently a motorhome service point (aire de services) or at least a jet wash and air. Intermarché and Super U are particularly good in rural areas; E.Leclerc is usually the cheapest for both groceries and fuel. Lidl and Aldi are widespread and great value but smaller: tighter car parks, no fuel at most sites, and a thinner fresh counter. A practical rhythm: do the big shop at a Leclerc or Intermarché when passing a town, top up daily at the boulangerie and market.
Watch the height barriers: some supermarket car parks bar anything over about 2 metres. Hypermarkets almost always leave an unbarriered section near the fuel station or garden centre, so circle the car park before giving up.
The sacred lunch hour and Sunday rhythms
Rural France still stops for lunch. Small shops, pharmacies, tourist offices and even some fuel-station kiosks close from roughly 12:00 to 14:00 or later, so plan your errands for the morning. Restaurants work the opposite way: kitchens serve lunch from about 12:00 to 13:30 and then close until evening. Arrive at 13:45 hoping for food and you will often be politely refused.
Sundays have their own rhythm: boulangeries and markets buzz in the morning, supermarkets typically open Sunday morning only (usually until about 12:30), and by afternoon almost everything is shut except motorway services. Monday is the other quiet day: many small shops and restaurants take it off. Stock up Saturday and you'll never be caught out.
Weekly markets
Nearly every town has a weekly morning market. Ask at the tourist office or campsite which day, or just watch for signs saying marché. Go between 9:00 and 11:30; by 12:30 traders are packing up. Bring a bag and cash (small traders may not take cards for tiny amounts). At produce stalls, wait to be served rather than handling the fruit, and say when you'll eat it: "pour aujourd'hui" (for today) tells the seller to pick ripeness accordingly. Rotisserie chicken stalls are a camper's secret weapon: a hot chicken with potatoes cooked in the drippings is a ready-made dinner for two or three. In high summer, markets in the south start and finish earlier to beat the heat.
Drinking water and "eau potable"
Tap water in France is safe to drink. On the road, fill your tank at campsite and aire service points marked eau potable (drinking water). The one sign to respect is eau non potable (common on cemetery taps, some village fountains and irrigation points): it means not for drinking, treated or not. Many cemeteries and villages do have potable taps, but only fill where it's explicitly marked (see the Fire-Season chapter for the cemetery-tap debate). In drought summers some communes restrict outdoor water use, so top up when you can rather than running the tank low.
Fuel strategy
Supermarket fuel stations (E.Leclerc, Intermarché, Super U, Carrefour) are consistently the cheapest in France, often dramatically cheaper than motorway services. The habit to build: never fill on the autoroute unless you must; come off at a town, fill at the hypermarket, and shop while you're there. Cards at the automated pumps, LPG (GPL) and adapters are covered in full in the Roads chapter.
Eating out without breaking the budget
The best-value restaurant meal in France is lunch, not dinner. Look for the chalkboard offering a menu du jour: a set two- or three-course lunch, typically somewhere in the €15–25 range, usually including bread and often better cooking than anything at that price in the UK. The plat du jour (dish of the day alone) generally runs €12–17. These deals are usually lunch-only, weekdays only, and follow strict hours: be seated by 13:00. Where the workmen's vans are parked outside at noon, the food is good; that rule rarely fails. Tap water is free and yours by right: ask for une carafe d'eau. Service is included in French prices, so tipping is a small round-up, not a percentage.
Where shops thin out
Most of France is generous with shops: even small towns keep a boulangerie and a mini-market, and a hypermarket is rarely 30 minutes away. A few areas are the exception, and they are worth planning around.
- Lozère and the Causses. France's emptiest corner. On the high limestone plateaux and in the Cévennes, villages may have no shop at all and the nearest proper supermarket can be 45 minutes away in Mende, Millau or Florac. Stock up before you climb onto the causse.
- High mountain valleys. Above the market towns in the Alps and Pyrenees you are down to village épiceries with short hours and resort prices. Do the big shop in the valley (see the Grandes Alpes feature) and treat anything higher as top-up only.
- Inland Corsica. The coast is well served; the mountainous interior is not. Corte has supermarkets, but between towns expect very little, and Sunday closing is near-total.
The rule that covers all three: shop in the last real town, keep two days of food and water aboard, and remember the Sunday afternoon and Monday closures bite hardest exactly where shops are fewest.