The house is located in Ste. Marie de Re close to the old village center in a very quiet, albeit very narrow, picturesque street. The house has been owned by the same family for over 40 years, the last long term resident was a painter who was fascinated by the picturesque island and above all the unique quality of the light here on many days of the year. We continue to try to maintain the special character of the house. The house is attached on the Northern side to the neighboring house and therefore it remains pleasantly cool all through hot summer days.
    The walking distance from the house to the beach is about 10 minutes. In Ste.Marie de Re, the coast has a sandy beach with a long stretch of the typical lime stone going far out into the Atlantic. Swimming is easily possible at high tide, at other times one should wear plastic sandals to prevent injuries on the way into the water (there are plastic sandals in many sizes available in the house). The tide pools and little limestone caves provide an exciting playground for little children and grownups alike during low tide. The distance to the next beach without limestone (Plage de Gros jonc) is about six km away and it can be reached in about 20 minutes using the bike lane or the road leading to Le Bois.
    All necessary shops are within walking distance from our house (a supermarket, a bakery, doctors, a pharmacy, two restaurants). Also within walking distance is the Institute for Thalassotherapy 'Neptune' (www.thalasso.net; www.cofrase-thalasso.com/poitou-charentes/indexde.htm). Their heated sea water pool is extremely pleasant especially on cool or rainy days.
You can park your car in the immediate vicinity of the house on the street or on a larger parking lot at the church and in front of the town hall (the latter are both about a 2-minutes-walk from the house).

The beautiful courtyard (about 200 square meters = 1860 sq. ft.) has sun all day long (there is plenty of garden furniture and a table for extensive family meals outdoors). The courtyard is bordered by a typical high stonewall (2.5 m = 8.2 ft. high) that provides complete privacy. There is are a grill, five bicycles plus some beach equipment available for our guests. All rooms are open to the courtyard, i.e. the rooms are not connected with each other directly; so you have to go through the courtyard in order to get from the large living room (with fireplace) to the bathroom, to the kitchen or to the upstairs. The stairway to the upstairs bedrooms also leads up directly up from the courtyard; a little covered balcony upstairs is very pleasant for a siesta (there is a hammock!) or enjoying the outdoors even during inclement weather (although the Ile de Re has as many sun hours as the Riviera!), sitting at a little coffeehouse table.

There is a long hallway upstairs from which all the bedrooms can be reached. The whole upstairs has beautiful wooden floors. Upstairs there are 4 large bedrooms, three of them equipped with a sink with warm and cold water. One bedroom has a crib in addition to two individual beds, the other three bedrooms have a queen size (double) bed each. All in all there is room to comfortably house eight people plus a child upstairs. In addition, the sofa in the living room can be transformed into a double bed for two additional guests, so it is possible to house up to ten adults plus one child.

Bedding and sheets are available in suitable quantities. BUT: You should discuss with us whether you bring your own towels and sheets/ duvet covers when you make your contract or contact the manager about this question.

There is a second new bathroom upstairs now, making the stay of a larger group of people much more enjoyable.

The downstairs bathroom, with the toilet in a separate room, contains a shower and a sink. The upstairs bathroom is equipped with shower, sink, and toilet.
The kitchen is furnished with a table, 6 stools, gas stove, large refrigerator, oven, sink, kitchen utensils and china for ten people, coffee- and espresso machine plus a toaster with grill, dishwasher and a washing machine (you can dry your laundry on the clotheslines outside or up on the balcony.
The large (55 square meters = 510 sq. ft.) living room with a gorgeous fire place (usually there is wood ready for use in the court yard) has a dining table plus chairs for eight people plus another oval table with chairs for four additional people, a convertible sofa, two antique cupboards (with games, books, sheets and towels) and a moveable easel.
Five bicycles plus a kids' bicycle are available for our guests. Do bring your own helmets! And please DO NOT bring the bicycles onto the beach/ into the sand, the chains get ruined from the sand!

There is a phone in the house : (33) for France (0)5 46 27 06 67 ; you can use this phone with a prepaid phone card and you can receive calls from elsewhere as well, of course.

A more complete inventory with practical questions like 'when do the trash collector come? ' is HERE, and a list of 'where to find things' and how to operate them is found HERE. Please print out both of these lists plus the page with contacts before you travel to the island - that way you will be able to look things up when you need to.

The house is taken care of by property managers living on the island. They give out the keys, organize the final cleaning (which is included in the price), take care of the deposit etc. (details will be prearranged with Irmingard Emanuel or Maria Gogarten when finalizing a contract, see contacts) and they help with any upcoming problems during your stay. Mme. Bobinet is fluent in French, German and English, so there will be NO communication problems.

Please do inform the MANAGERS of your approximate time of arrival shortly before your vacation starts; normally they will expect you at the house (address and instructions how to get there will be given to you with your finalized contract).

After a substantial amount of our linens vanished tracelessly, we now generally ask our clients to bring their own bedlinens (duvet covers for the 220x155 and 135x200 silk or woolen blankets) and towels.
But if you want to use the ones in the house (we understand that often the extra baggage is a problem) you will have to pay the final cleaning/laundry (the manager takes care of that; they charge about 8 Euro per load in the washing machine). Please settle that question of what you bring yourself and what you will need from our linen/towel supplies beforehand with the owners or the managers.

In order to offer you the best service the house is thoroughly cleaned before your arrival. However please check following before leaving after your vacation:
-all kitchen utensils should be clean / the refrigerator needs to be empty and clean
- fire place and BBQ should be left empty and clean
-unwashed house and bed linen should be collected and placed in the basket.

Electricity will be charged according what you have actually used (meter readings).
The house can be used without extra heat from April through October. During the rest of the time one has to use electric heaters for individual rooms.

We have a sliding price scale depending on the season and the number of people occupying the house; seniors' rebates are available. The following prices are per week (usually Saturday 5pm to Saturday 10am) including the final cleaning  without the final linen/towel laundry and without the town's vacation tax. Electricity will be charged according to meter readings.

We will charge 50 Euro in addition to the final rent per one dog (because there is additional cleaning).

Usually we rent out for a week, but we might consider short term rentals for less than a week in the off-season as well.

Off-Season: April, May, June, September, October.
Depending on the amount of people that occupy the house, the time frame and the length of your stay  we have flexible and low prices which we will gladly give you upon request.

July and August are main season:
we charge 990Euro per week.

For parties below 6 people we can talk about reductions in price. All prices are given in Euro! (Currency Converter)

Interested parties should contact Maria Gogarten under iledere@carrot.mcb.uconn.edu

Also see contacts page for more email addresses and phone numbers.
See also : http://home.arcor.de/iemanuel/  for more photos, information and more links.