The villa has a secured lawned garden at the rear equipped with a BBQ, table and chairs for outdoor dining and garden furniture for sunbathing - alternatively you can take your meals undercover in the conservatory extension. The sejour room combines a further dining corner with a small but fully equipped kitchen area. Off the kitchen is a shower room/WC also housing the washing machine. An open wooden staircase leads to 2 interconnecting double bedrooms - one with a double bed and the other 2 singles. The conservatory which doubles as a second dining/sitting room has a double sofa-bed and a large screen TV. Its sliding glass doors lead directly on to the garden.

The tiny colourful port of Le Crotoy is crammed with 24 vividly painted working fishing boats moored at its marina and is lined with lots of sidewalk cafes, lively brasseries and good restaurants specialising in regional fish dishes and piles of gleaming mussels covered in cream sauce all fresh from the day's catch. In the evenings it's all a bustling Gallic scene - each restaurant competing for custom with some of the best seafood menus along this coast.

Whilst home to fishing folk since the 10th century the town is also noted as the last place of imprisonment of Joan of Arc. You may visit the site where she was kept prisoner by the English for several months in 1430 and walk in her footsteps as she was led across the vast Bay of Somme through St. Valery and on to Rouen where her fate awaited.

But, Joan was not Le Crotoy's only famous 'visitor'. In 1865 Jules Verne stayed at no. 9 now rue Jules Verne overlooking the port where his boat the St Michel was anchored and wrote his classic novel Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea. A little later, in 1899, Toulouse Lautrec set up easel in Le Crotoy and his portrait of his friend Maurice Joyant is on display today in the Albi Museum. The writer, Colette, often holidayed at Le Crotoy just after the turn of the century and the town is mentioned in her work. A walk around this still village-like old town with its compact fisherman's cottages and turn of the century villas is an interesting way to walk off your evening meal.

Le Crotoy was made for lazy summer days. Its vast sandy beach is the only south-facing one in northern France. At low tide you can stroll along the sand and rocks searching out all types of shellfish and molluscs. The wide stretches of sand are also the perfect place to try out the native sports of sand yachting, kite flying or you can treat yourself to a ride by horse and cart.

Easily reached by dedicated cycle route is next-door Saint Firmin-Crotoy with an excellent sailing school and wonderfully natural beach, Plage de la Maye. Along the way you will pass unspoilt countryside of ponds and tall grasses that provide refuge for endless species of wild birds. You may also be lucky enough to spot several wild herds of the region's Henson horses grazing in the landscape which is often likened to that of the famous Camargue.

Small and compact Le Crotoy offers an impressive list of attractions for all the family. Four cycles are included in the cost of rental and make an ideal mode of transport on the flat terrain of the town and region. Linen is available for hire. Electricity is metered and there is electric heating in all rooms plus a gaz heater for supplementary heating. The villa is available all year