Save up to 30% on Brittany Ferry crossings to France and Spain

[Wapping]

By booking one hotel night during your holiday.

I have created this sticky based on a contribution from Wessie, 01 March 2025:

Just made a booking for us to go to France in September. Overnight crossings with cabins came to £907 online, 2 bikes, 2 cabins. Out via St Malo, home from Le Havre.
I found a hotel in Saumur on the Brittany website that will do for our last night and rang the holiday line (can't book hotels online).
Cost of booking 2 rooms in the Best Western on the island in the Loire at Saumur, including breakfast, came to an extra £4.
This has made what was an initially expensive ferry pretty decent value. Other hotels will probably be booked direct where possible as likely cheaper. As stated above, you only need to book one night with BF to get the 30% off.

The website has an interactive map as they will ask for the hotel code when you want to book. The call handler was happy to compare two hotel in or near Saumur before I booked.

This is not the easiest page to find on the website but once there, use the map to locate hotels

Cross Channel Ferries to France & Spain - Brittany Ferries​

Sail direct to the best holiday destinations in France and Spain saving you miles of driving, fuel costs and tolls as well as giving you more precious holiday time
www.brittany-ferries.co.uk

 

[Popell]

Seconded, last Octobers trip to Spain, two bikes one cabin was looking at about £1100(approximate figures)
On advice from a fellow tosser, booked single night in a BF listed hotel, Los Tres Reyes in Pamplona and the entire bill dropped to about £880, absolute no-brainer. Probably ‘paid’ £20 more than best available price for the room but the saving blew away that little premium
Had previously assumed that all hotels needed to be bf booked, not the case.

Did notice that Fuente de is on the list, fab hotel, well recommended.
It seems that the Monasterio del Leyre is closed for refurb, anyone know a time frame?

 

[wessie]

I just checked the Best Western price for our dates and 2 rooms with breakfast for 3 adults is £235 for 1 night. That reduces the cost of the return crossing to a notional £672, including 2 overnight cabins each way. £336 each bike.
If we compare that to the tunnel, a return crossing is £108 on our dates. We would also need a hotel after travelling from Mid Wales, somewhere towards Rouen for onward travel to La Rochelle. Plus another hotel on the return leg. A cheap Ibis Budget is around £50 now. That puts the tunnel/hotel combo to £208 per bike, more if we use a better hotel. Then factor in an extra hour travelling via the M25/M20 to get to the tunnel and 225 more miles in France getting across Normandy etc.
The Brittany Ferries price does not look expensive now, and we have a leisurely 200 mile trip down through Brittany rather than a motorway slog over twice the length.
Something to think about if heading to Spain from a French port and using the La Rochelle area as your overnight stop.

 

[landmarkjohn]

We got Rosslare Bilbao return 1 bike 2 people, 4 berth outside cabin each way and 3 nights hotel in Potes for €720. Not a bad price.

Going out tomorrow night, it was booked last year when there was a €100 discount offer. Only problem is it's raining there next week

 

[AustinW]

Booking your trip as a holiday, ie adding a hotel with your ferry, changes the terms and conditions of travel considerably, mainly around any changes you made need to make to the booking, changes BF may need to make, and refunds if you can’t make the trip. Read and understand before you jump in and book or change your booking

 

[wessie]

Booking your trip as a holiday, ie adding a hotel with your ferry, changes the terms and conditions of travel considerably, mainly around any changes you made need to make to the booking, changes BF may need to make, and refunds if you can’t make the trip. Read and understand before you jump in and book or change your booking

You are replying from England to someone booking under Irish Law but they may have something similar to the UK

The ferry booking is protected by the Athens Convention and BF Conditions of Carriage.

Adding a hotel converts your booking to a package holiday so you get an additional layer of protection under ABTA if you are booking from the UK.

All visible here for the UK https://www.brittany-ferries.co.uk/information/terms

 

[AustinW]

if I was replying I would have quoted John.

I posted for general info for anyone thinking this was a way of getting a cheaper crossing at no risk. The risk is change to a booking is not as straightforward when you also need to change hotel reservations. Go onto it with your eyes open ( not yours specifically Wessie - anyone reading this thread and thinking of booking a holiday rather than just a crossing).

I’m off in just over a weeks time with two nights in hotels costing me £50 less than the crossing alone. 2 weeks ago I had a broken bike and faced the prospect of having to cancel the whole trip as it was too close to departure to guarantee BF would accept a change to dates. Fortunately the bike is fixed.

 

[fatbob99]

We got Rosslare Bilbao return 1 bike 2 people, 4 berth outside cabin each way and 3 nights hotel in Potes for €720. Not a bad price.

Going out tomorrow night, it was booked last year when there was a €100 discount offer. Only problem is it's raining there next week

And rain it did

 

[asifmo]

Just an alternative offer at the moment, 10 days travel Plymouth to Santander for £307 if you're happy on a seat. You can book a cabin for an extra £97 each way.

I thought I would give it a try rather than a slog across France as the cost would be similar for one way from Calais for me with 2 overnights.

(I've not done the maths if its cheaper to use the 30% with a hotel stay but it looks to be)

 

[wessie]

Just an alternative offer at the moment, 10 days travel Plymouth to Santander for £307 if you're happy on a seat. You can book a cabin for an extra £97 each way.

I thought I would give it a try rather than a slog across France as the cost would be similar for one way from Calais for me with 2 overnights.

(I've not done the maths if its cheaper to use the 30% with a hotel stay but it looks to be)

I'm typing this from the Pont Aven bar halfway to Santander and for me, the break even figure is around £700 using Plymouth, not only in cash terms but that you arrive in under 21 hours. The fact my crossing cost £470 makes it a bargain. Although 40 euros for dinner, 30 for a bottle of Pomerol and some beers bumped up the cost a bit. I'm worth it, though

 

[glyndwr]

I'm typing this from the Pont Aven bar halfway to Santander and for me, the break even figure is around £700 using Plymouth, not only in cash terms but that you arrive in under 21 hours. The fact my crossing cost £470 makes it a bargain. Although 40 euros for dinner, 30 for a bottle of Pomerol and some beers bumped up the cost a bit. I'm worth it, though

I am going to Bilbao from Rosslare next Tuesday 28th May and paid £260 each for two bikes and a cabin for 2 , A big saving on Portsmouth, I get free travel to Dublin from Holyhead so that's a bonus and no long motorway ride down south .

 

[albatross]

We are also due in June to Santander from Plymouth…rang BF on Friday and checked if they still honour their up to 30% discount as in their holiday packages…I had booked the crossing already 2 months ago and that that was difficult as most crossings are already booked..
…Sure enough, discounted my crossing with a booked star hotel in Bilbao for a £50.- per night, reckon that will do the job nicely…..

 

[handscombmp]

I've just rang Brittany Ferries to book for next year to get the discount to be told that they aren't accepting combined accomdation/ferries booking for 2026 yet.
They're also moving to a new system so don't know if they can book the ferry now and then the add the accommodation on with a discount later on.
New system should be live around September I was told.

Now I need to deicide whether to book a ferry now and take a gamble that i might not get the discount later on but i've got the ferry i want!

 

[Smartbazza]

i also used this when in spain last month. Booked one night in a Parador to get the discount.

Barry

 

[wessie]

Now I need to deicide whether to book a ferry now and take a gamble that i might not get the discount later on but i've got the ferry i want!

The price of the ferry will only go up the later you leave it, thus negating any discount you might get and you might not get the dates you want. One of the things that drives up prices on later bookings is that the cheaper cabins go so you end up in a premium one, or worse, only have a lounge seat available.

I booked last month for Sept 2026 and have a return for £481 from Plymouth with 2 berth cabin both ways. As the discount is only on the ferry cost, not cabins, 30% would be around £100, so pretty much what the hotel room would cost based on past experience, so no net gain. Of course, if you are going at peak season or from Portsmouth the costs will be higher so the 30% might be significantly more.

 

[John Armstrong]

I've just rang Brittany Ferries to book for next year to get the discount to be told that they aren't accepting combined accomdation/ferries booking for 2026 yet.

I've just been told that the holidays will be available end of September / early October. And, that you can then add the hotel bookings onto a booking to get the discount.

 

[John Armstrong]

I've just been told that the holidays will be available end of September / early October. And, that you can then add the hotel bookings onto a booking to get the discount.

And today, not till the end of October

 

[John Armstrong]

And another couple of weeks wait to be able book.

 

[Berin]

Does anyone know, if you book with the discount and then change the booking, is the discount lost?

 

[wessie]

Does anyone know, if you book with the discount and then change the booking, is the discount lost?

the key thing is that you are booking a package holiday covered by ABTA regs not ferry only booking conditions. These have their own regs you can see here https://www.brittany-ferries.co.uk/information/terms

there are other regs that apply such as Conditions of Carriage that set out statutory compensation for delays

Section 11 here https://www.brittany-ferries.co.uk/information/terms/holiday-terms deals with alterations by you on a package with ferry and hotel

There is a £25 admin fee. You will have to pay any extra ferry fare (remember the prices can go up substantially with their dynamic pricing) and any accommodation change less than 30 days notice will be treated as a cancellation not alteration.

Nothing about losing the discount so I would assume that as long as your revised booking includes a hotel, you will still get a discount on the new ferry price.