As the Tigers head coach prepared to take his squad to France for the third game in this season's Heineken Cup, Howard said: "I know from my own experience of the French championship that it is a tough place to go and we are expecting a tough game.
"It is a small town and they have done a superb job being such a force in French rugby there.
"When I played at Clermont we talked about how difficult it was to play at Bourgoin, with a very passionate crowd in a small ground. But it is great for the players to play there and I enjoyed the experience."
Howard welcomes back his senior internationals, including captain Martin Corry, for a crunch encounter in the Rhone Alps region of France, and is delighted to head over the Channel with his side sitting in third place in the Guinness Premiership after a tough recent programme.
"I am obviously happy to have all of the internationals back," he said. "And I am also really proud of the guys who have played in the last four weeks.
"We had a poor performance at Northampton last week with a younger team, but there were still some positives in terms of individual performances. We beat Worcester, we were really good in winning at Wasps, got a victory over London Irish and against Saracens we started slowly but they are a reasonable side who did not lose a lot of players to internationals and we had our chances to win it.
"I am really happy with those guys and I hope for their sake that we can keep the momentum that they started."
Tigers follow this weekend's trip to France with a return encounter with Bourgoin at Welford Road a week on Saturday before the final Pool D games against Cardiff Blues at home and away to Munster in the new year.
"The back-to-back games, like we found out against the Ospreys and Wasps in recent years, are very tough," said Howard. "They are like a game of chess and you cannot afford to get ahead of yourself."
