michele_m

Mid-April, my family (2 adults, 2 children -11 and 8) have sorted out our 3 week itinerary except for the 4.5 days between Nice and our arrival in Paris. We're interested in seeing some of the Roman ruins, Pont du Gard in Avignon, perhaps the walled city (Aigues Mortes), or other highlights we may not know about. We definitely want to see Lascaux Cave, and would like to see a castle (Chenonceau, Chambord?).

We will have a car. We have not arranged our accommodations yet, as we're not sure of our itinerary for these days. If there's a castle where we could stay one night (for under $250), even better. We don't mind spending more of the time in Provence and the South Coast, and then having to power through a long day's drive to make it to Paris, as long as we see one castle and Lascaux.

We are leaving Nice on a Sunday morning (I know, I've gathered this is not ideal for seeing Provence, so we anticipate we may have to focus on seeing geography or ruins/bridges vs exploring little towns where all the shops are likely to be closed Sunday/Monday). When we arrive in Paris, we are flying out mid-day on the 5th day (Thursday), so must arrive within close driving distance the 4th night. We'll return to Paris for another week after our short excursion to Germany to see family.

I would appreciate some advice on how to spend an interesting few days(Sunday to Thursday noon) getting from Nice to Paris, as well as any advice on which towns to stop for the night. We'll have a chance to relax over Easter, so don't mind packing the days with sights and busy activity leading up to that weekend.

Janetd5

Returned last week doing the opposite drive - Paris to Toulouse, with 4 nights in Paris, then 9 nights on the drive. I also love Roman ruins, and the Pont du Gard is fabulous. It is located between Avignon and Nimes. (Saw it on a previous trip. Stayed in Arles, wonderful Roman sites!)

A good mid way stop enroute to the Loire is Sarlat-la-Caneda, a charming medieval town in the Dordogne, and not far off the A20. Near Sarlat is the prehistoric cave Font-de-Gaume. You can still visit the original cave, not a reproduction. Reservations are essential (can be obtained on-line) as visitors are limited. Also, the cave tour is given in French and my language skills are menu level, but just seeing the cave art – amazing.

This trip I wanted to see two chateaux east of Tours. Stayed at L'Hotel du Grand Saint Michel, located within the estate grounds of royal chateau Chambord, and a stones throw from the chateau. (Described by a 19thC writer as the skyline of Constantinople on one rooftop!) The location was fantastic - sunset/sunrise with the chateau out your window! Basic hotel room and reasonable cost; also, a very nice restaurant with reasonably priced fixed menu choice. Nearby is the chateau Cheverny, still occupied by family in one wing. Beautifully decorated. Of interest, the daily 3pm feeding of hounds! What an event! (Arrive by 2:30pm.) Chenonceau is an hour away. Definitely the number one chateau most want to visit (and for a very good reason - wonderful history, and lovely building and grounds). Hope this helps! Have a wonderful trip!

StuDudley

If you follow your original plan, you'll spend most of your 4.5 days in the car.

Nice to Avignon/Provence 2.5 hrs
Avignon to Sarlat/Dordogne 5.5 hrs
Sarlat to Tours/Loire 4.5 hrs
Tours to CDG 2 .75 hrs
Total driving time = 15.25 hrs, and this excludes stops along the way to visit sites, lunch, pottie, gas etc.

So:
- Leave Nice at 9:00 after breakfast & arrive in Provence (St Remy) at 11:30
- Drop off bags & drive to the Pont du Gard & visit 11:30 to 3:00. Lunch at the cafeteria there
- drive to les Baux & visit 3:00 to 5:30
- Drive back to St Remy, check into the hotel, and explore St Remy (many shops are open on Sunday) 5:30 to 7:00. Dinner at 8
- Next day, drive to the Luberon & visit Gordes & Roussillon and see some of the pretty countryside. 8:30 to 12:30
- Drive to the Walled city of Avignon & visit (much better option than Aighes Mortes, IMO) Lunch. 12:30 to 5:00.
- Drive to Tarascon, visit the castle. 5:00-6:30
- Drive back to St Remy
- Next morning, drive to Carcassonne & visit 9:00-2:30 - hopefully getting there before the last tour of the morning. Lunch
- Drive to Sarlat & check into a hotel. 2:30-6:00. Too late for Lascaux tour. Visit Sarlat 6:00-7:30
- Next morning take first tour of Lascaux - 9:00- 10:30 (I guessed at the "start" time)
- Drive 5 hrs to Tours/Chenonceaux, check into Hotel & visit Chenonceaux. 10:30 to 6:00.
- Next morning, visit Chambord (30-45 mins away by car) & visit. 9:00-11:00.
- Drive 3 hrs to Chantilly (near CDG). 11-2:00. Visit Chantilly Chateau. You could visit another chateaux in the Loire & visit Chantilly tomorrow if you will have time available before your flight.
- Next morning fly to next destination.

PLEASE NOTE how much time you have spent driving from site to site - and how few sites you actually spent time visiting.

Consider:
- After Provence, drive 3 3/4 hrs to Burgundy & visit the towns & chateaux there (much prettier region than the Loire, IMO). Stay 2 nights.
- After Burgundy, drive 3 1/2 hrs to Chantilly & CDG.

This is 9.75 hours of "dead" driving, instead of 15.5 for Dordogne/Loire.

Stu Dudley

StCirq

Why do you even want to drive? A car will be useless in Paris and it's a long and mostly uninspired route between Provence and Paris. There are only two things you seem interested in seeing along the way: Lascaux and a castle. A castle can be found just about anywhere in France, so that seems like a very small issue. Not sure why the cave has to be Lascaux, either (though I'm a big fan of it, even though it's a reproduction).

I would drive to Toulouse and spend a day or two there - you can visit Pech-Merle cave from there with a car, plus Carcassonne and a host of small, lovely towns if you like. Then take the train from Toulouse to Tours and find some tour operator that will take you to a couple of Loire Valley châteaux. If you are dead set on spending a night in a castle, I'm sure that can be arranged somewhere in the Loire.

Then, train to Paris.

michele_m

Thank you Janetd5, StuDudley and StCirq,

Janetd5,

I'll look into the alternate cave, though I think we'll be doing Lascaux too; my husband is keen to see it. Thanks for the suggestion of L'Hotel du Grand Saint Michel. Sounds lovely.

StuDudley,

Wow - thank you for the detailed itinerary! Much appreciated. I'll look into the Burgundy option - the sticking point is that we're pretty committed to Lascaux, which is right in the middle of a large area that requires a lot of driving to see it.

StCirq,
We decided on a car (these 4 days are the tail end of our car rental for 8 days; doesn't cost much to tag on the extra few days), even though we know some will be boring driving - seems more flexible and less expensive than 4 train tickets to each spot we want to see, and hiring out tour operators etc. We have no plans to keep the car in Paris. We have considered train from somewhere in the Loire to Paris - may still do that option if we can arrange to see what we want to see - I think we're set on Lascaux.

Thanks again! Your experience is very helpful as we plan.

StuDudley

>>StuDudley,

Wow - thank you for the detailed itinerary<<,

Except I had you staying 1 too many nights between Nice and CDG. I had
- 2 nights (Sun & Mon) in Provence
- 1 night (Tues) in the Dordogne
- 1 night (Wed) in the Loire

On Wed night, you need to be near CDG.

So - that means you should skip Provence entirely in order to visit Lascaux.

So:
Sunday
It is a 7 1/4 hr drive from Nice to Sarlat. With pottie breaks, lunch, hotel check out & in, it will consume at least 9 hours. If you leave Nice at 9, you will arrive in Sarlat at 6 PM. Lascaux is about 30 mins past Sarlat, so you won't have time to visit it on Sunday. Carcassonne will take about 2-3 hrs to visit - but you won't have time for Carcassonne either. Sunday is a 100% "in-the-car" day. Walk around Sarlat in the evening

Monday
Visit Lascaux first thing in the morning. It may consume most of the morning. In the afternoon, visit Roque Gageac, Castelnaud, and Beynac (probably won't have time for all of these). Stay overnight in Sarlat.

Tues
Drive 5 hours to Chenonceau. With check in & out of hotels, if you leave Sarlat at 9 you will be set-to-go in the Loire about 3PM. That will give you time to see only 1 chateau on Tuesday.

Wed
See another Chateau. It will take 3 hours to drive to Chantilly. So if you visit Chambord from 9 to 11:30, you will arrive in Chantilly around 2:30. That will give you time to visit Chantilly.

Thurs
Unless your flight leaves after 2 pm - you won't have much time to do anything today. You should leave for the airport about 4 hrs before your flight (time to get lost once, return the car, find your bearings, etc).

You have 4 days to "sight-see". That's about 32 hours of "quality" time available.

Your vacation for 4 days consisted of 1 hr at Lascaux, 2-5 hours visiting Beynac, Roque Gageac, Sarlat, etc, 2 hrs at Chenonceaux, 2 hrs at Chambord, 2 hrs at Chantilly. That's around 12-14 hours of "being there". The other 18-20 hours were spent in the car "getting there". Not a good ratio, IMO

The Dordogne is tied with Provence as my favorite region in France. However, I would never "waste" these many hours of a "too short" vacation, just to see Lascaux. Get a book about it instead.

If this was my vacation, I would spend the 3 nights in Provence. On Wed, stay in Provence most of the day and then return the car at the Avignon TGV station & take the 3 hr TGV to the Gare du Nord in Paris (PREM fares are around 40E each). Stay near the Gare, dine at Train Bleu (a "must see" in Paris, IMO), and then take the taxi to CGD on Thurs.

Stu Dudley

Michael

I believe that the Train Bleu is at the Gare de Lyon, not the Gare du Nord.

StuDudley

>>I believe that the Train Bleu is at the Gare de Lyon, not the Gare du Nord.<<

Yep - I was working on my own TGV tickets from Lille to the Gare du Nord earlier today - got confused. The TGV from Avignon arrives at the gare de Lyon.

Stu Dudley

StCirq

Well, do what suits you, but it seems like a really silly plan to me. And I don't understand the bit about the tour operators - where and why would you need those?

Figure in the cost of fuel and tolls, plus the sheer boredom of 18+ hours' driving just so you can see Lascaux and a castle - makes no sense to me. Plus you end up in Paris with a car that's completely useless there.

Oh. well.

michele_m

Hi again

Lascaux is on the 'bucket list' so we have been trying to figure out the most reasonable way to include it. I think we all agree it's not the easiest thing to include in our trip. We have family at home who are a 15 hour drive away, and have done the drive in 2 days - BORING! We know this is the least "holiday" part of our vacation. Thank you for helping me figure out the best way to do it.

We're more interested in Provence than castles, so as long as we get to tour one, we're good. It doesn't have to be Chambord or Chenonceau. They are just on the way once we're in Lascaux, so we figured we might as well see one or both of these. We'd rather spend the optional time in Provence and speed through the northern part of the trip. We'd be happy to spend 3 of the days around St Remy, Toulouse, and Carcassonne if there was a way to see Lascaux with the remaining 1.5 days, recognizing that we have to be within commuting distance to CDG by Wed night (flight is around 1 pm). Could we take a train to Sarlat on the Tuesday evening, see Lascaux Wednesday morning, and then train to CDG Wednesday evening? We haven't been able to figure that out, though. Is this even possible?

StuDudley,
I'd noticed the extra day once I took a closer look at the itinerary. It's still a work in progress, and I agree we'd rather find a way for the Provence-CDG commute to be by train. Our children are keen to take a train, so we're happy to take a train or two.

StCirq,
You mentioned "find some tour operator that will take you to a couple of Loire Valley châteaux" I gathered if we took a train to a town near Lascaux, we'd also have to be arranging a drive to and from the cave (I've not seen any indication that it's near enough to a TGV station to walk). Is it easy to arrange for a ride to see the caves without paying someone all the cash we might save on tolls and gas? We'll also be hauling our luggage at this point. I can't quite figure out how to deal with luggage while we're at the cave unless we stay overnight in Sarlat and ask the hotel to keep them while we tour. Are there storage options for luggage at Lascaux?

We looked for train tickets on SNCF French site already a month ago, and didn't see any of the PREM fares left on routes we were exploring. I think they get snapped up quickly. Since then, I've been figuring that two adult fares and two child fares cost more than extending the car rental an additional day, and I've been less inclined to plan the trip via train. I'm open to exploring train again - it means we can walk around and nobody has to be the driver.

PeaceOut

What's in Lascaux?

StuDudley

>>Lascaux is on the 'bucket list' <<

You need to empty the bucket, and fill it with things that can be achieved. Lascaux is not one of them if you also want to visit Provence for a few hours.

There are no reasonable trains between Provence & Dordogne/Sarlat. There is a train/bus combination that leaves Avignon at 6:40am & arrrive in Sarlat at 3:40 PM with 2 train/bus changes. There are later departures with 3 changes that get in later in the day. And once in the Dordogne, you'll need a car to drive from where you are staying, to Montignac to pick up tickets, and then drive to Lascaux to do the 45 min tour (hopefully the few English tours will not be sold out), then from Lascaux back to your hotel, and then from your hotel to the train station or keep the car & head north. Anyway you work this schedule, Laucaux will be quite "iffy"

St Cirq has a second home in the Dordogne which she has owned for over 20 years, I have spent 10+ weeks in the Dordogne. We know the "territory". Provence & Loire also (34 weeks in Provence for us).

There are other "difficult" logistics we have not even mentioned yet (like reserving & picking up tickets for Lascaux). Unless you stay 2 nights in the Dordogne - your chances of getting a good visit to Lascaux are in jeopardy. In April, Lascaux is open from 9:30 to 6:30. However, the last tour probably departs around 5:30PM. This means you will need to get to the Dordogne by 3:30PM to get tickets in Montignac, and then drive to Lascaux. Good chance that last tour will be in French & possibly sold out too. So for the first tour in the AM, you need to be in Montignac at 9:00 and at Lascaux by 9:30 , and the tour will probably be in French and will likely end around 10:30.

Use www.viamichelin.com to determine drive times yourself - since you obviously don't believe the times I posted. Sarlat is actually Sarlat la caneda, and Montignac would be the best place to stay overnight when you drive to the Dordogne for your 45 min visit to Lascaux.

Stu Dudley

mingwei1

I both sympathize with the bucket list and also speak as someone who has much pared down an itinerary based on advice from folks at Fodors for an upcoming trip. FWIW I was able to reserve with Lascaux in advance by emailing [email protected] and asking for an English tour.

michele_m

Hi again,

PeaceOut,
Have a look at some of the tour books, or google images, and you'll get a glimpse of the polychromatic detailed art in this cave, from several thousand years ago. It's not on everyone's 'must see' list, though on many travellers', including ours.

Mingwei1,
Thank you for the contact email to reserve our Lascaux tour.

StuDudley,
Both you and StCirq have been a wealth of information, and I appreciate your willingness to share your experience. I'm using both your driving time estimates and several of your recommendations in our planning (for this segment of the trip, and others from other posts). I did go back on the SNCF voyages website after my last post, and as you describe, there's no easy way to get to Lascaux by public transportation in limited time. So, we'll stick with the car and entertain ourselves best we can on the long drives.

I anticipate that any reading this can appreciate that a 'bucket list' is a very personal list, and not one that needs defending or justifying. We'll check this one off the list this trip to France, and hopefully return before long to explore the areas we merely skim this time.

Thanks again, everyone for your input.