5 Best Sights in The French Riviera, France

This large, public sand beach, just east of the port and capitainerie (harbor master), is close to a restaurant where you can rent a lounger. Arrive early in the summer to claim your spot close to the sea. Note: you'll readily be able to discern the tourists from the locals, who tend to be attired in bottoms-only beach wear. Amenities: lifeguards; parking (fee); showers; toilets. Best for: sunrise; swimming.

The Arènes (often called the Amphithéâtre) can seat up to 5,000 and is still used for concerts and bullfights. Back down on the coast, a big French naval base occupies the spot where ancient Roman galleys once set out to defeat Cleopatra and Mark Antony at the Battle of Actium.

This eccentric chapel was the last designed by Jean Cocteau as part of an artists' colony that never happened. It's an octagon built around a glass atrium and is embellished with stained glass and frescoes depicting the mythology of the first Crusades. Above the front door, note the tongue-in-cheek painting of the apostles—it features the faces of Coco Chanel, Jean Marais, and poet Max Jacob.

Fréjus is graced with one of the most impressive religious monuments in Provence. The Groupe Épiscopal is made up of an early Gothic cathedral, a 5th-century Roman-style baptistery, and an early Gothic cloister, its gallery painted in sepia and earth tones with a phantasmagoric assortment of animals and biblical characters. Off the entrance and gift shop is a small museum of finds from Roman Fréjus, including a complete mosaic and a sculpture of a two-headed Hermès.

Northeast of Old Town and near the Porte de Rome is the Roman theater (circa 1st century). Its remaining rows of arches are mostly intact, and much of its stage, including the orchestra and substructures, are still visible at its center. Today, the site is known as the Théâtre Philippe Léotard (he was born in Fréjus), and it hosts Les Nuits Auréliennes every July.