France
Jul 10th, 2015, 07:03 PM
#21
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"I would like any advice on where to begin planning an itinerary. "
You have an incredible wealth of options! You might start at your local library, looking at some guidebooks -- perhaps the Insight or Eyewitness or National Geographic, which are, IME, the best for inspiration. See what places grab at your heart. Then you can start looking at some of the guidebooks that are mor helpful for framing a trip, like Fodor's and Frommer's and the Michelin Green Guide. Finally, the Rough Guide or Lonely Planet for detailed planning.
Enjoy!
You have an incredible wealth of options! You might start at your local library, looking at some guidebooks -- perhaps the Insight or Eyewitness or National Geographic, which are, IME, the best for inspiration. See what places grab at your heart. Then you can start looking at some of the guidebooks that are mor helpful for framing a trip, like Fodor's and Frommer's and the Michelin Green Guide. Finally, the Rough Guide or Lonely Planet for detailed planning.
Enjoy!
Jul 11th, 2015, 04:17 AM
#22
I think that you should work backwards - which places have the best connections to Malta, in terms of accessibility, reasonable departure times, etc. That gives you where you want to end up.
Most long-haul flights arrive at CDG, but you could of course fly from there to another city or get the train - depending on where you want to go. also it might be possible to fly into somewhere else - Toulouse and Nice have quite a lot of long-haul arrivals too.
With 3 weeks you could see quite a lot of France but there's a danger that you try to fit in too much and end up spreading yourselves too thin - I would consider having at least one full week's stay somewhere, perhaps in a gite, which ought to be reasonably easy to find during that time. There is also a growing trend for B&Bs in France; we stayed in a great one in Pampol once where they had a communal breakfast table and our french improved quite rapidly.
Both gites and B&Bs ["tables d'hote"] can be found here:
http://en.gites-de-france.com/?ges=R...k_redirect.php
Alternatively you should have no trouble just winging it that time of year - there are innumerable little hotels in France that you can just walk into and book a room and we have found some lovely places doing that.
This doesn't help much with the where, but perhaps it's a help with the how.
Most long-haul flights arrive at CDG, but you could of course fly from there to another city or get the train - depending on where you want to go. also it might be possible to fly into somewhere else - Toulouse and Nice have quite a lot of long-haul arrivals too.
With 3 weeks you could see quite a lot of France but there's a danger that you try to fit in too much and end up spreading yourselves too thin - I would consider having at least one full week's stay somewhere, perhaps in a gite, which ought to be reasonably easy to find during that time. There is also a growing trend for B&Bs in France; we stayed in a great one in Pampol once where they had a communal breakfast table and our french improved quite rapidly.
Both gites and B&Bs ["tables d'hote"] can be found here:
http://en.gites-de-france.com/?ges=R...k_redirect.php
Alternatively you should have no trouble just winging it that time of year - there are innumerable little hotels in France that you can just walk into and book a room and we have found some lovely places doing that.
This doesn't help much with the where, but perhaps it's a help with the how.
Jul 11th, 2015, 04:59 AM
#23
Join Date: Jun 2007
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Last May in France was very rainy and a little cool where we went, but the gardens were gorgeous. We drove around upper and lower Normandy and as far south as Argenton-sur-Creuse, looking for gardens, Plus Beaux Villages, and Villes/villages fleuries. Stayed mostly in B&Bs.
