France: Burgundy, Provence and Paris Itinerary Help
 

We are planning an eleven day trip and appreciate your thoughts and help with the following itinerary.

Day 1: Land CDG 10:30am, train to Beaune. Pickup car. Stay in Beaune
Day 2: Travel Around Beaune, 2nd night in Beaune.
Day 3: Travel around Beaune. 3rd night in Beaune.
Day 4: Travel to St Remy (4 hr train thru Lyon). Stay in St Remy
Day 5: Travel around Provence. 2nd night in St remy
Day 6: Travel around Provence. 3rd night in St remy
Day 7: Travel from Provence to Paris (TGV).
Day 8 -11: Paris

We dropped Lyon, and opted for a 3rd night in Beaune, rather than 1 night in Lyon. Is this recommended, and would this be enough to get a sampling of the area, without too much traveling in between?

Are you picking up a car on Day 4? There's no train station in St-Rémy.

I was also wondering how you intended to take a train from Beaune to St Remy.

I would never spend 3 nights in Beaune myself, what a big snooze. But you might like it if you intend to travel around the countryside a lot. Beaune isn't very big and there isn't much to do there. It's really hard to know what to make of your schedule because it totally depends on your interests. To me, i'd much rather stay in Lyon or Dijon than Beaune, which I found dull, but I have zero interest in buying wine on a trip or going to wine shops or wine tasting. Actually, I do like wine a lot, so I like to taste it in France, but at restaurants and cafes, I don't have any interest in going to vineyards to do wine tasting as I wouldn't see the point. I'm not going to buy wine and ship it home on a trip, so what's the point. But I know some people do, so if you are on a wine buying trip, that could make sense. It's just a real small town, that's all.

Otherwise seems okay, the amount of time you have places. YOu just need to figure out that train thing. And if that means you aren't even going to have a car, I really would drop Beaune and stay in a city like Dijon or someplace with better things to do and more transportation options.

Yikes. Maybe this is too slow a pace? I should clarify, that we were going to rent a car in Beaune, travel around the area, and return the car in Beaune. Then, we were thinking of taking the TGV from Beaune to Avgnon, renting another car, and driving into St Remy (30min to 1hr). we would be using St Remy for our base in Provence. again, we would return the car to Avignon, and TGV back to Paris.

In both Beaune and St Remy, we wanted to use each of these locales as a base to explore the area. We do enjoy the overall wine experience and our interests lie in visiting vineyards, meeting vintners and tasting and learning about their product.

Appreciate the continued feedback!

I think your itinerary is just fine. We spent 2 weeks in a Gite near Beaune & kept busy every day. We've lived near the Napa/Sonoma area since '75, so we gave up visiting wineries about 15 years ago - although we are big-time wine drinkers. Beaune is not large, but it has a very nice cafe scene & lots of good restaurants. Getting in & out of Beaune is much easier than getting in & out of Dijon or Lyon. I would never base in Lyon and try to visit the countryside from there. We got caught in the commute traffic in Lyon once - what a mess!!!

One change to your itinerary that I would recommend would be to drive from Beaune to St Remy. It is about a 4 hr drive and door-to-door would be much quicker than a train - especially if you have to return the car in Beaune (as I recall, the rental office is not close to the train station) and then re-rent a car in Avignon. Once you get out of Burgundy, the scenery along the autoroute isn't that great until you get to upper Provence.

Stu Dudley

>>We do enjoy the overall wine experience and our interests lie in visiting vineyards, meeting vintners and tasting and learning about their product. <<

That is hard to do in France, unless you have an "in" with some specific vintner. You don't just "wander in" to a winery and state what you want to do - especially at the major wineries. There is an "active" thread on Fodors about Beaucastel in Chateauneuf du Papes. We went there in '99 and got a great tour. Actually we initially visited it in July and just walked up to the winery and asked about a tour - and they said that they were booked up solid for that week and the next week. We returned in Sept & made a reservation in advance and got a great tour & tasting and everything we wanted to do.

Stu Dudley

We loved burgundy and have spent over a week there without being bored. A day driving through the countryside, a day in beane, a day in Dijon, and that's just scratching the surface. To me, it is exactly what I expected rural france to look like...not to mention the wonderful food and wine...heaven!

Don't miss the marches aux vins wine tasting in their cellars in Beaune! http://www.marcheauxvins.com/vin-bea...e-tasting.html

Meant to add we did the same trip and just drove to st remy from Beaune. Takes several hours, but it was easy and we stopped in Orange to see the roman arena to break up the trip. That way you don't have to hassle with dropping the car, taking the train and picking up the car again.

Here is our trip report from our trip in 2006
http://www.fodors.com/community/euro...rip-report.cfm

Thanks Stu and Jamikins for the tips so far. Jamikins - the glimpses of the trip report that I've just read have been very entertaining (especially at the gas station). Thanks for sharing that, and I am looking forward to reading all about it.

So with the input so far, I've made a little change in the middle:

Day 1: Land CDG 10:30am, train to Beaune. Pickup car. Stay in Beaune
Day 2: Travel around Beaune. 2nd night in Beaune.
Day 3: Travel around Beaune. Drive south to Lyon/Beaujolais region, stay the night outside of Lyon/near Beaujolais.
Day 4: Travel around Lyon region, and drive south to St Remy (about 3 hours). Stay in St Remy
Day 5: Travel around Provence. 2nd night in St Remy
Day 6: Travel around Provence. 3rd night in St Remy
Day 7: Travel from Provence to Paris (TGV).
Day 8 -11: Paris

Since we'll have a car, I just moved on the 3rd day, rather than stay again in Beaune. Help appreciated, is this a good idea?

I would just stay in Beaune & visit stuff in that region. When we stayed in Beaune for 2 weeks (as I previously noted), we preceded that stay with 2 weeks in Beaujolais. We liked both regions equally, but for "efficiency" reasons - I would not spend any excess time on the road getting to a new location.

If you do decide to stay in Beaujolais, the Gite where we stayed also has 2 B&Bs. The setting is stunning - it is one of the few B&Bs listed in the Michelin Red Guide. It is actually a winery - and the owner speaks perfect English (they are French - but earned their money in the US). He will give you a tour/tasting and will discuss wine stuff with you. Just let him know you are interested when you reserve.
http://www.vatre.com/

FWIW, some of the best restaurant meals we had were in Burgundy (we dine out in France 30-40 times each year). However, meals in Beaujolais were about 85% as good as the ones in Burgundy at 2/3 the cost.

Stu Dudley

Pick up the car on day two. You'll be too tired on day one to drive around, and there is enough to see in Beaune itself.

The Gites-de-France site also has pictures.
http://www.gites-de-france.com/locat....1.1301.G.html

Stu Dudley

If I was doing this trip, staying in Beaune for 3 nights works as others have said.

So much to visit outside of the town and it is a lovely town to base yourselves.

A little info. www.burgundyeye.com www.burgundy-tourism.com

If you want tips and idea for St Remy, check my new blog "St Remy and around"
http://saintremydeprovencetourism.blogspot.fr/
Hope this will help

I don't believe the TGV goes to Beaune. It does stop at Dijon and we've taken the train from there to Paris several times. Also, many car rental offices are at the Dijon station (Europcar, Avis etc.).

The drive from Dijon to Beaune is less than an hour and through some of the world's finest wine country. Given your arrival time you should be able to stop if you want.

Driving from Beaune to St. Remy wouldn't be awful and there's some pretty country along the way. That way you wouldn't have to go through the car rental process again. You can plot a route at www.viamichelin.com.

Yes, the train goes into Dijon and the car rental places are right at the station. They do close between 12 - 2 I think so time your trains appropriately!

>>Yes, the train goes into Dijon<<

Yes - but there are no departures from CDG. Best thing is to take the TGV to Lyon and then catch a train back to Beaune. There are departures from CDG at 10, 12, and 2 that get you to Beaune about 4 1/4 hrs later.

Stu Dudley

Remember that two short term car rentals might be a lot more expensive than one longer one.