France Itinerary Options: Paris, Provence, Nice, Alps?
 

Hi all. My spouse and I have booked a two week vacation in France the first two weeks of June. This will only be my second time traveling abroad (we live in Alaska), our first trip being Italy in 2019. I'm trying to find a good balance to see a few regions, but also have enough time to enjoy them. We've decided on only 3 full days in Paris, we want to have time to explore other things and figure we are likely to be back in Paris sometime in the future. After Paris we plan to rent a car and use that to get around until we end up in Nice. The main differences between our options are that in A we spend some time in Annecy (go to Mont Blanc) and less time in Nice/Provence. I'm wondering if going to Annecy will be trying to do too much? We really enjoyed our time in the Dolomites in Italy, so I think it would be cool to get into the French alps, but maybe the Provence area will satisfy that? Option B we would probably have more time to explore the smaller villages in the area between Avignon and Nice, and do things like the Verdon Gorge and Entrevaux.

I really appreciate any feedback, on the options below or maybe something else we should consider to do or place to stay. As stated above I have only traveled abroad once, so we don't totally know what we like, trying to get variety but also balance what we are doing, and be efficient, so we can enjoy our limited time.

Option A

• travel day
• Paris 3 days
• travel day
• Annecy 2 days
• travel day
• Avignon 2 days
• travel day
• Nice 2 days
• travel home

Option B

• travel day
• Paris 3 days
• travel day
• Avignon 2 days
• travel day
• Moustiers-Sainte-Marie 1 day
• travel day
• Nice 3 days
• travel home

How many nights do you have?

I find it easier to plan by nights and where stayed than by days (just an opinion)

Avignon is not that big a "city" once you've done the popes' palace, the non-bridge and wandered around the fortifications and hung out in a marker/flea market depending on days selected that is about it. What do you like to do? I guess you could visit the aquaduct or another ancient nearby town (Arles/Nimes).

2 1/2 days in a location isn't much time - assuming that by "Avignon" you also include the Luberon villages, Cote du Rhone wineries & villages, St Remy, Les Baux, Dentelles, Pont du Gard, Uzes, Arles, etc. We've spent 23 weeks there - just to give you an idea of the many things to do & see in the region.

Mt Blanc can be a gamble. We were there for a full week in July a few years ago - and we could only see Mt Blanc about 3 days out of 7 and that was almost always in the morning.

I would not spend your "too little" time in Provence going to Moustiers - unless you also want to visit the Lavender fields near Valensole. It can be done as a day trip from the Avignon area.

See attachments

Stu Dudley

Yes, that may have not been the best way to format it. We will have one more day than night in each location. We would try to use our travel days to cover ground in between locations. Avignon would be more of a base for exploring the region both some of the ancient architecture, wine areas, and some of the smaller regions.

You might consider St Remy as a base instead of Avignon. Avignon is a tad hard to get in & out, and there is some very ugly urban sprawl in every direction (except west) that you'll need to drive through every day. Not the "image" of Provence you'll want to preserve in your memory.

Stu Dudley

Wow, thank you so much for those guides, I had seen some reference to them on the forums, but great to read through them.

Yes, by Avignon I mean seeing all of those things; Luberon, wineries, Pont du Gard etc. Thanks for the Mt. Blanc weather info as well, perhaps it is best to put that time towards south France and explore the alps on a different trip.

If we end up with the extra time in the south of France, the idea of the two nights at Moustiers was to try to break up the driving and explore more on the way to Nice. On our day from Avignon to Moustiers we would see some of the villages around the Luberon, the next day we would rent a Kayak in the Verdon Gorge, and explore some of the smaller villages in the area, the following day we would depart for Nice (4 nights) and explore some places like Entrevaux on the way.

After reading your guide I am reconsidering staying in Avignon and instead staying someplace smaller.

We stayed in Avignon and as mentioned above by Stu, it was a chore getting in and out town each day. Stay in St-Remy.

""Verdon Gorge, and explore some of the smaller villages in the area""

There are not any noteworthy ones - except for Moustiers. A drive to the Gorge & a kayak trip will likely consume an entire day. And you have very few (if any) days to spare. Read my itinerary and stay in the "central" Provence area. There are dozens of small villages near Avignon & Nice.

Stu Dudley

I'd like to suggest a rethinking of your itineraries. As they both stand, they give over an awful lot of time to getting from one place to another. France is a big country and you're going to be doing a whole of driving from here to there, with very little time to see what's around once you get there.

I understand the desire to see Provence and the Annecy area, both of which are beautiful--but I'm going to suggest that you eliminate both and consider an area like Burgundy, which is incredibly beautiful, full of ancient towns, abbeys, and chateaux, and an awful lot closer to Paris. This would give you a big dose of countryside without wasting tons of time on autoroutes. Or have you booked your return flight from Nice already, in which case I guess you're locked in.

You could include a stop at Vaux-le-Vicomte on your way south. It's about an hour and a half SE from Paris and is to my mind the most glorious chateau in France. From there it's easy to get to Dijon if you prefer a city or Beaune if you prefer a town, or any of a dozen other places you could base yourself. You could even divide your time and base in two places, one in the northern and one in the southern part of the region, and cut out some of the day-to day-driving.

It would be easy to carve out a three-day stay for Annecy if you like. It's about three hours from Beaune and would restore one of your choices--and a beautiful place it is.

I just think that attempting to cram the huge region that is Provence into this trip is looking for frustration. I do agree that Moustiers and the Verdon Gorges would not be among my highest priorities even though I loved both--but on a return visit, after spending many weeks in other parts of the region over a number of trips.

There probably won't be much if any lavender in the Valensole that early in June, BTW.

Hello

I don't know how I missed that string.

Hello much obliged for the very accommodating answer.

I haven't exactly dominated the hunt work on here.

I think I'll sit back around.

""Burgundy, which is incredibly beautiful, full of ancient towns, abbeys, and chateaux, and an awful lot closer to Paris.""

It is 1 hour closer by TGV, than Avignon. I would agree to skip Annecy - but I'm one who enjoyed Provence a lot more than Burgundy. However, Dijon (along with Toulouse) is our second favorite city in France, and Beaune is on our "top 5" list of smaller cities. We''ll be in northern Burgundy (4th try due to Covid) for 2 weeks in Sept.

My wife's Shutterfly books:

Provence & Cote d'Azur
https://stududley.shutterfly.com/28

Beaujolais & Burgundy
https://stududley.shutterfly.com/38

Click "Full screen" Due to Shutterfly enhancements, captions & titles are often missing or truncated.

Stu Dudley

I was going by the OP’s statement that they plan to drive from Paris to their other destinations. Obviously driving times are enormously variable, but for a ballpark overall estimate Viamichelin estimates the drive from Paris to Avignon at seven hours and from Paris to Beaune at three hours twenty minutes.

I haven’t had time to go through all the responses yet, I will do that more thoroughly later. First, thanks everyone for the thoughts, very much appreciated. Second, I did want to clarify I did not mean to say we would drive from Paris. The plan would be to either train to Annecy (if we did the alps) or Avignon (or somewhere nearby) and then rent a car from there. We would keep the car until we got to nice and then explore the area around nice using public transit.

It seems like by train we could get to Provence or Annecy in approximately 3.5 hours.

Are you flying out of Nice or returning from Paris?

They said that after Paris they would rent a car. This could be interpreted to mean either "in" Paris or "sometime after" Paris. I would never drive from Paris to either Avignon/Aix or Dijon. There is excellent TGV service to both regions. We've driven this entire route - but never all at once. The sun is almost always in your face the entire way, it is boring, and you could hit commute traffic near Lyon. We're taking the TGV from Dijon to Paris this year, and we always take the TGV to/from Provence. I recommend the OP do the same.

Stu Dudley

""It seems like by train we could get to Provence or Annecy in approximately 3.5 hours.""

2 hrs 40 mins to the Avignon TGV station.

We've taken the train between Annecy & Paris & it is slower. And it was also 1 1/2 hrs late - but the station is close to Old Annecy, so you can kill time!!

Stu Dudley

Hi all, I have had some time to read through the responses. Thanks for the feedback. To clarify, we will be renting a car after we train to Provence from Paris, and then returning it in Nice. We will be flying out of Nice to Frankfurt, where we will fly home.

After reading the responses I think we are going to cut Annecy (due to time, but also when I think about the Dolomites in Italy, we enjoyed the scenery but also really enjoyed how there were less people and it was a bit slower, sounds like that will be easier to find in the smaller villages in Provence than at Mount Blanc). We will spend 4 nights in Paris. 5 nights in (western/central) Provence, and then 4 nights in Nice. We will pick up the car in Provence and return it in Nice. We will train for our stay in Nice. After reading through the guide from Stu and some other comments and resources, I'm thinking we will base around St. Remy. We might do that for the whole time, or maybe 3 nights there and 2 nights somewhere else in the area, I'm not sure yet. Still trying to work out the details to make sure we have things to do or explore every day throughout the area.

I think your plan is a decent plan although 3 full days in Paris is not a lot of time. I also agree that St Remy is a good base for that part of Provence and I would not waste time moving to a second location in that vicinity.

good choice

I think your plan is a solid one, and I agree with mjs that moving to a second location really isn't necessary; part of the joy of Provence is the beauty you'll encounter as you drive from place to place over the course of the day.

I'm going to make one suggestion that reflects my own preferences. Instead of spending all your time in the St Remy area and in the busy Luberon villages, perhaps take one day and head a drop north (maybe 45 minutes) to the area around Vaison-la-Romaine. Vaison itself is a fairly largish town for this area, with a sprawling Tuesday market and popular Roman ruins. The area surrounding is prime wine-growing territory, with villages like Gigondas that produce very fine wines and are a delight to wander around. If you really want to get away from the crowds, there are small villages like Le Barroux where you may not encounter another tourist but that are extremely beautiful (that word again), just off the beaten track. The tiny villages of Le Crestet and Seguret are wonderful to stroll through and get lost in (okay, you can't get lost in Le Crestet). The scenery as you drive through the Dentelles de Montmirail is lush and green.

Anyway, I know this is a minority opinion, but I prefer this part of Provence to the more crowded Luberon. Just sayin'.

I agree that it may be a bit short, but we figure we will be back on future trips. Also part of it is based on our Italy trip; we spent 4 nights in Rome and 4 nights in Florence. Honestly at the end of our time at those spots we felt ready to move on. Not that we had necessarily seen it all, but I think seen enough for one time. They were a lot to take in.

Thanks for the idea. We are definitely interesting in see some of the wine country and Roman ruins. I think we will have time if we are there for 5 nights, I want to make sure we can fill that time up with things to do every day so ill put that on the list.

I also agree with frenchaucoeur that the area around Gigondas is beautiful! We visited for a day several years ago when we were visiting our daughter who lives in Provence. Le Barroux also has an interesting castle, and the drive through the Dentelles de Montmirail is lush and green and just gorgeous. We also stopped in another village/town for lunch. I don't remember the name but I am sure Stu Dudley has mentioned it before.

As Karen says the area around Gigondas is beautiful. We stayed 12 nights in Sarrians in June 2018 and would happily go back. Gigondas itself has a Michelin star restaurant which you should definitely try, their wines are excellent too. Do make a trip to Châteauneuf-du-Pape, the ruins of the old château in the upper town are interesting, there are also several tasting rooms in town. We particularly liked Beaucastel.

The drive around the Dentelles de Montmirail is beautiful, with several lovely little villages en route. As I said, we so enjoyed our stay we want to go back, but when is the question, so many places we want to see…

"Châteauneuf-du-Pape, ........... there are also several tasting rooms in town. We particularly liked Beaucastel.""

Does Beaucastel also have a tasting room in the village of Chateauneuf du Pape? We tasted wine at their wine estate quite a number of kilometers north of town near the A7 Autoroute. Details are in the attachment on my post #4.

Stu Dudley

Stu, you can’t buy wines at the Beaucastel winery, they asked us to go to the tasting room/shop in town. We liked both places very much, they also ship for you, something quite reasonable when we went.