klondike

My husband won a week's stay at a gite on Ebay and the owner has agreed to let us stay from Sept 18 through 9/24 ....now the planning begins!

for specifics on the gîte you can go to:
http://martinfamilygroup.com/france-vacations.html

We (2 couples) will have a leased car and be coming from Lourdes. It looks like taking the "scenic" route will almost double the time than if we take the autoroute. Mappy.com gave something like 7.5 hours if we take the back roads and from prior experience we always need longer than those estimations.

We were thinking of autoroute, with stop for lunch in Carcassonne for cassoulet and a short visit (3 of the 4 of us have visited previously) before getting settled in at St. Thibéry. Then during the week making day trips out and about.

Has anyone first hand knowledge of St. Thibéry? Besides Pézénas and Montpellier, any suggestions? We like art, history, architecture and just soaking up the ambiance (=lots of café/dégustations stops) Husband broke leg and foot some time ago and has not totally gotten his form back, so nature hikes aren't the best activity, though general walking with cobblestone streets is fine. A little beach time might be nice, but suntanning hours on end is not our thing, so a pleasant beach recommendation for people watching and relaxing would be ok. We're foodies, but not higher than 1 starred Michelin as a rule -prefer the mom&pop places, actually.

Thanks for any route, sites, and/or restauration recs!

Also, we need to drop my sister and her husband off one of those day at Nice train station for a night train to Italy. My husband and I aren't really big city types ...should we overnight in Nice anyway to see a little of Vieux Nice-where neither of us has been before- or return back to the gîte that same night? It looks like that would make it a pretty full day. Thanks again for any suggestions.

travginny

ttt

mpprh

Hi

St Thibery is well placed to visit Languedoc. It is also only 1hr to the Spanish border and Camargue.

For the first day, I'd take the autoroute across to St Thibery. It won't be too busy in September.

Some info :

Restaurants : http://www.the-languedoc-page.com/to...estaurants.htm
Places : http://www.the-languedoc-page.com/to...rism-towns.htm
Photos : http://www.the-languedoc-page.com/ph...hoto-index.htm

You are about 4hrs from Nice, so a stop over would be a good idea.

The nearby Etang de Thau is worth exploring.Marseillan, Bouzigues and Sete all have restaurants and beaches.

Peter

Michael

Does the night train start in Nice, or does it come from Paris? If the latter, why drive all the way to Nice to drop off your relatives.

klondike

Thank you, Peter. Very helpful links.

Good point, Michael. Originally we were trying to find a cheap airline from Nice, then switched to train. I thought I had checked into connections from Montpellier and that it made for an unreasonably long trip. But maybe I just got "stuck" on Nice; I will re-check this option.

mpprh

Hi

I've got low cost flight departures here :

http://www.the-languedoc-page.com/to...departures.htm

There are flights to Italy from :
Barcelona
Girona
Lyon
Marseille

Peter