Hi. We are a family of 6 adults who will be staying August 20 - 24th in the south of France
We are looking for a beautiful city / village to stay that can also be used as a central base to Avignon, Aix-en-Provence, villages near Roussillon, and Marseille and others perhaps you can recommend.

We were thinking of Saint-rémy-de-provence. Yes / No/ Any other suggestion?

FYI We enjoy beautiful scenery, great food, wine. Not really into heavy hiking. We will have a car with us.

Thank you.

St Remy

IME, traffic around St. Remy can be terrible. Aix might be easier.

If you haven't already seen it, you might find some useful information in my trip report:
A stellar month in southeastern France

Aix is definitely beautiful. I posted a trip report recently- search my name. It is very close to Marseille. There are frequent buses from Aix to Marseille. Other people have posted here about staying in Aix and taking many day trips. Also the Aix tourism office leads regular trips to nearby towns. My vote is Aix.

You don't have to stay in a city/town for your base. With a car, you can stay in a village. Easier to move about that way.

The traffic in Aix is worse than St Remy. I like Aix a lot but it's not close to much except Marseille and the Luberon. St Remy is more central to Avignon, Les Baux, Arles, Gordes, Rousillion, CDP, Chateuxneuf du Pape, Pont du Garde, Camargue. You can stay in the countryside but then you usually have to drive somewhere in the dark for dinner.

I will definitely have a car. We will visit Aix - for sure. I am looking to where to lodge. I am also getting isle sur la sorgue. I like the idea of canals. So now not sure how to decide between isle sur la sorgue and Saint-rémy.

I greatly enjoyed my brief stay in L'Isle sur la Sorgue, but would warn you that traffic in the area around the time of its Sunday market can be horrendous.

We’ve stayed in St. Remy with a car twice and enjoyed it. Easy to visit the towns mjs mentioned above and also L'Isle sur la Sorgue for the Sunday market.

You might search this forum for Stu Dudley’s Provence trip reports. He and his wife visited there annually for many years and he gave great advice.

IME, traffic around St. Remy can be terrible. Aix might be easier.

I'm considering St. Remy for a week. Did you find the traffic terrible as kja said?

We've stayed in or very near Saint-Rémy three times and, as others have said here, it is very centrally located for visiting a large part of Provence. It never took long to get out of town and on the road. Aix (pop. 145,000, 460,000 if surrounding area included) is much larger than Saint-Rémy (pop. 9,600) and is not as centrally located. I don't find the town of Saint-Rémy particularly charming or interesting, but do find it a very convenient base for touring.