We stayed at 4 hotels in France, all from the Fodors guide. All worth re-visiting, I'd say. Provence, Dijon, and Paris. Prices ranged from $60 to $110. <BR> <BR>The best two were Axial-beaubourg in Paris (Marais district), and D'Arlatan in Arles. Clean, decent showers, well located. Helpful staff. These were the more expensive pair. <BR> <BR>The 'hotel du palais des Papes' in Avignon was decent (clean, OK bedroom), and in a perfect location, but the bathroom was SMALL! You could not sit on the toilet properly, even! (while the bidet had pride of place) and the shower was microscopic, with a fabric curtain that did little to stop water going everywhere (possibly giving rise to the mosquito problem?). <BR> <BR>The Hotel Wilson in Dijon was OK; very cheap, and decent shower, but just a little far from the 'center' given that it was raining (bus #9 stops outside, though). Also, we left our window open one evening and were eaten alive by mosquitos! If only they had screens on the windows... <BR> <BR>None of the breakfasts were as good as those had in similar establishments (for free) in Italy; but then, you can walk around town and get a great breakfast (the coffee was the weak point; and no cold cuts - just croissants, etc - except D'Arlatan). <BR>

This is a very helpful post. Lots of first hand info. The unfortunate part is that it will be hard to retrieve when you need it. Wish there was some way to get to this stuff easily without making hard copies of everything you think you might find useful someday or trying to keep an index of hotel names, etc. to search the site with later.

Chris, <BR> <BR>I've made a couple of inquiries to the D'Arlatan with no response. Do you recall how you made your reservations? I am looking to book in May 2002, could that be part of my problem? <BR> <BR>Thanks for the information on the hotel in Avignon, I was checking into that as well and figured there was a "catch" to the price.

Don't see why that post would be hard to retrieve as the 3 major cities (Avignon and Dijon and Arles) are mentioned right in the text. Seems like that's what you'd search on. It would be hard if no place names were mentioned in it.

Regarding Arlatan - I called them using the phone number in the fodors book (they were helpful and spoke perfect English). I was able to make the reservation by email, but I can't recall the address off-hand (fodors is useless about publishing email addresses - maybe because they change often...). I think they gave me the address on the phone (remember, french pronunciation of letters is different so the seemingly simple task of giving an email address is not quite so easy!). <BR> <BR>Regarding Palace Des Papes - you might want to call and ask about specific rooms. Given they are using ancient buildings, each room could be very different. The lady I spoke to there spoke perfect English. <BR> <BR>I think the question about 'hard to retrieve' relates to the fact that messages are not easy to find, a year later (for example). I have had difficulty searching for messages that are old; have you had success? How long does Fodors maintain the posts online?