seaside85

My husband and I (early 30's, New Yorkers) are planning a trip to France. In the last decade or so, we have been to Paris three times, to Nice and the surrounding area once, and on day trips to Versailles and Lille. I really liked Nice and the surrounding towns (especially Eze and Villefranche-sur-Mer) on our prior trip there. For this upcoming trip we were thinking of starting in Paris and spending a few days in Marseilles -- the question is where else to go. We'll have about 16 days, and we would like to travel mostly by train. One of our favorite things to do on vacation is just walk around a lot, and to explore a city or town by foot. We also like interesting architecture, museums (in moderation), and good food and wine.

Here are some of the routes we're considering:
1. Paris -> Dijon -> Lyon -> Marseille, with day trips from Marseille to Arles? Avignon? Montpellier? Nice? -> back to Paris

2. Paris -> Mont Saint Michel and/or Rennes -> Bordeaux -> Carcassonne -> Marseille -> Lyon -> Paris

3. Paris -> Lyon or somewhere else? (1-2 nights) -> Marseille with various day trips -> Paris

Thanks for any feedback/suggestions!

Michael

Arles is a nice town to visit, as is Aix which can be reached by bus leaving the train station.

StuDudley

We spend 2 months in France almost every year - but travel by car most of the time.

I think a great train itinerary would be:
Dijon

Lyon
Aix en Provence
Toulouse (along with Dijon - our favorite city in France)
Paris

Not a fan of Marseille, and Carcassonne is a 2 1/2 hr visit, IMO.

StuDudley

Somewho my suggestion got posted before I finished

- Dijon with day trip to Beaune
- Aix with a day trip to Marseille if you are determined to spend time in Marseille, Arles, or Avignon.
- Toulouse with a day trip to Carcassonne and also Albi

Stu Dudley

Christina

well, you can do any of them, so guess you just have to decide. No 1 and 3 are basically the same.

what you like doesn't mean a lot as there isn't anywhere I've been in France where you could not get good food and wine if you tried.

Obviously no. 2 is a bit trickier, but I presume you know that. YOu know you can't get to Mont St Michel by train, don't you? But if you just want to go there for a day or two by bus and don't mind that, sure, you can do it by public transportation. Without Mont St Michel I can't imagine why you'd go to Rennes.

If I were you, I'd change no. 2 to add Toulouse after Bordeaux. And then I'd add Narbonne and Montpellier before Marseille (and might omit Lyon, but that depends how much time you have. So by train taht would be Paris-Bordeaux-Toulouse-Carcassonne (if you must, you can do that as a day trip from Toulouse easily enough)-(Narbonne omit if no time, I did it as a day trip from Montpellier, actually)-Montpellier-Marseille-(Lyon)-Paris.

(1) gives you lots more time to do day trips, and that would be fine also. Just your call, do you want to focus more on the SW or the Rhone valley.

seaside85

Thank you, Michael, Stu Dudley, and Christina!

Stu - can you tell me more about why you're not a fan of Marseille? Toulouse was on our original list and now I can't remember why we removed it. As someone who goes to France almost every year, would you mind sharing your top 5 favorite cities/towns?

Christina - thanks, I did see that Mont St. Michel is accessible by bus but not train. So, you wouldn't recommend Rennes if we're not already going to be in the area? We'll look into Narbonne, which we hadn't read about thus far.

StuDudley

We are big architecture fans, and too much of Marseille was destroyed in WWII when the Jews were huddling there & Hitler wanted to roust them out. It's a tad grungy in places - but that bothers some people more than it does us.

Favorite Cities and Villages in France
What we like:
We are building architecture buffs – old architecture – not new. We also like to see lots of pedestrian-only streets, outdoor markets, non-touristy shops, & outdoor cafes. We typically don’t go to many museums, so cities get “no points” for having museums. Also, churches don’t give a city extra points. When ordering these cities, we did not consider the “setting” of a city, like the beach at Nice or the lake at Annecy.

Cities with a population greater than 85,000

1. Paris
2. Dijon
3. Toulouse
4. Rennes
5. Strasbourg
6. Avignon
7. Aix-en-Provence
8. Rouen
9. Montpellier
10. Lyon
11. Nice
12. Nancy
13. Bescancon
14. Bordeaux
15. Nantes
16. Marseille
17. Lille
18. Perpignan
19. Narbonne

Cities with a population greater than 10,000 but less than 85,000
1. Sarlat
2. Colmar
3. Beaune
4. Figeac
5. Auxerre
6. Chambery
7. Vannes
8. Annecy
9. Troyes
10. Albi
11. La Rochelle
12. Perigueux
13. Arles
14. Bourges
15. Dinan
16. St Malo
17. Quimper

We'll be in Lyon for 5 nights starting June 5, so this list is subject to change.

Stu Dudley

Christina

I like Marseille myself, it's fine if you want a bigger city.

I'll admit I've never been to Rennes. Sure, if you want to see a city, it has some attractive buildings (Medieval) and a local history museum. It's the capital of Brittany. I just thought your list was so long already, I wouldn't go there compared to other places if you weren't going to the Mont. My list was really too much for only 16 days. You just have to cut something somewhere, but you could just do Paris-Normandy-Rennes+Mont St Michel-Bordeaux and Toulouse, if you wanted, actually. That would be plenty for 14 days. That's actually not a bad itinerary.


If you ended in Toulouse, I'd fly back from there, it is a major city in France and there are lots of flights.

Narbonne was the home of Charles Trenet, if you've ever heard of him. But it has several points of tourism interest and a nice canal running through it. But if you don't want to visit a museum, of less interest. I was there on a market day (Tuesday) which I enjoyed (not food). It's on the rail route between Carcassonne and Montpellier.
http://www.narbonne-tourism.co.uk/di...-and-monuments
http://www.francethisway.com/places/narbonne.php

FrenchMystiqueTours

Certainly you can spend your time traveling by train if you just want to hit the bigger towns and cities but I personally find the best part of exploring France is seeing the countryside and smaller villages and out of the way places, mixed in with a few of the larger towns/cities, and the only way to do that is with a rental car. I've written several photo reports about my vacations in France and if you want to have a look at one that I'll provide as an example you'll see all the kinds of places and countryside you could explore if you had a rental car that you wouldn't see if you were just relying on trains/public transport. Here is a link to a photo report I wrote about spending two weeks exploring the southern Corrèze département and the adjacent Lot and Dordogne départements: http://tinyurl.com/q6bb5av

Southam

From New York, fly into Marseille. It will probably involve a transfer at a gateway city, likely Paris. Enjoy Marseille. Take the local train to Avignon as your base for excursions to Arles etc. Train to Lyon and/or Paris.The advantage in this counter-clockwise travel is that your trans-Atlantic jet fatigue will be used up on the first day. Flying home from Paris can be done with reasonable mid-day hour departure. But this itinerary should only be arranged through a multi-destination search function, which will be as cheap as a Paris round-trip and save lots of time.
PS: Avignon is a great base with a very efficient civic tourism office covering the region: http://www.avignon-tourisme.com/home-1-2.html