CledTravel

My girlfriend and I are struggling to find a small town/village in the Provence countryside to stay for a week or so. We are both in our twenties, and want a relaxing, slow week, away from too many tourists.

It would be nice to get around the village/countryside primarily on bicycle, but we are open to renting a car to get from the nearby train station and around the surrounding area.

We are really looking forward to:
- lavendar fields
- picnicing in the countryside
- eating from farmer's markets
- meandering around the area on bikes

We are not really interested in architecture or tourist attractions during this week of our trip.

This is our dream. We thank you so much for your help!

Michael

This might be of interest: http://www.provenceweb.fr/e/vaucluse...a/stmartca.htm

cigalechanta

There are many to recommend but my favorite
is Eygalieries in the Alpilles. I've stayed here
many years until y husbands death.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q059AgwjEm4

Christina

Do you speak French? Just wondered, as it would make things a lot easier. Just a few words of advice, small villages don't have train stations. And car rental options are slim at places that are not the bigger cities, even though there may be a car rental place at some smaller towns. If you rent a car, you'd have best choice at the TGV station upon arrival, eg, Avignon. For example, Isle-sur-la-Sorgue actually does have a train station (one of the smallest places in that area that does) but the closest car rental location is Avignon TGV or Cavaillon. So it depends how close to that train station for car rental you expect to be.

Biking sounds good, but again, small villages probably don't have bike rental shops. Were you going to bring your own bicycle? That's a lot of trouble. For example, ISle-sur-la-Sorgue again doesn't have a bicycle rental shop. I stay in Pernes-les-Fontaines when I'm in that area, which is a bit smaller town, but I like it and it has shops and restaurants--but it has no car rental nor bike rental place, either.

The problem is the places I know that have some bicycle rental shops are due to lots of tourists, that are small. Gordes has one and so does St Remy. Carpentras does, also. Well you can search if you want on the French yellow pages if you know French www.pagesjaunes.fr

Maybe your idea of a small village isn't that small? What were you thinking in terms of size?

janisj

You have two threads going . . .