My 2 friends and I so far have a 3 week trip planned with round trip from New Orleans to Paris in October 2024 (which works best for us rather then multicity trip). We will take train to Lyon on landing then spend a couple days there. We will rent a car from Lyon, spend maybe 2 days in Beaune due to our love of white burgundy wine (as well as a B&B we love there there) to relax and enjoy. From there we will stay a week in Provence. I was originally thinking of one of the villages and then 2 days in Aix, which I have never visited. But it would work better due to our interest in the market and shopping in Aix on a Saturday to consider a Gite for a week with maybe a day or overnight stay in Aix during that week. I have stayed before in the Luberon area but would welcome any ideas of places to stay convenient for day trips during the week. I don’t know much about the Gite aspect vs the shorter stay apartments I have stayed in before. So any input would be recommended. We are planning after that to drive or train to Bordeaux. We could either take the train from Marseille (6ish hrs) or drive there over 2 days, spending a night on the way on the Dordogne area (which I know nothing about and plan to visit on a future trip. We will be in Bordeaux for 3 days then take the fast train to Paris for a few days prior to flying home.
Any recommendations or ideas?

The Provence west or the Rhone centered around Arles is a possibility. Arles has a large market on Saturdays, which means that if you stay inside the old town, as we did, you have to be careful on where you park on the periphery. My recollection is that coming from the train station, the parking lot on the right as one arrives at the city gate is the one that can be used on market day. From Arles you can do day trips to les Baux, Tarascon, the Camargue.

Attached is my Provence & Cote d'Azur itinerary, and also itineraries for the Languedoc and also the Dordogne.

Stu Dudley

Beautiful pictures! Will look closely at area. Had hoped to get closer to Bordeaux to make a shorter car ride the second day, but looks lovely.

Stu, thanks so much for itinerary! I had used your Provence portion for travel in 2017, so I am happy to have this again for Provence as well as other areas. By the way, you mention gites a lot and we are interested in that for our week in Provence. Is there a particular company/site that you recommend to help choose one?

Vrbo
AirBnB
gites-de-France.

We've rented over 70 from the latter site. It is much more reasonably priced than AirBnB & Vrbo.

Stu Dudley

Another vote for Gites de France. Would you be interested in staying closer to the Côtes du Rhone wine villages? Search the Vaucluse department. For Aix/Arles area, the department is Bouches du Rhone. Read Stu's guidance and decide what suits your taste.

IMHO the Dordogne is not a one-night stopover. Depending on what you like, there are any number of lovely stops on a more direct route.

Spend as much time as you can in the Dordogne. It's a great region. Maybe spend a night at Carcassone on your way there.

If looking for something different beyond the Provence and before Bordeaux, try the Pyrénées; Argelès-Gazost, close to Lourdes, might be a good choice. From there you can do outings to Gavarnie, Pont d'Espagne, the Pic du Midi de Bigorre (col du Tourmalet) and the Pic du Midi d'Ossau, or some of the lakes between Argelès and Pau when taking the high road.

I appreciate all of the input. I think given feedback on Dordogne, we will save it for a longer visit there next trip. We will stay in Lyon and Beaune 3 nights each and then 7 nights in Provence. During the week in Provence we will either do a day trip or more likely an overnight trip to Aix-en- Provence for a Friday night stay then Saturday market and lunch before driving back to our gite. After Provence we will take the train from Avignon to Bordeaux for 3 days before ending the trip with 4 days in Paris.

Solid plan.

Instead of Avignon, you might have faster, less expensive or more frequent options for trains to Bordeaux from Nîmes Centre or Nîmes-Pont du Gard TGV (in Manduel, pretty handy to St Remy). By all means check your options on SNCF-connect.com before definitively selecting the drop off location for your rental car.

Will do. Thanks!

Belated feedback to you, FTOttawa, but your suggestion to consider Nimes Centre rather than Avignon when taking the train from Provence to Bordeaux was very helpful! It saves us time and money and we have happily purchased our train tickets.
Thanks!