Public Transit or Car for visiting villages outside Nice?
 

I am looking for advice for our 3 day visit to Nice. We are 2 adults and 2 children and we will have a car as Nice is one stop on a longer vacation.

We want to take a few day trips: 1) Trois Corniches, 2) Vence/St. Paul de Vence and 3) perhaps Antibes.

My question is whether it would be better to just park the car at the hotel (centrally located near Place Massena) and take buses to visit the towns outside of Nice.

With kids in tow we prefer not to spend a lot of time waiting for buses however from the other posts and blogs I have read it seems bus service is very good. Other wrinkle....we will be there in August.

thanks for any tips
Chris

Bus to Vence and St-Paul de Vence; train to Antibes. Friends who go for an extended stay every year gave us that advice and it worked well.

A friend who recently returned from the area didn't use a car and said she wasted a good deal of time on and waiting for the bus. You really need a car to see the corniches, and both St-Paul and Vence are easiest to visit with a car. But parking could be a problem unless you get to St-Paul early, Vence less so.

Thanks for speedy comments. Good example of varying experiences I have seen.

The Trois Corniches may be best by car - is not part of the vacation tale how one survivedthose hairpin turns? However, I remember someone saying you could get to Menton by bus or train for 1 euro which is incredible.

The whole parking issue is going to be challenging in August. Once we park at the hotel not sure if we will want to risk finding a spot in small towns.

Thanks Happy Trvlr and Underhill for speedy comments. Good example of varying experiences I have seen.

The Trois Corniches may be best by car - is not part of the vacation tale how one survivedthose hairpin turns? However, I remember someone saying you could get to Menton by bus or train for 1 euro which is incredible.

The whole parking issue is going to be challenging in August. Once we park at the hotel not sure if we will want to risk finding a spot in small towns.

Grace Kelly did not survive the hairpin turns unfortunately.

There is no question parking and traffic will be a nightmare. There is no question that the bus and train are not as nice as having your own car.

There is also no question you cannot have your cake and eat it too. Pick one. Either has pluses and minuses and only you can decide which matters more to YOU.

We took the bus to St. Paul de Vence. It was slow, we arrived at the Fondation Maeght just as it was closing for lunch. We did not get a chance to go to Vence itself. We saw the Matisse chapel on another trip. If you have a car, use it just for convenience sake and because it will save traveling time between the sites you intend to visit.

I took the bus to Grasse from Nice, that isn't too difficult. Not that this place is of particular interest to you, it sounds like, and I might agree.

At least Antibes is easy by train.

For inland sites I would go by car, for the coast one can choose car or take the train.

Thanks folks. Glad to hear your various experiences. Chris

all bus services have their timetables on line. for cote d'azur that's

http://riviera.angloinfo.com/informa...t/local-buses/