nspotz

(I accidentally posted this in the Greece forum, so re-posting....)

I realize that to some, comparing Southern Italy and Southern France is like comparing apples and oranges. Yet, I would still like to know.... which one would you choose? My husband and I will be flying into Paris on June 24th and flying home on July 7th. We would like to spend a solid five or six days in Paris and then venture south. Ideally, the second part of our trip would be more relaxing... days spent on the beach or light sight-seeing. If we were to choose Italy we would want to try and squeeze in a day or two in Rome at the end before flying home.

Some background: We are in out late twenties. Our favorite aspects of traveling include beautiful scenery, good food and soaking up a different culture. We enjoy museums and historical sights but we don't need to see everything... we learned this in Greece this past summer! Our favorite part of Greece was lounging on our balcony in Santorini and walking down to the Bay for a swim. We spent some time in Italy a few years ago (Rome, Florence, Cinque Terre and Venice) and fell in love. My husband has traveled all over France except the south.

Would love to hear your thoughts! Thanks!

Michael

Get yourself a <i>gîte</i> fairly close to the coast (between Grasse and the coast might be a good place) and you can lounge there or go to the coast or visit villages, as you wish.

http://en.gites-de-france.com/

nytraveler

I would do southern France:

1) better weather - not so hellishly hot
2) tons of interesting things to see/do - but spread out between several cities and towns - so ech day is not clogged with sights
3) some of the beaches are quite nice - versus rocks and pebbles in most of Italy
4)Nice is a fantastic (pre roman)city great for sights, food and relaxing
5) chance to hit Monaco (a hoot if you don;t mind spending the $ for one day)

Jean

If you're already flying in and out of Paris, it wouldn't be "relaxing" to travel to southern Italy, then Rome and then back to Paris in one week. Stay in France. Consider heading to southern France immediately on arrival and putting all of your Paris days at the end.

StuDudley

Ditto the others!!!

Stu Dudley

kerouac

It's true that it's a totally different experience, hard to compare. Southern Italy (particularly Sicily) could be excellent if you really like total immersion into a different culture without large quantities of foreign tourists.

Southern France is much more cosmopolitan and is easier to get around for various side trips, but you might get tired of all of the other tourists in the middle of summer.

Think about the French Atlantic coast (Biarritz, Bayonne, Hossegor, Capbreton, etc.) rather than the Côte d'Azur if you don't want to hear English spoken everywhere, even though Hossegor and Capbreton have huge concentrations of Australians due to the surf industry.

nspotz

Hi! Thanks for the input.... we actually would purchase tickets into Paris and out of Rome if we chose the Italy option. I found cheap tickets from Paris to Naples, which is a two hour flight and then we would take the train/bus down to Amalfi.

StuDudley

>> Paris to Naples, which is a two hour flight and then we would take the train/bus down to Amalfi.<<

Which would consume most of one entire day - door to door.

We were in the Biarritz area for the last 2 weeks of June in '12. Didn't get a lot of sun. There were only about 2 days out of the 14 where people were "on the beach". We were there for 2 weeks in early Sept of '03 too - and the same weather conditions. One of my tour books says that the Pays Basque area gets more rain than Ireland.

You can get to/from Provence (Avignon TGV station) in 3 hrs by TGV train from either Paris or CDG.

I would fly into Nice & spend about 3-4 nights there - without a car. Then I would rent a car & spend 3 nights in St Tropez. Then drive 2 1/2 hrs to the Luberon in Provence & spend 4 nights there. Hopefully the lavender will be blooming. Then take the TGV back to Paris & spend your remaining days there.

Stu Dudley

kja

I would find southern Italy too hot at that time of year, but I don't deal with heat very well.

kslanker

We spent the end of May in the South of France and loved it. We also have been to Italy many times, including the South and Sicily and enjoyed it as much. Our Trip to France involved renting an apartmen in Nice and using the Trains and Buses to visit the towns of the French Riviera and as far east as Ventimiglia Italy (which has a great open air market on Friday mornings). With a little planning you can also visit a couple of the mountain towns in France like Eze and St. Paul de Vence.

My favorite city on the Cote d'Azur is Antibes. There is a Picasso Museum there which while not great is worth the visit.
The shops and restaurants are great and the port is spectacular. The port demonstrates (via yachts) how much money you probably DO NOT have.

Nice itself has several art museums including a great Marc Chagall collection. A local downtown bus virtually drops you off at the door. The Place Massena is closed to traffice is has many many restaurants and shops.

The English walk along the Medi at night is fantastic.

Having said all that, I still like Italy the best.