We have a villa in Cannes for 2 wks and plan to take daily side trips....Would you recommend seeing both St. Paul and Vence? We are going to Eze...and I love romantic quaint beautiful places. I have heard that L'Columbe d'Or in St Paul is lovely & we plan to have lunch there as well as do the Foundation Maeght Museum and we are also eating at La Chevre in Eze. Would you recommend both St. Paul and Vence, or if we just did one, which one and why???

Last month. I ate at both restaurnats and they are great. Did not like Vence but did like St. Paul. Great art galleries. Also drive all the way to the tpo for the foundation. Do not walk. It is all uphill.

What Vence has that St. Paul doesn't is the Rosaire Chapel, with the Matisse "vitraux". I couldn't see them, though, as the chapel was closed for lunch when I got there.<BR><BR>As villages, St. Paul is undoubtedly more picturesque than Vence

I agree with the above; St.Paul de Vence is more picturesque than Vence. Another idea for you; we did this easily in a day's drive from Cannes:Head to Grasse (see a perfume factory if you're so inclined), then drive the Gorges de Loup (twisty, windy road with spectacular rocky scenery) to Gourdon which is another mountain village similar to Eze. On our way back we drove through Vence, stopped in St.Paul de Vence and then saw a glass factory in Biot.

I loved St.Paul de Vence--very picturesque medieval walled town with lots of history, cute quaint shops and the Gallerie Maeght is wonderful and not to be missed- IF YOU LOVE MIRO, they are the foundation that is in charge of his works.....

If you travel from St. Paul de Vence to Gourdon, stop in Tourrette sur Loup....fewer tourists, great art, lovely walled village. You can continue on to Grasse and back to Cannes.

Daily side trips--a great plan! And you're choosing a good location.<BR><BR>St. Paul de Vence is great--the Maeght Musee is a knock-your-socks-off Modern Art museum, and the town is utterly charming. Loved looking for Chagall's grave.<BR><BR>But speaking of Chagall--go to Vence. The old chapel there houses a beautiful Chagall Mosaic over the baptismal fount (this isn't in most of the guidebooks). And the true "Chagall experience" is caddycorner to the mosaic, a collection of photographs of the kids baptized. If you admire that artist's love of his family, then you know how appropriate that is.<BR><BR>Anyway, Vence has the old city/living city charm. St. Paul de Vence is cutsy, cutsy (and we plan to go back, so...)<BR><BR>We are not in love with Grasse. We are happy we headed there because we stopped at Mougins on the way. Small, tiny, neat. Little restaurants with fabulous menus. Exquisite little photography museum with hundreds of photos of Picasso in later years. Marvelous tippy-top hilltop view.<BR><BR>We loved seeing Renoir's home in Cagnes, especially now that we finally made it to Giverny. Monet and Renoir knew how to live.<BR><BR>And you have Antibes to explore, too.<BR><BR>Enjoy!<BR><BR>(PS--the view from Eze is the most unspoiled on the coast. The town itself didn't thrill us (nice, but St. Paul de Vence and others are more nifty). If you are capable and are into hiking, the hike up and down from Eze sur Mer is worth it -- it allows you to soak in the view).

Candace,<BR>Please take it from me. I, like many of the people on this board, have traveled extensively throughout Europe.<BR>Vence, in my opinion,has nothing to offer worth the trip going there. We recently returned from a six week trip to Europe, and Vence was our biggest disappointment. Vence St. Paul, on the other hand meets everyones expections. Do it as a day trip from your villa.

I'm not in love with Grasse either. However, I very much enjoyed Cap D'Antibes, and the lovely Picasso museum on the corniche. There is mostly pottery by Picasso on display, all lovely, as is the building itself, its garden and sea view.

We took many, many photos in St. Paul. It's a photographer's dream.

I'd like to propose that you NOT drive into the village of St. Paul, the streets are small and filled with people walking, even later in the day when the tour buses have departed. (If you can time it for late afternoon visit I think your experience of the town would be enhanced.) It's a tiny gem of a place and I think it could be called up hill (one way, downhill the other!) but nothing strenuous and there are shops and galleries entirely lining the streets so unlikely you'd be charging through anyway. It just seems rude to drive into these places and clog the streets with you auto. (I know there are 2 camps on this, but want to raise this flag.) It is about 20 minutes from Cannes so you might make multiple visits to that area up there easily. Tourrette is an excellent suggestion also.<BR><BR>Columbe dOr is actually outside the walls, so you can use the plentiful parking all around there. Also easy walk to the Maeght from there. I agree that Vence is not much for charm, but easy enough to go to the Matisse Chapel. There is parking just down the road in a small square on the edge of Vence.<BR><BR>

To add onto "think about"s post above, we took the bus from Cannes to Vence, then down to St. Paul, then to Cagnes for the Renoir house. The bus works great for Vence and St. Paul--cannot see how using a car would be much better;however, I think a car would work much better for the trip to the Renoir house.<BR><BR>We really wanted to see the Matisse chapel in Vence, so it was important for us to go there. However, if you are not into Matisse, it's not the most attractive chapel. One would suppose it would be very colorful, but it isn't. We were forewarned, so it wasn't a disappointment. If you're going to do this, check the opening times of the chapel--it has limited opening hours (just in the afternoon, I believe)and is a bit of a walk from town center.

Vence and St Paul are only about 2 miles apart so you could very easily do both. There is a car park just outside of St Paul - no one would drive into it, most of the "streets" are undriveable anyway, all you could do is a little of the perimiter road. St Paul is very photogenic but touristy. I doubt any "real" people actually live there - just people in the tourist industry and artists. Vence, on the other hand, is a real town that also happens to be beautiful. The poster above who said it was a dissapointment must be the type that only wants to visit postcard towns. One of my favorite photographs from all my trips was from St Paul, but Vence remains my favorite small town in Europe.

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Check out the Exotic Garden in Monaco. It was our very special surprise in that general area.

Hello all... regarding St. Paul de Vence... I am traveling there in late November. Initially I am planning on staying at the Hostellerie des Rempart. Has anyone seen or have stayed at this hotel? it looked quaint and the prices were pretty inexpensive. Thank you for any feedback!