We will be staying in Provence 12 days before moving on to Cote d'Azure. I've read many reports here of suggestions for staying in two places, such as Gordes and St. Remy. But looking on the map, they are quite close together. We don't mind moving to a second place, but is there an advantage as far as the ease in making day trips?

The two are about an hour apart.

But the point is that you'll want to daytrip to areas beyond that i.e. from Gordes, to the Haut-Vaucluse and from St-Rémy, to Pont du Gard and Aigues Mortes. You couldn't do those daytrips from the other location...

No, stay either at St. Remy/Les Beaux or Gordes.

IMO, St. Remy/Les Beaux is a better base for daytrips to Nimes, Arles, Avignon, Orange, St. Maries-de-la-Mer, Camargue. The attractions around Gordes (Senanque, Bories, Roussillon are in easy reach from St. Remy.

Anyone else?

bookmarking

We've spent several vacations in this area and based ourselves at Sous l'Oliver each time. It's not far from Isle sur la sorgue. We've day tripped in all directions from this wonderful B&B and never felt the need to change locations.

http://en.chambresdhotesprovence.com/

I wouldn't move between those points myself, but I have stayed in two different places during about only a week stay -- but they were farther apart. I did it partly to hedge my bets, but also because if you really want to see a lot, you can spend a lot of time driving around every day if you aren't that close to what you want to see.

I stayed in Aix for 3-4 days, and then moved up to a place closer to Vaison la Romaine, Grignan, Gigondas, etc. That was a nice trip. I was going the opposite direction (then took the TGV back to Paris), but you could do the same thing the other way.

It depends where you want to go for day trips, from either one of those, some day trips can be really far away.

I'd vote for the St-Rémy area, but you could certainly split the time if you wished with 12 days to spend. We always like trying new places and so tend to move every 3 or 4 nights.

We stayed in St. Remy and found it easy enough to visit E, N, W & S. But, if 12/days, it might be nice to split the time with Gordes.

hi, images,

thanks for the link to the B & B - i loved the english translation, particularly the fact that the french breakfast time is 30 minutes earlier than the english one. do the french rise earlier than us?

looks like a good choice though.

regards, ann

Thanks to everyone for your suggestions. Anyone else with ideas?

I stayed just outside of Isle sur la Sorgue and found it a fairly central base. I understand about the moving to cut down on daily travel times. We did the same in the Dordogne and moved just an hour away. This meant that for the longer days trips we cut down on a lot of repetitive driving. At the time I wasn't sure whether it made sense to just move an hour away but in fact it worked really well.

What sort of accommodation are you looking at? If you spend 12 days in one place then are you looking to rent a house which of course will be cheaper than hotels. If you split the time then you could do a weekly rental/house and then move to a B & B for the remaining nights. I like the idea also of trying different types and places of accommodation and the moving of course lets you do this.

If you do move then maybe think of visiting some even further away places and make the move more worthwhile. For example visit the Gorges Verdon and Moustiers Ste Marie etc.

Oh decisions, decisions. Good luck, let us know what you decide.
Schnauzer.

PS make sure wherever you stay that you are going to be VERY happy there, i.e. enough restaurants, shops etc to keep you busy. You don't want to then be driving at night for a meal when you have been driving all day. You probably won't cook every night even if you do get a house. St Remy appeared to have quite a lot of restos as did Isle sur la Sorgue. Maybe let us know what type of holiday it is that you are looking for ie self catering or be catered for, what time of year etc and you may get some more help. 12 days in one spot could be a long time if it isn't right!

Thanks for your input, Schnauzer. We will be in Provence the middle of October. Hopefully, there won't be a lot of rain. Right now we are considering the B&B Le Prince Noir in Les Baux for one base. They got excellent reviews on Tripadvisor. Would like a second base, but am not sure where. I've read there aren't a lot of restaurants in Les Baux but we tend to eat our main meal at noon and probably take something back from the markets to eat in the evening.

I always recommend splitting the time between St Remy & the Luberon (Gordes, Roussillon, Bonnieux, etc) for a first timer.

Stay IN St Remy & enjoy the small village feel - walking to restaurants, cafes, shops, etc. Then stay out in the countryside in the Luberon so you can enjoy the countryside, walks through vineyards from village to village, bike rides, driving in the Luberon at Sunset.

Actually for 12 days I would spend 4 in St Remy, 4 in the Luberon, and 4 near Vaison. Getting to the Drome region from either the Luberon or St Remy is farther than I want to travel in a day, and this area is very scenic. East of Vaison in the Baronnies is one of my favorite areas - and perhaps not doable from the Luberon or St Remy. Also, Vaison will put you much closer to the Rhone winegrowing region.

Would you get bored being in 1 hotel/B&B for 12 days???

Stu Dudley

Hi Anne,

Breakfast was always at 9 a.m. and I complained each time we stayed there. We love the morning market days, and would start many days traveling to the village which had a market. You know how hard it is to find parking on market day! I was so happy to see they changed breakfast to 8:30 a.m.! Roland and Isabelle own this family home, and ran the B&B for years. Their son and daughter in law run it now, passed down from parents to son. Julien began cooking dinners a couple of years before he took over the B&B.

Breakfast is a huge affair, lots of delicious food, served outdoors in the summer. Evening dinners are fantastic, with all guests sitting around a family table, also outdoors in the summer. We usually started with drinks at 7 and ended dinner around 11 p.m. Wonderful moments, and worth staying here just for this!

I vote for some time in St. Remy and some time in Gordes. They are quite different experiences and, as others have noted, provide the opportunity to make day trips to quite different towns in opposite directions.

I will be using 2 bases in Provence later this year. They are:
Vaison-la-Romaine
St Remy-de=Provence

The former is handy for Mt Ventoux, Seguret, Beaumes-le-Venise, Suzette, Orange, Nyons etc; the latter for Arles, the Carmargue, and the southern Luberon & Durance villages. In between (depending on your route) are Isle-sur-Sorgue, Venasque, Senanque, Gordes, Rousillon & other Luberon villages, Simiane-la-Rotunde, etc.