Avignon in October?

I'm wondering if you want to be in the center of town in Avignon as it mostly caters to tourists with a lot of hotels. The market in town center is Halles d'Avignon; it a large indoor market with extended hours where you can probably find anything you want but is not the small farmer's market you might be imagining. You may want to look at the smaller towns and villages surrounding Avignon for a quieter neighborhood feel. Most villages have a farmer's market on their selected day so the farmers can rotate through the area. I'm supposing that you can find a rental with a kitchen that is affordable in the more suburban areas. Other posters may have specific leads on this. October should be a great time to be in Provence.

Hi, I hope you have a good trip.
My father and I visited Avignon the first week of October in 2017.
We stayed in a hotel the Walked City proper. We parked our car in the underground parking adjacent to the papal palace. And then walked through the square and on to our hotel. I miss remember the name of the hotel. (It was in RS guide) It was an older hotel and had a pretty good location for walking to the Palace or to a street cafe for dinner.
Our time in Avignon was perhaps our most relaxing on our trip and the most “French” place we stayed in that we ate mostly in cafes that had a good number of locals. Often just watching a soccer game on the tv while eating. Most other places were more touristy,

As for places to go how long do you expect to be in Avignon and do you expect to have a car (for even part of the time)? The obvious places include the Palace and the bridge but you should try and go and see both Nimes and the Pont de Gaurd Aqueduct.

We plan on being there about 5-6 days. My friend is open to renting a car for a bit, I am fine with walking the town and perhaps taking a tour. Any feedback on those?
Do we need reservations for the train?

Kathleen, I live on Whidbey!

The TGVs are all-reserved trains. You can potentially save a lot of money by buying TGV tickets early, before others snap up all the (quantity-limited) cheap tickets. You can go to the SNCF website and compare the cost to travel to Avignon tomorrow to the fare you see for mid-May (as far out as schedules are loaded). At the moment you won't find many fares because so many trains are being canceled, but I saw a 157-euro one-way fare for tomorrow, so they can go at least that high. For May 15, there are a couple of trains under 50 euros (TGV Inoui, with some extra rules attached) and some regular TGVs in the under-65-euro range.

However, you need to be sure of your travel date and time before buying. I think SNCF may have changed its ticketing rules recently, but at the very least it would be very expensive to have to change the ticket.

Avignon has two train stations. The Avignon Centre station will almost certainly be closer to your hotel. You can get a ticket through to that station with a change at the Avignon TGV station.

Or you might fly into Marseille Provence airport and take a regional train (TER service) from near the terminal to Avignon centre. If flying trans-Atllantic you may have to change planes in a gateway city. Bought as a single ticket, it should cost only a little more than getting off in Paris.

Thanks, but already booked our flight into paris. Good to know for next time ( fingers crossed!).