Base for touring Provence

I've based in St Remy and liked it. I found a small hotel sort of on the edge of town - walking distance to the center, but close enough to the main road out of town to make day trips easy. I've also based in Avignon but for driving day trips I like St Remy best. I did drive into Avignon that trip and that wasn't too bad, but I wouldn't have wanted to do it daily. From St Remy I did day trips to Arles, Uzes/Pont du Gard, the Luberon villages as well as Avignon.

The biggest question is - are you going to have a car?
If you're not Avignon is the best for connections, public transportation and tours for a single place to stay.

Assuming you're going to have a car it probably comes down to what size city or town you're looking for for that long a stay.

-Nimes and Orange are bigger cities that come with the all the city baggage that tourists generally aren't looking for. They are also each at the far end of Provence so will be further from some things. If you were going to choose one I'd go with Nimes.

-For medium sized towns I really like Arles over Avignon but there are plenty of people who say the opposite. They are both medium sized towns with enough restaurants to explore and and places to wander in the evenings that you won't get to feeling like it's a rerun. If you have an affection for van Gogh that makes Arles is an easy choice between the two. Arles has more ancient ruins and Avignon has more "modern" complete constructions because of the papal past.

-For smaller towns St. Remy is super cute and upscale so every alley has a charming shop or cafe in it and there are a lot of little shops but it is slightly further way and will add some travel time both ways when you go to places like Orange and you will have to drive everywhere.

Staying somewhere larger also gives you the option of not taking the car and training to places you intend to spend the whole day and training back which can be a nice break from driving and parking. (Both Nimes and Avignon are about 20 minutes from Arles by train.) Other smaller towns that I would recommend visiting - like Vaison al Romaine and L'Isle-sur-la-Sorgue - are further away than I would necessarily want to recommend as travelling to and from everyday.

Sounds like a great trip,
=Tod

Since you have a car, I would avoid staying in the larger towns. St Rémy is a good recommendation as it is very central to the area, but I also like Uzès a lot, possibly more, and it is very close to Nîmes, Pont du Gard and Orange, and still quite good for Avignon and Arles. Less so if you plan on spending time in the Lubéron.

Hi from Wisconsin,

We stayed outside of St. Remy at a Gite de France apartment near the small village of Molleges. St. Remy would have been very very different, not necessarily better. The market day in St Remy is not to be missed. Try and time you tour so you are there on Saturday.

St. Remy is small enough to be a real pleasure. It has a nice large developed square with plenty of good restaurants. Parking can be a nuisance. But where isn't it?

wayne iNWI

I believe that I read that there is a market day on Wednesday in St. Remy as well.

We just returned from our trip to Provence.

As you will see, everyone is split. We stayed in both Arles and Avignon. We grew to love Arles and found Avignon less interesting.

Yes, Arles is more gritty, but the area is easily traversed and there are some great restaurants and sights to see. We did make a day trip to St Remy and were very glad we decided to stay in Arles. St Remy is charming, but it is very upscale. It just seemed to be a lot of high end shops. Arles was more interesting to explore.

But I know others differ, this is just our perspective.

Thanks to all of you who have replied. Based on the replies, tour books and YouTube I've decided to make Arles the 'HQ.'