Guides in the Dordogne

Day trips from where and to where? What kind of places? Caves? Castles? Villages? Farms? Food? And what time of year?

There are relatively few guides for day trips in the Dordogne; it's a region best explored independently with your own car. The vast majority of caves and castles have their own guides. Guided tours are available in some villages, check with the tourist office.

But to visit the Dordogne, the "best" guides are a few travel guides, some research on what you want to do and see, and a road map.

The region is quite large. As JoLui says, best explored on your own with a car. When we were there, we usually did just one thing in the morning and one in the afternoon. We had to drive between places. It is not compact. (That is part of its charm and draw.) There may be some guides, but you would have to have one for more than one day, as sights are spread apart. (Not long drives, but not 5-10 min Utes either.)

For an area as secluded as the small villages in the Dordogne, I generally ask the hotel for suggestions. The larger towns (Sarlat-la Caneda) have a Tourist Information (TI) which might also be helpful. In Rick Steves BEST OF FRANCE, he recommends Exploreo Tours (minivan) (www.exploeo24.com) and Ophorus Excursions, www.ophorus.com. He also recommends taxi tours with Christoph Kusters (taxialacarte.com)
It's a lovely, bucolic area. We'll be returning in June and hoping for better weather than we had in May 2024 which was very wet to the point of being unable to canoe.