Itinerary for Nice and Provence

To me, 4 complete days is enough on the Riviera. You can add St Paul de Vence as a side trip; some people mention Antibes too but my memories of Antibes are hazy.

Bus to Aix is fine, but:
- the train line is scenic
- with 14-15 days, I would definitely spend 2 nights in Cassis (for the Calanques), which is better reached by train from Nice
- I would suggest 3 nights in Aix, including a day trip to Marseille
- If my count is right, you have 5 nights left for Arles, which is ideal. Day trip to Nîmes is easy; Pont du Gard and Avignon as well, les Baux de Provence too but that might require a privately-operated tour since public transport is scarce. You can go to Orange too (but check the status of the Roman theater's renovation work).

Rick has a guidebook that focuses on that part of France. I highly recommend getting a copy of it so you can decide on what places will be most interesting to you. There is much of interest along the Riviera and in the hills above. A guidebook will provide more complete information than we can do here.

Carol-BC
14-15 days is a good amount of time to spend in Nice and Provence.

Re Nice: If you go to Cap Ferrat, be sure to take the coastal walk around the the peninsula. It's lovely. Stop at the Villa Ephrussi de Rothschild which is nearby. Eze is a wonderful hilltop village, with fab views. We drove to these places, but I think there is a bus to Eze from Nice.

On our last trip, we stayed at Aston LaScala, just a couple of minutes walk from Old Town. Very nice hotel, but breakfast was very expensive, so we always grabbed a coffee/croissant nearby. Our first time in Nice, we stayed LePerouse, which was fabulous.....probably couldn't afford it now.
And once, we rented an apartment in Villefranche, with a wonderful terrace on the Med.

Lots to see in Nice itself.. museums, the Old Port, the Rock (hike up or take a bus to experience the cemetery with its greek mosaics, etc..
Also...if you like ruins, you can take a short bus ride to Cimiez, up in the Nice hills, to see some roman ruins, and a Matisse museum.
We spent an afternoon in Antibes, too. Unfortunately, we didn't have time to visit all the other interesting hill towns nearby.

Last fall, we spent about a week in Avignon. Loved Avignon...the Papal Palace, the museums, wandering the neighborhood., the indoor huge market. Pont du Gard? meh. Day tripped to Arles, which we enjoyed too.
In Avignon we stayed in an apartment, and at the Bristol Hotel. Avignon is small enough to walk everywhere. Bristol is a short walk to the train station. There are two, one for TGV and one for other routes.
Unfortunately, due to some stressful circumstances, we didn't get to some of the other towns we planned to visit, and I'd go back in a heartbeat.

Enjoy!

I highly recommend you listen to the Rick Steves Audio tours related the region. TONS of great information.

Avignon is a great place to visit - take the little "train" tour that starts in the min square - well worth the 45 minutes.

How about Grasse for some perfume tours?

I can't address traveling without a car we always rent a car for sightseeing.

Donna, do you mean listen to the radio shows? Rick doesn't have any Audio Tours for Provence as the only one (Arles) was not produced per the Audio Tour list. Would love to know as I will be going to this area soon too.

Thanks to you all for your helpful responses. I really appreciate it. Thanks jadam for all the suggestions (love old Roman ruins/antiquities). I looked up Hotel Aston La Scala in Nice - Looks lovely and within the price range. I 'll have to check out Eze for buses. Re Guidebooks: They are scarce as hen's teeth around here. I was aware of RS's Provence/Riveria guidebook but can't buy it right now (no stock anywhere!) Will have to order. Have a hold on it at the library but not available until late April. I find the RS forum people really helpful and so went here to get some ideas for planning. I suspect Europe is going to be very busy this year due to the pent up demand for travel. Our federal government just recently rescinded the testing requirements for fully vaccinated travellers coming back to Canada. That's a big relief. Hopefully the Fall should be ok - Europe is having another surge right now and hopefully Putin doesn't do something really stupid in Ukraine... Well as the old Chinese Proverb goes - "May you live in interesting times"
Take care everyone and "Happy Travels"

We are staying in Provence for 6 nights before heading the Nice for another 6 nights. The RS guidebook for that area and the one from Fodors have been invaluable in planning. I ordered both online from Chapters/Indigo and they came in about a week.

Things to do in Provence that aren't on your list ( but not sure about how accessible they are using transit as we will have a car): the Camargue (not sure about going in Oct though), Fontain de Vaucluse near Isle sur la Sorgue, which we are going to primarily to canoe, so again not sure about this in the fall and Rousillon for the ochre trail.

In the Riviera, consider a trip to the Gorge du Verdon with an organized tour, Menton by train, hiking along the cap at Antibes.

As for a hotel in Nice, we got the Beau Rivage for $240 CAD and the location looks unbeatable to me.

Enjoy!