Late December and early January France trip

I would encourage you to adjust the itinerary so you can be in the Alsace region while the Christmas markets are open, preferably on weekdays when they are less crowded. Strasbourg’s markets end on 12/27. Colmar’s close on the 29th.

Agree with Travel4fun. Had a 3 week Christmas market trip 2 Christmases ago and it was amazing. I would not go south of Paris until after new year's.

Strasburg and Colmar are magical during Christmas markets.

Provence is about 12,000 sq. miles in area. Please narrow down where you mean. which towns or city are you considering? All your other locations are cities.

Too bad you'll miss la Fête des Lumières in Lyon (December 5 through 8 in 2025). It's something to experience. Here's a video from last year's events.

All of the places listed are south of Paris.

You are going to have to plan around the holidays, and I really can't advise traveling on 31 DEC. You want to be in place that day as everything will shut down around noon. And you want to have tickets for any major celebrations should you decide to attend.

Most of Alsace shuts down on 24 DEC, although some of the holiday markets may stay open longer. This kind of depends on the place and how the holidays fall within the week. I have not yet seen a reliable posting of the market dates for 2025.

Some of the markets in Paris will stay open after Christmas, but not all, if the last two years are anything to go by. But nothing will be open after the 2nd. Both Strasbourg and Metz normally have at least some of their holiday markets open until the 2nd also. But most of the small towns in the Alsace-Lorraine shut down between Christmas and New Years.

Living close to Provence, IMHO it's not a place to visit in winter. A lot will be closed. It can seem bleak. If the Mistral Winds are blowing out of the Alps, you'll pray for mercy. Come visit from April to November, and use your Provence nights someplace that is made for winter tourism.

And you should start in Alsace while the markets are open.

For Christmas, you need to be somewhere large, like Paris, on December 24th and 25th because you have the best chance for being able to make a restaurant reservation or finding a chain restaurant open on those dates. A lot will be closed. You can extend your Paris dates and do some day trips (Fontainebleau, Chartres, Reims).

As for Bordeaux and Lyon, I've been to both but am not an expert on openings and closings but you could extend you dates and do daytrips from each also. Be sure you research the restaurants in advance and reserve to be sure they are open during the holidays.

The way you've documented your proposed itinerary make it appear (at a glance) you have more time at each stop than is accurate, because you've listed your travel days for both the original destination and the new one. This is what you actually have:

Bordeaux: 3 full days
Provence: 3 full days
Lyon: 1 full day
Alsace: 2 full days
Paris: 4 days if you fly home on January 5

I have no experience traveling around France in winter, but I've been to all those places (not recently to Paris), and I think you're rather short on time at many of those stops, especially in Lyon. Keep in mind that the days will be extremely short in late December.

I think you might find a car handy in Alsace if you want to visit multiple wine villages. It could be a bit unpleasant, standing on a sidewalk, waiting for a bus that runs infrequently.

acraven has nailed it.