Need help planning our next trip.

South sounds like Italy--or Spain. I'd chose Italy in a heartbeat, but you have just come from there. You could spend some time in SW France, then cross the border.

Or: if you do not mind the lack of crowds, visit the Dordogne and Lot. Finish in Paris, or else fly home from Toulouse or Bordeaux.

The weather won't be perfect but it should be okay. I'd stay clear of the rural parts of northern France in April, but even that can be nice.

"April in Paris" is a cliché for a reason, it can be really nice and the city also looks great with wet streets reflecting the buildings etc. As long as you're under something and it eventually stops (which it does).

How about Burgundy, just north of where your tour ends? I haven't been there in the spring but the countryside is so beautiful in fall that I'm sure it's great in spring too. You'll want a car if possible -- rent one in Macon or take the train to Dijon and rent it there. Beaune is a good base, and certainly worth a visit even if you base elsewhere. If you don't want to drive, Dijon is probably your best base, with a good museum and historic center, and frequent trains to Beaune and I expect other Burgundy destinations. You could easily spend a week, or longer depending on how "slow" you want to make your tourism. And Paris is a fast train wide away if you've had enough countryside and small cities.

I'd head south west, travelling from the Med to the Atlantic .... Montpellier >> Toulouse >> Bordeaux

Nancy,

In looking at your profile it seems like you have France covered already. Piecing things together based on what you have and have not seen plus April weather, I'm going to throw out the Istrian Peninsula in Croatia as a decent option.

Another option could be Catalan country - Collioure in France and towns over the Spanish border.

I should note that the Dordogne is one of my favorite places and would be a nice compliment to your itinerary, but it seems like you've been there once or twice. Ditto for the Loire. I love Brittany too, but April will be rainy and not an ideal time to visit.

-Matt

If you want to stay in France, I would head down through Nimes/Montpellier, through the Languedoc and hit places like Sete, Minerve, Carcassonne, Toulose -- there are many beautiful small cities and towns through the region.

Or branch through to Coulloire and the Catalonia (if you have not been) -- Girona, Barcelona, etc. Another diversion would be into Italy, hitting Torino and the Barolo wine region, and dropping down to the Cinque Terra.

Thank you all so much for your suggestions. I'm currently sitting with a map and considering each option. One limitation for us is that we don't want to rent a car. I'm taking some time to research the cities you all suggested and I'm sure I'll be back with more questions.

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Scratch the Dorodogne without a car, then. But plenty of other good choices.

Nancy, have you been to Sicily? It's about a 2-hour flight from Paris to Catania or Palermo. Sicily in April is lovely ... we were there in mid April 2015, and will return next April for three more weeks.

Thank you for your many suggestions. I've been pouring over my map and French train routes for a couple days now. I think that, considering the time of year, I want to head south. Right now, I'm leaning toward flying into Marseilles and going straight to Aix-en-Provence for a few days before meeting our group. At the end of the trip, going from Macon to St. Remy for 4-5 days and, then, to Montpellier for another 4-5 days. I think we could fly out of Montpellier, although I haven't gotten that far along.

Normally, we travel by train, but, on our recent trip to Italy and Slovenia, we used GoOpti ride share twice and we were very pleased with it. I'm open to opens like that if available, but that, too, I need to look into.

Any thoughts about this itinerary would be most appreciated.

One more vote for Dordogne! I was an exchange student in France 30 years ago and was just there again in Normandy, Provence, Paris. But Dordogne was INCREDIBLE. Perfect for slow travelers. No tourists that time of year. You'll have the prehistoric caves, castles, and scenic villages als to yourselves. Could be rainy, but worth it! You'd need a car in Dordogne however.

I love the Dordogne, too, but we won't have a car, so I don't think that it's a good option for this trip. We've been to Sicily and we definitely want to go back, but not just for a side trip.

After looking more into Montpellier, I definitely want to include it. We may fly home from there. I really wanted to go to St. Remy, but it looks like a no-go because there's no train service. Maybe Nîmes? We'll probably spend time in Aix-en-Provence on the front end of the trip.

There's good bus service to St-Remy.

Not too far southwest of Montpellier, in the interior, is the small town of Pezenas. Attractive and with a lot of nice craft shops.

The small coastal town of Sete is worth a visit, too, but I preferred Pezenas for the window-shopping.

I need to get a better map! Both Sete and Pezenas look very appealing. Could you see spending a few days in Sete? (I'm a sucker for seaside towns.)

I'm a slow traveler, but not that slow! It's an appealing sort of place, and it might work for you, but I usually prefer to base myself in a somewhat larger town with good bus or train links. I stayed in Montpellier and in Perpignan, with side-trips to Sete, Pezenas, Narbonne, Collioure, Ceret and the Yellow Train into the Pyrenees. Perpignan is a bit rough around the edges, certainly not France's prettiest town, but it has a few points of interest and is the transportation hub for that part of France.