Provence trip. Feedback appreciated

I sympathize; there are endless attractive destinations all over France. Since you'll have a car for part of the time, I encourage you to make a point of hitting the places that interest you but are difficult or impossible by public transportation--places like Les Baux and Roussillon. Forget about trying to see all the intriguing places; it can't be done. Just settle on a good mix of experiences.

To the extent that you plan day-trips, whether by car or by bus/train, you won't have to make ironclad plans at this point. Many of your little jaunts will involve a regional train (TER) or a bus--if not the car, so the cost will not be higher at the last minute. There is nothing wrong with having 3 or 4 potential day-trips identified and choosing from among them, based on your energy level, the weather, and the availability of the sights and activities you're interested in on the day in question.

The fewer times you have to change hotels, the more flexibility you retain, so I'd think carefully about staying in both Avignon and St.-Remy, which are less than 40 minutes apart by bus and surely faster by car. It's true that the two towns have a different feel, but it is such a pain to change hotels.

Arles, incidentally, is closer to St.-Remy than to Avignon, so if you keep both bases, you might do better to hit Arles from St-Remy.

Outdoor markets are a significant attraction to many tourists in Provence and along the Riviera. They're often just one day a week, though some are more frequent than that. i suggest that you do some Googling and build yourself a list so you don't miss a good nearby market that you could easily see. (A current guidebook should also provide market info.) In addition to shopping opportunities, the markets allow you to try local food specialties. Or not-so-local foods: I saw paella being cooked and sold at a number of markets in southern France last year. The market schedule may help you structure your trip. For me, hitting perhaps two markets a week was worth planning for. Anything beyond two, that tended to be serendipitous. Too many gets repetitive.

Art museums are also a major attraction in southern France. If you are interested in those, it will certainly affect your itinerary decisions. Nice, in particular, has a lot of good art museums. No art museums and no side-trips might mean just 2 nights in Nice (and I wouldn't travel there from Provence in that case). Throw in an interest in art and 5 nights might be right, even without any side-trips. But there are a lot of atteactive (though typically rather touristy) side-trips to be made from Nice: Menton, Villefranche-sur-Mer, Cap Ferrat, St.-Paul-de-Vence, Vence, Antibes, Cannes, Eze. That's just for starters. Incidentally, a lot of those places have art museums of their own.

If you are not interested in art museums, I think it's fair to say that there is more sightseeing variety in Provence than along the Riviera, though I believe the Riviera has better gardens. So if there's no interest in art, I'd tilt toward Provence, time-wise, and if my other destinations seemed to exceed 24 days, I'd consider skipping the Riviera on this trip. To be clear, I really enjoyed my time zipping east and west along the Riviera, but sometimes painful decisions must be made.

We just spent 7 nights (4 in Salon and 3 in Manosque) here a few weeks ago. This was our 3rd visit..first time we spent a few nights near Avignon, next trip 3 nights in Salon. So overall we’ve had 12 nights.

I’ll touch on a few things, and of course Sept will be different than July. (Our other two visits were in early Oct). We were able to visit a lot more little towns this time...including St Remy, Orange, Isle Sorgue, Roussillon, Gordes, Vaison la Romaine...and 6-7 smaller spots along the lavender trail (which is why we went). Places like St Remy or Sorgue, we only spent a few hours visiting. A big factor for us was the heat tho...after a few hours walking around in 35c heat, I was ready to get back to the ac/car. Still, half a day may be fine for these spots. Bigger towns like Nimes, Arles, Aix would warrant (for us) the better part of a day.

If this had been our first time visiting, a few more nights would have been perfect, but we didn't want to revisit some of the spots (we’ve done Avignon and Nimes and didn’t need to return). Have you looked into the Verdon Gorge? You mentioned hiking around Roussillon and may enjoy a day here. We didn’t go because...well...it was hot, but I figure if we ever get back in cooler weather I’d go do a hike there. (Our hostess in Salon and our financial advisor both told us it was nice! Others don’t care for it so much)

As for a car...it really does help. Driving is pretty easy...just like at home. You just need to watch your speed, and I will say they are more aggressive there...lots of tailgating when you are doing the speed limit. We’ve been lucky in that all 3 of the rentals we’ve done (which have been in France) all had integrated gps, so very helpful. But overall, it wasn’t a huge issue.

There are some lovely spots along the Côte D’Azur as well. If you really want to do along there as well, your tentative plan would be fine. But if you really want to deep dive into Provence, you would def find something to do on your whole 14 days. And if you want to toss Marseilles in there, that would be another full day as well.

(I always laugh at my husband because he’ll be like...is there enough stuff to do there for 7 nights? He said the same thing when we spent 8 nights in NL last year...there is never a shortage of things to do! And it is nice to be able to take your time instead of rushing because you only have a few days to see everything).

Thank you acraven and Nicole for your suggestions. I'm going to try to put it all together and pray we have a good time. We'll see.

I'd look to consolidate some of your locations. Once you get into the hill country with a car, the distances are pretty manageable and the driving not too bad. You could cut down the Avignon focus and simply move to St. Remy earlier. You could then select base two somewhere further north like in the Luberon. Driving is not too stressful in the country, just in and around the larger towns and cities. Just get a good data plan for your phone or download a good GPS app (or ensure your car has a GPS).

Once in Nice, you can take the train or bus and fill your four days prior to departure. Everything is well connected. For your friend, the best shopping besides the markets is in Nice and Cannes. For discount fashion, there is an outlet center near Salon de Provence. There are also some coastal walks and hikes that are quite nice, around Cap Ferrat and Cap d'Antibes.

Since you will need to eliminate some places, I suggest that Avignon is skippable. Its main attractions are a half a bridge and the papal palace, which is mostly empty. There are many towns which are easier to use as a base, with a car. You might consider staying at one of the plethora of inns or b&bs just outside the towns. The experience, itself, can be wonderful; and you wouldn’t need to cope with parking or getting out of town issues.
One heads-up on Cassis and the calanques. If it is too windy, or the water is rough, the boats don’t go out. In that case, DO NOT take the tourist train tour. It’s one of the worst tourist traps I’ve experienced. We discovered afterwards that there is a hiking trail which takes you along the top of the calanques, maybe even down. That’s the way to go, if the boat ride is a no go.

I agree with the comments about Avignon. I don't think much of the city as a place to visit, but if you do, you really don't want a car. So you can see Avignon, take the train to Arles as you plan, and then rent a car in Avignon when you're leaving. You could even make that the day you visit some wineries.

Just to be the devil's advocate, I liked Avignon a lot. The side streets are very picturesque. I dislike palace furniture, so the unfurnished Palais des Papes was just fine with me, and I lucked out: the palace had a temporary exhibition of African sculpture. It made a great art gallery.

Or pick up your rental car at the Avignon TGV station and home base in St Remy de Provence. We recently spent a week at a vacation rental walking distance to central St Remy, easy drives to Arles, Pont du Gard, Orange, Nimes, Les Baux, Isle de la Sorgue.

On an earlier trip we had taken TGV from Avignon to Nice for several nights, loved the Chagall Museum.

We based out of L'Isle sur la Sorgue and hit almost everything that you mention as day trips from there four the course of a six night/five day stay, so it depends on how much driving you want to do vs. moving (we chose the former). We also did Cassis as a day trip from our area (including a three-Calanques boat tour) and also hit Bandol in the same trip. I would suggest trying to get there fairly early in the morning before all of the other day-trippers come in and parking becomes more difficult -- though we were there on market day (Friday), so that might've made things worse (and if you can be there on a market day, do it!).

As far as your timing for each town, it depends on how long you like to stay and what you like to see. My husband and I probably tend to be on the faster side and don't check everything out -- if we walk by a store that looks interesting, we'll walk in, but otherwise, we're strolling around. I think we averaged two towns a day. One other small down you didn't mention would be Uzes, esp. on market day as they have a local parade (a local tipped us on to it and we were glad we went). Your itinerary would be more than enough time for me, including Nice (we went down to Barcelona to finish our trip, instead of going over to Nice).

Driving around France is really not that bad and reminds me of the US with smaller two-lane roads for the more rural areas and major three-lane highways to travel longer distances. We were in Scotland in Sept, and the roads in France are far better :) We already had our car, though, as we drove through the Loire Valley and Burgundy beforehand.

If you like markets and want a huge one with everything from food to clothing to junk stuff...Forcalquier has a HUGE Monday morning market. Our Airbnb hosts in manosque told us about it. They told us to skip Manosque as most things were closed on Monday and to go to Forcalquier - the market went up and down streets, part was in a huge parking lot...there were a lot of things like clothing, soap and souvenirs, but we picked up cheese and veggies and roast chicken...