Provence without a car

How are these 5 days situated? Is this 5 days in France (6 nights) or 5 days including all travel to somewhere else?

For the Loire Valley without a car, take the TGV from Montparnasse (I assume you are passing through Paris) to Tours Centre and stay in the area between Tours Centre and Place Plumereau, Vieux Tours. Other areas of Tours are not of interest. This area is small and very walkable. Across the street from Tours Centre is the Office de Tourisme from where a number of minibus tours depart for all the places you mention.

https://www.tours-tourisme.fr/

Alternatively, for just these châteaux, you could base in either Blois or Amboise, but reaching them can be more awkward than taking the TGV directly to Tours.

5 days may not be sufficient time to include Provence, but generally, you would take the TGV to Avignon, the transportation hub for western Provence, and stay within the walls of the old city. There is a bus to Pont du Gard and train service to Arles. If these are your only points of interest, you could also take the TGV to Nîmes and take the train to Arles, bus to Pont du Gard. If you go to Pont du Gard, you might as well include Uzès, which has a fabulous Saturday market and is a interesting city on its own.

https://avignon-tourisme.com/en/

If you had the time, you could easily spend two weeks in western Provence and eastern Languedoc.

Be sure to make the little sidetrack from Arles to the abbey at Montmajour, not just for the history but to get a feel for the fields that Van Gogh was setting up his easel in. And they often have art/photography exhibits and lectures there, too.

As RS often advises, if you get the early bus to Pont du Gard you can beat the crowds, and be about done in time for lunch and then you have the afternoon for a hike or meander on the water while everyone else is bunched up.

I would postpone Provence rather than trying to cram it into a 5-day trip that needs to include 3 chateaux as well. However, I suppose what you want to do is theoretically possible. It's just that I can't imagine going to Provence and seeing only the Pont du Gard and Van Gogh-related sights in Arles.

For this short a visit, precision about the timing matters. Where are you arriving from? At what time of day? How many nights are you spending on the ground in France? Where are you going after Provence? Are you flying out of Marseille, or must you travel back to Paris for your departure?

I feel like 5 days is just not quite enough to do both these areas. Like, one more day would be great. Particularly, getting between the two would take the better part of a day if it went like clockwork. The Loire really requires a car or some sort of organized tour. Everything is spread out. I wouldn’t enjoy an tour much there either I think, as you’d end up visiting château at their busier times.

Arles, Avignon and Pont du Garde are much more doable via public transit. Avignon is more of a transport hub, including (infrequent) public bus to and from Pont du Garde. To see Pont du Garde, I ended up doing a half-day minibus tour out of Avignon which included a stop in Les Baux and a Roman monument. It was a good deal, and a lot more effective than trying to bus on my own. I found Arles much more interesting and would stay there over Avignon anytime. If you’re able, be there for market day. I don’t know if minibus tours are offered out if Arles, but if so that would make an easy decision.

I’m assuming you coming/going from Paris? The TGV connects with both Avignon and Arles. It also stops in Lyon. If five nights in Arles sounds like too much then I highly recommend a night or two in Lyon. It’s like a mini-Paris in a great way, with a fantastic restaurant scene.

Thanks all for your valuable feedback! I will be coming from Milan and have five days to sepnd before heading to Paris where I fly out.

Thinking of basing in Ambois for Loire unless there are better suggestions.
Melissa

I just got back from Provence and I ended up hiring a private driver to take me to the 3 places I was staying at. I stayed at Les Baux de Provence, Uzes and Avignon. I could have done the bus, but I have been battling a leg injury for the past year and splurged on the private driver (also to save time). I hire a private tour guide (Ooh Provence) which was wonderful. Christopher picked me up from my hotel in Les Baux de Provence and we spent the day touring Van Gogh and Roman ruin sites including a lot of Arles. Driving to Uzes, the driver stopped at Pont du Gard and gave me plenty of time to explore. I recommend the Saturday Market at Uzes as well as visiting this very charming village. I did one night at Avignon which I thought was plenty of time to tour the Papal Palace and other sites. From Avignon, I took the high speed train to Paris which was a very easy trip. Like others have mentioned, I think doing both areas of France mentioned would be tough for a 5 day period.

One thing to consider is that I found France to just be more packed with tourists this year than in past visits so transportation presented more challenges than usual. I suggest you be flexible and have possible alternate plans. The morning I was to take the train from Barcelona to Arles, there was an accident on the Spanish side so trains to France were cancelled for 2 days. I managed to snag a bus seat, but it took longer than the train.