rental car recommendation; pick up in Aix; drop off in Avignon

How many days do you have? Just the day you are dropping off the car, or a few days in between? And what time of year?

One of my fav spots was Roussillon (for the record - I love taking photos, especially of old doors - and Roussillon has plenty, so I could be biased). I'll agree with Pont du Gard. We've visited both the Arles and Nimes arenas - I kinda liked Arles better, but that is probably because we visited both in one day, and we visited Arles first, so Nimes was a bit redundant.

We rented a car in Aix and dropped it in Avignon at the train station. We went through Auto Europe and the car rental agency was EuropeCar. We picked the car up at the city office of EuropeCar which is right in the heart of Aix and near (1/2 mile) the hotel where we were staying. Wherever you get your car, if you get a gps make sure you know how to run it before you leave the rental car agency. We had to turn around and go back after a few miles, when we decided we couldn't get it to work. After the attendant helped us, we were good. We dropped the car at Avignon train station where we took the train to Paris.

We spent 4 nights outside (east) of Avignon at a small, family run hotel. Our favorite places to visit were L'Isle-sur-la-Sorgue (Sunday was a great market day), Gordes, Abbey Notre-Dame de Senagque, Pont du Gard, and Roussillon. Lots to see and do. Have fun.

thanks for the ideas. We're staying in Aix end of April for two nights, then will rent and spend another 3-4 nights driving around Provence before taking the TGV from Avignon to Caen for a few days of Normandy and the channel islands.

still trying to decide where to headquarter for driving day trips in the Luberon/ Mt. Ventoux area.

Just a heads up:

We did something similar; I.e., coming from another town and returning the car to the Avignon TGV station. We encountered no filling stations en route (no autoroute segments). Once in Avignon, we tried several that our gps led us to, none of which was manned or would take our cc’s or cash. We had just about decided to eat whatever refueling price the rental company would hit us with when we found a manned station. If you care about such matters, you need to plan a refueling strategy.

Using maps.com, we found a Total just a few hundred meters from the entry to the Avignon TGV car rental return, which had both manned and unmanned pumps. This was about ten days ago. Love that app.

For the Mont Ventoux area, staying in Vaison-la-Romaine or any of the small towns and villages nearby might fit your needs. I’m not sure if you are actually looking for an overnight base in the area, however. If so, it’s a short distance to the Côtes du Rhone vineyards, the base villages of the Ventoux and the road up, the Nyons area, as well as Carpentras and Orange.

Hopefully you'll luck out and the car will have an integrated GPS - we've done 3 rentals in France since 2012 and all 3 had integrated GPS...great for finding gas stations! And restaurants...and parking.

Vaison or Nyons would make a great base for a couple of days. We spent a week in Nyons last year, and on one of the days took a spectacular trip through villages in the vicinity of Mount Ventoux: http://mainelywinenews.blogspot.com/2017/05/in-shadow-of-mont-ventoux.html

Another thought.

We stayed at Les Carmes - this was a splendid surprise ! We loved the ambiance of the courtyard breakfasts, the pool, and the delightful bedrooms of this old mansion. And it was very inexpensive.

It was close to our destinations of the Cotes du Rhone driving tour, and all of the hill towns like Bonneiux and Lourmarin, Gordes and Menerbes.

And there is a gas station 1/2 mile from the B&B in Isle sur la Sorgue which is then very close to your Avignon drop point.