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scenic drive with 2 night stops Paris to Nice in December

My husband daughter and I want to drive from Paris 14th December to Nice 17th, seeing the countryside.
best route needed, with stops.
Thanks Brita

Posted by
3656 posts

Whenever, I see requests like this, my first thought is what caused you to decide to drive in the first place? Those reasons can often form the basis for choosing places to stop or your route in because there are just about a million options for a drive from Paris to Nice. Also, when you say see the country side, are you planning to drive on the non-toll roads and stop often or do you want to drive let's say 2-3 hours the first day and stop and explore an area and then do the same thing the next day and so on? What are your interests? There is a lot to see between Paris and Nice and I might suggest stops that are of no interest to you. By the way, if you leave Paris on the 14th and get to Nice on the 17th, you will have three nights for this trip. You could make your first stop in northern Bourgogne and stop someplace like Auxerre or Chablis. I love un-oaked Chardonnays so Chablis and that area are of great interest to me but maybe not to you. You could also stop in Valence and spend an afternoon in the Drome department and visit Montélimar and maybe even cross the Rhone and take a look at the Ardèche department. Another possible stop is Avignon or one of the provencal towns such as Arles, Orange or Aix-en-Provence. And if you want to see another city, Lyon is great. You could also skip Lyon and spend the night in Vienne and see the Roman ruins there. And that's not the half of it.

Posted by
7175 posts

14th Beaune (312km)
15th Lyon (160km)
16th Aix-en-Provence (299km)
17th Nice (175km)

That is 3 stops though !!

Posted by
15560 posts

I haven't been in winter, but I hope someone comes along who has and can confirm that the countryside is worth driving through at that time of year. When you're planning driving times, take into account that speed limits on the highways are reduced when wet.

Posted by
3 posts

Thanks, I am vague as there are so many options, three stops sound great will probably stay in Antibes on the 3rd one.

Posted by
32519 posts

I'm really confused.

Your question here is for driving from Paris to Nice with your last night in Antibes.

Your other question is about finding a rental car in Nice.

Are you driving to Antibes from Paris and returning the car there then renting another in Nice?

Posted by
10120 posts

Married into a French family, I've seen plenty of the countryside in winter. Ugh. To me, north of Lyon is bleak in winter--with a some exceptions. Forget the charming villages with flower boxes in the windows, the outdoor cafe terraces in the winter. There are hundreds of historic sights to see for sure: Vezeley, the Antique Theater in Orange, the Roman city of Vienne, if you're looking for sites. As for route--there is no best route. I've driven them all. The autoroute is one long, boring road, while the highways, the nationals, take you through every town and village, over mountains. You'd go nuts. My choice would be to get on the TGV to Avignon or Marseille and rent a car there if I didn't know what I wanted to see and do between here and there.

Posted by
7981 posts

Have made this drive both ways and agree with Betts. If you have several days in nicer weather or if you have had a car for a week in Provence or whatever then it makes some sense, but as transportation not so much. If ever a route was designed for train travel, this is it.

We have made stops in Vezelay, in Semur en Auxois, in Beaune, in Vienne and in Aix on similar trips and each of these was terrific -- Vienne we literally picked by just looking at a map, had no idea what a treasure it was -- it was just a convenient stopping point and so were thrilled with the Roman ruins no far from our bog standard Ibis quick overnight lodgings. All of these towns are beautiful but the weather and scenery this time of year is bleak and the driving can be nervous making.

When we made our trips we were doing things like driving from Rome to Paris in early summer, or on our way from Amsterdam to visit friends in Provence for a week, or spending a week in the Dordogne before driving to Paris. We would not rent a car this time of year just for this transportation from Paris to Nice; I'd spend more time in Paris -- do a day trip or two locally if villages are important (e.g. https://janettravels.wordpress.com/category/day-trips-from-paris/) and then train to Nice.