Just came back from self guided trip to southern France. Started in Arles, then to Vaison La Romaine, over to Sarlat La Caneda and then down to Carcassonne. My hotel rating is for quality not necessarily price. Most of them had free wi-fi that worked ...usually.
We lived and worked in Europe for four years in early 2000's so I had been to, or through many of the towns, areas.
We rented a vehicle and used Rick's guide for locations, sites and hotels. Great trip, only issue was our first hotel, Arles- Hotel de la Muette (Logis Hotel system). Arrived after 24 hours of flying from Hawaii to Marseille and 45 minute drive to Arles. They claimed we did not have a reservation, weren't interested in my confirmation email and #certificate with price and dates. We had to walk around and find other hotel(s). Not impressed. I had actually changed our date after initial request to them required a date change for our stay, which we did.
So, Arles: found Hotel Du Musee - really nice, remodeled, great location for walking and day trips, lovely courtyard (midrange). Then Hotel Regence - good location, very helpful and nice owners, clean room, older place (budget). Went to Pont du Guard, Les Baux.
fortress site.
Vaison La Romaine: Hotel Burrhus - great location, free parking nice terrace overlooking town square. Pretty walkable medieval village, Roman ruins and theatre, Cote Du Rhone winery country, very nice to drive the 'Wine Trail' Rick provided. No crowds at these dates mostly local folks enjoying a glass or two.
Sarlat La Caneda: Hotel La Villa des Consuls - really large room, great location in medieval city, tough to find parking, but used lot (free after Sept. 15) a few blocks away. Friendly and helpful owner. (medium hotel). Went to tour of Cave paintings - great day and very well done. They will be opening Las Caux 4 next year, which will improve the visit. Our Rouffignac Cave tour was by one of the family members that owns the cave; not much English but he gave a great tour. The tour included these two caves and the Pre-History museum; stopped for lunch at a pretty hamlet with tables beside a chateau and on the bank of the river. Scarlet is one of the prettiest medieval towns, clean and lots of restaurant choices, great people watching square, no traffic in sight.
Carcassonne: Hotel Du Pont Vieux. Walking distance from La Cite'. (budget-medium). Really nice spot, great and private courtyard, free parking less than a block away Went to Minerve, Cathar fortresses south and a few other large fortresses, beautiful countryside and tons of places to visit if you like chateau's and fortresses.
Used GPS (EuropeCar) which was mostly very helpful. Took us on some really, really small roads.cowpaths which were shortcuts but did give us pause. A few times tried to get us to turn down blocked streets or no car zones - walking area and did two roundabout pin ball moves in a few small towns - go to round about -all the way around -took us back to next roundabout where it had us do the same thing, we did it just for laughs and then took a different exit, it recalculated correctly and we were on our way. Once it took us, in a very small hamlet, down a gravel path where we came to grape pickers with tractor unloading road at winery. We stared at each other, waved, led to the loading docks. We drove to the front of the building and took that road. GPS is definitely worth it.
Our 18 day trip, self guided with Rick's book was definitely worth it. Although I really enjoyed our Rick Steve's tour in Italy two years ago, this was a little more relaxing and we could go each day, or any day to new sites we learned about while there.