If you want a day at the beach, just an hours drive is CASSIS. This is my favourite port town b/c it is small, and not as touristy/famous as Nice or Cannes so it's mostly LOCAL French tourists, but this village has a bit of everything, a little market, little grocery store a few bakeries, restaurants right on the water....and a unique thing is that it has the CALANQUES so you take a scenic boat ride to see the limestone cliffs. If you go here, definitely have lunch at my favourite place (you need reservations) for Villa Madie.
For Roman ruins, I'm sure you will hit Avignon (famous aqueduct / bridge Pont du Gard), or Orange (amphitheatre) or Arles.
I have not spent much time in Marseilles, but my Paris friend loves it for art, architecture and old churches/cathedrals.
Constance, for you and your love for wildlife, Camargues region is just an interesting place with the wild horses and birdlife. It's a very unique place.
But my favourite part of PROVENCE area are the tiny villages in the heart of Provence...the LUBERON area.
Rousillon is a very special place, there are a lot of artists who settle here and have galleries b/c of the OCHRE coloured soils so they take their paints and pigments from the land.
Driving distance from APT (a bigger town, medieval city, bigger market) are all the little towns like Bonnieux (famous little bakery here), Gourdes (lovely, sits on top of a hill), All these little villages are LOVELY! You can always find a great place for lunch in the shade...a delicious bakery...etc. These drives are so beautiful!
The best part is hitting the markets. There are tons of websites saying which village has a market on which day, on any given day of the week, there will be a village with a market going on. WE love picking up bread, cheese, etc. and having picnics. Summer is the time for amazing cantaloupes, peaches, etc. BEST FRUIT ever!!!
NOTES FROM ALMA FRIEND
To tell you the truth, we never took the boat to the Calanques. We would always hike there from Cassis. From the town, you just follow the signs saying "Calanques" up to the top where there is a bunch of parking (I'd definitely get an early start however!). From there you can hike to the first calanque (Port Pin) and it has a really great sandy beach and some decent snokeling. In our experience it doesn't get too crowded and we really love it. The hike is probably about 45 minutes and it's important to have good shoes. There are some slippery parts and the part where you go down to the beach is a little steep, but we have done it a bunch of times with our kids, and we survived! You can keep hiking past the beach and there are some spectacular views.
No comments:
Post a Comment