Provence and French Riviera, France

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Apple & Orange > Type of trip > Adventure > Provence and French Riviera, France

TRAVEL GENERAL INFORMATION

Period of this trip:	June 2015
Country:	France
Currency used:	Euro
Duration:	7 days
Number of travelers:	2
Budget:	ca 1.100 GBP or (550 GBP pp)
Best Period:	April – October (for lavanda plantation June/July)
Guide used:	NA
VISA:	No for EU
General Info:	A flight ticket to Nice and a car is all you need to explore this region of South of France. You have everything, mountains, lakes, rivers, canyons, remote villages and vibrant cities. We visited a bit of everything, but our absolute winner is…Parc du Verdon!!

TRAVEL PLAN

Day	Area	What to Do
1	London to Nice	1 hour and 15 m flight..not much to say. At the arrival we collected our pre booked car – fantastic fiat Panda! and drove for ca 60 min to Entrevaux to our B&B, La Maison de Julie. This place is amazing. We had a quite big apartment with also a living room facing the swimming pool and a balcony with a stunning view of the mountains.
2	St Andre Les Alpes lake, Saint Julien du Verdon	Following the suggestions of our host Carol, we drove to st Andre Les Alpes lake and spent the entire day hiking along the river. There are several nice spot and no people! Rest of the day we chilled out by the lake. Worth a stop in Saint Julien du Verdon, a small village, so beautiful! Check pics!
3	Verdon National Park – Gorge du Verdon, Castellane, Le point Subline, Plage du Pont Galetas, Lavanda Plantations	Quite a full day! In the same day we drove towards the Gorge du Verdon passing trough Saint Julien du Verdon (stop for a picture – again), Castellane for a quick visit, Le point sublime (quite stunning Gorges view from the top). We stopped at the plage du pont de galetas (Galetas Bridge beach) and we took a pedalos to visit the Gorges. In the afternoon we drove in the direction of Valensole to visit lavanda plantations. Quite spectacular to get lost trough the plantations! Valensole is not great so we visited Greoux Le Bains, which is a near by and nice village. Then back to Entrevaux…quite a long drive!
4	Mercantour National Park – Circuit de Gorges du Cians et de Daluis	We did the Circuit des Gorges du Cians et de Daluis, the “Colorado” of the Alpes on the Mercantour National Park. We drove to a village called Guillaumes, towards a wonderful panoramic street passing the Gorges Daluis. Stopped several times. Guillaumes is quite a nice village. We had very good lunch at the restaurant Le Centrale in the main (and only) square. From Guillaumes we took the direction to Valberg (Ski resort in winter) and Beuil. The road back from Beuil to Entreveux is effectively inside the Gorges du Cians, a deep and narrow red canyon. Stunning!
5-6	Antibes	The French Riviera from Juan-Le-Pins/ Antibes to Montecarlo is nothing special. Beaches are very narrow, with rolling stones and mostly private (quite expensive to hire sun beds and forget about your privacy, there is no space!). Cement is everywhere. Cap Ferrat is quite nice, but not accessible to normal people! Busy Busy, expensive, not so clean beaches..the rest!We did a trip to Grasse, 25 km from Antibes. Looks like a bit abandon place, but quite nice. The perfume Museum is quite interesting. The other “free museums” are just shops.Our favourite beach was in Antibes, the only one with sands, but it was invaded by jelly fishes!:-(
7	Nice to London	Last half day to the beach and back to London.

TRAVEL COST LIST

B&B Entreveux
– 2 nights –

La Maison de Julie
C/O Carole et Christian Bolgari – Place Ste Marguerite – Le Plan – 04320 Entrevaus – France
T:+33 (0)4.93.02.46.42 M:+33 (0)6.67.57.98.10
email: contact@maisonjulie.com
website: www.maisonjulie.com

(€60 pd including HUGE breakfast) – we got also 10% discount because it was not a weekend we think!!

€216

Hotel Antibes
– 2 nights –

We are not going to post the name of the hotel as we didn’t like it at all. Maybe it was too cheap!? This area is particularly expensive so don’t go too cheap or you will be disappointed.

€110

Trips and Other

Car Hire (panda) for 7 days – no insurance

€135

Fuel

€70

Pedalo on Lac De Sainte Croix (1 hour)

€15

Perfume Museum – Grasse (€10 pp)

€20

Meal

Average Meal Price