If you stay a night in Marseille, you can try to make a reservation at restaurant AM, 3 star. Supposedly very special.
1 Like
so circling back ~2+ months later…appreciate all the advice up thread
We are going to do the following:
- 2 nights Avignon
- 2 nights Lyon
- 1 night Chablis
- 3 nights Paris
we land so early (9am) in MRS that I think we can easily go to Aix en Provence or another small town en route to Avignon on Sunday. Then we have a full day (day 2) to see the rest of Avignon plus 1 or 2 other small towns. I figure on the drive up to Lyon we’ll make a stop at a nice town for lunch as well.
The night in Chablis is just to break up the drive and my wife and I really enjoy Chablis wine, so why not…figured we can get into town and maybe do 1-2 afternoon tastings as it seems like the tasting rooms are mostly in the main area making it easy to go between them.
And though just 3 nights in Paris, our flight home on the last day is 6:30pm local time, so we have a good half day if not more before we need to depart for the airport.
appreciate all the advice…
Nice stops, not why you would want to not just enjoy Avignon on your day there rather than run around squeezing more in. It’s a congested town, give yourself a day without car hassles. French are very tough in drinking and driving, threshold is lower than here I think.
The drive from Avignon to Lyons is gorgeous. The towns are right off the highway. Tain l’Hermitage has the tasting room of Chapoutier as well as the Vahlrona chocolate factory. Or arrange a visit with your favorite producer.
Other than Chablis, the car is a hindrance in those towns, not a help, and not the quickest way to get between them. The train is great. But if you do the Avignon to Lyons drive leisurely, a car makes sense.
If you aren’t visiting wineries and really want to drive, Auxerre is a nice stop for a night. But staying in Chablis sounds nice too.
Rember, the place you are us just as nice as the next place, don’t vacation by checklist. Minimize time lost to friction.
1 Like
well we land so early on Sunday (9am) and we leave Avignon on Tuesday, so we have 2 full days and from what I read online, 1 day is likely enough to walk around and enjoy the major city sights. so that is why I thought en route maybe we’d stop off and see another city, not as if our hotel is available for us to check in. Though I agree its not about a checklist, and if we enjoy Avignon we can even spend some of the day we check out of the hotel there too.
Not too concerned with drinking and driving, I never do it, and really just parking the car to get between the sites. If we were not going to stop in Chablis, I agree I may likely have ditched the car. So I assume in Avignon and Lyon the car will stay parked while we us taxi/uber to get around the cities.
For cars, I looked, for 9 Euro a day we can park ~1/3 of a mile from the hotel in Avignon, so I plan to just park it…I haven’t looked yet near our hotel in Lyon, but the return place is a block away from our hotel in Paris so will drop it once we get into town.
I think I’d rather take the leisurely drive between Avignon and Lyon, and then again spend a night somewhere between Lyon and Paris. We tend to like to see various small cities and quaint villages. Living 15 miles from NYC makes us a little jaded to big cities, I am sure we’ll like Paris, but I’d rather spend the time driving between the sights and stopping like you said at a winery or a chocolate place versus using the train for maximum efficiency and adding another day to Paris. I have to assume if we return to France, we’ll spend a few days again in Paris, who knows if we’ll go back to Provence/Lyon, so I think we would like the driving experience?
1 Like
If your budget allows, you might consider eating and staying at Troisgros in Ouches, outside Roanne. 1.5 hrs from Lyon and 4.5 from Paris. If you stop there, you can easily stop in Chartres on the way to Paris to visit the Cathedral (worth the detour).
1 Like
Thanks let me look that up. Even if just a pit stop detour for sightseeing
Too many choices . . . I had a knock out recent meal at La Cachette in Valence.
1 Like
A Three star pit 
Ha sorry meant the Church if timing for a meal didn’t work 
A quick oil and lube at Troisgros sounds like a plan!
1 Like
https://www.carrieres-lumieres.com/fr
Bandol - go to Pradeaux, Tempier and Pibarnon
2 Likes
Bandol is an hour west. Quite the detour; might as well go to Burgundy
well ,then he should go to Burgundy. Best wine in the world and great food. But, Bandol is really good and a lot more under the radar.