France's second city and its oldest, Marseille is discovered from the Vieux-Port to the Panier quarter, with the MuCEM and Fort Saint-Jean linked by a footbridge, Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde and the boat shuttle to the Chateau d'If. To the south, the Calanques national park protects 20 kilometres of limestone cliffs pierced by coves: Sormiou, Morgiou and En-Vau are reached on foot from Luminy or by boat from Cassis. In summer, road access to some calanques is closed or subject to booking for fire risk, and a sea shuttle serves the main ones from the Vieux-Port. Allow two days for the city and one for a hike in the massif.
The north-west of the region carries the classic image of
Provence. Avignon keeps the Palais des Papes and its ramparts, Arles its Roman arena and theatre still in use, and the Luberon its hilltop villages, Gordes, Roussillon and its ochre, Menerbes, Bonnieux. Senanque abbey is photographed in front of its lavender from mid-June to mid-July, and l'Isle-sur-la-Sorgue holds its antiques market on Sunday. The Pont du Gard, a three-tier Roman aqueduct, is 25 minutes from Avignon. This area is covered over short distances but saturates in July, during the Avignon Festival.
The former capital of Provence, Aix lines up the Cours Mirabeau and its fountains, the mansions of the Mazarin quarter and a market every morning. Cezanne's studio has been kept in its 1906 state, and Mont Sainte-Victoire, which he painted more than eighty times, is hiked from the Bimont dam, about 4 hours to the Croix de Provence. Around it, the villages of the Aix country, Ventabren, Le Tholonet, and the Sainte-Baume site, an ancient forest and a pilgrimage cave at 1,000 metres, offer cool air less than an hour from the coast.
Between Sainte-Croix lake and Castellane, the Verdon has carved gorges 700 metres deep. The Route des Cretes, from La Palud-sur-Verdon, strings together fourteen viewpoints on a 23-kilometre loop. At the bottom, the Blanc-Martel trail, 15 kilometres and about 6 hours, is walked with a shuttle for the return and a torch for the tunnels. Turquoise Sainte-Croix lake is good for kayaking and pedalos from the Galetas bridge. Moustiers-Sainte-Marie, clinging under a cliff, and Aiguines guard the western and southern entrances. The area is saturated in July and August and access can be regulated.
Between Marseille and Saint-Tropez, the Var coast alternates calanques, ports and vineyards. Bandol and Cassis produce seaside wines, the Giens peninsula closes a double tombolo, and offshore, the Hyeres islands, Porquerolles, Port-Cros and the Levant, form a marine national park: clear water, trails, no cars. Porquerolles is reached in 20 minutes by boat from the Tour Fondue and is toured by bike. The Maures massif, behind, is covered with chestnut and cork oak forests, with the hilltop villages of Collobrieres and Bormes-les-Mimosas.
The eastern part of the coast, around Nice, forms the
French Riviera: Cannes and the Croisette, Antibes and the Picasso museum, Old Nice and the Cours Saleya, Monaco and the corniches, Menton and its citrus gardens at the Italian border. The regional train links all these towns without a car. Behind, the hilltop villages of Saint-Paul-de-Vence, Eze and Gourdon, the Maeght foundation and the Grasse perfume houses round off the visit. This is the most built-up and expensive area of the region, especially in July-August and during the Cannes Film Festival and the Monaco Grand Prix in May.
The Hautes-Alpes and the north of the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence offer a completely different face: Serre Chevalier, Montgenevre and Isola 2000 for skiing from December to April, the Queyras nature park and its fortified village of Saint-Veran, the highest in Europe lived in year-round at 2,040 metres, and the Ubaye valley around Barcelonnette, marked by 19th-century emigration to Mexico. In summer, these valleys are hiked, run in whitewater and cycled over the passes of the Galibier, the Izoard and the Bonette, France's highest road at 2,802 metres.
The Mercantour national park, the region's only alpine park, stretches from the Ubaye valley to the Roya. The Vallee des Merveilles, at the foot of Mont Bego, holds over 30,000 Bronze Age rock carvings, seen only on foot with a licensed guide. The Vesubie, Tinee and Roya valleys, devastated by storm Alex in 2020 and since rebuilt, keep Baroque villages such as Saorge and Tende, the Train des Merveilles toward Ventimiglia, and alpine wildlife, ibex, chamois, and wolves that have returned naturally since 1992.
