Destination: France

LONELY PLANET'S OFFICIAL ITINERARY INFORMATION

Itinerary: Quick Getaway

Budget airlines make short breaks easy.



For urban souls, sophisticated cities like Paris and Lyon win hands down. Big but not everyone’s cup of tea is rough-cut Marseille, a heady mix of sea breeze and city-grit. Elsewhere along the Med, Nice beckons hardcore punters after sun, sand and sex; Toulon is a slick flit to St-Tropez; Nîmes– the stepping-stone alongside student-driven Montpellier to a Camargue safari – combines Roman relics in town with the Pont du Gard out of town; while the Pyrenees tumble into the sea near Spanish-styled Perpignan.

Toulouse, itself a two- or four-day itinerary, is the other Pyrenees launch pad. Fairy-tale castle-clad Carcassonne or the Loire chateaux around Tours vie with the capital for hottest romantic getaway.

In the Alps, Chamonix’s Clubhouse – the ultimate in design and stylish dirty weekends – is a two-hour drive from Chambéry and Grenoble, three from Lyon and St-Étienne , and an hour from Geneva (Switzerland). All these cities are first-class stops for skiing.

For an old-fashioned seaside paddle, Biarritz, Dinard or Brest are best. La Rochelle is a bridge away from Île de Ré; Poitiers neighbours Green Venice; Limoges is the place to stockpile crockery; while Nantes and Bordeaux are innovative French cities that surprise and enthral.

Travelling to France?
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