Best of Provence Beyond Avignon: Aix-en-Provence, Marseille, Luberon, Cassis Calanques, Camargue, Mont Ventoux & Southern Mediterranean France - A 2026 First-Person Guide
Browse more guides: France travel | Europe destinations Best of Provence Beyond Avignon: Aix-en-Provence, Marseille, Luberon, Cassis Calanques, Camargue, Mont Ventoux & Southern Mediterranean France - A 2026 First-Person Guide I have walked Cours Mirabeau in Aix-en-Provence at the exact morning light Paul Cézanne painted; I have eaten bouillabaisse on the Vieux-Port in Marseille where Greek sailors landed in 600 BCE; I have swum in the limestone fjord of Calanque d'En-Vau where the water turns a colour no postcard prints honestly. Provence is not one place. It is a Mediterranean region of about 31,400 square kilometres that wraps around the Rhône delta, climbs to a bald 1,909-metre peak, and pours out at chalk cliffs into a sea that has carried Phoenicians, Romans, Saracens, popes, painters, and now me with a notebook and a sun hat. Most first-time visitors do Avignon, see the Palais des Papes, drive through a lavender field in July, and call it Provence. That is the Block...