Nice, St Paul de Vence or Antibes?

[CruisingEh]

We will be tendered in Cannes from 7am to 6pm on a Sunday. We are thinking about taking public transportation (bus/train) to one of Nice, St Paul de Vence or Antibes. What I found is:

 

1. Taking bus #200 from Cannes to Nice is not worth it because the journey can take up to 2 hrs. If we take the train, then it's a 20 blocks walk away from the sea to get to the old town of Nice.

 

2. From Cannes to St Paul de Vence involves a train ride follow by a bus transfer. Approx 1 hr each way?

 

3. From Cannes to Antibes is a 20 min bus ride or 10 min train ride. Bus station is much closer to old town.

 

Given the above logistic, which one of the above should we visit? I know it's subjective, but which one is worth seeing more? Please share your opinion!

 

I guess another option would just spend the day in Cannes as we really haven't seen the town - even though we had been there twice!

[Hlitner]

Good questions and you have obviously done your homework. We have spent many months in this part of France and also been to Cannes on about ten cruise calls. Of the 3 places you mention, we would put Antibes in last place because it is a cute seaside resort/city in much the same vein as Cannes. In other words, if you have never been to Cannes you would probably enjoy walking around this port city as much as going to Antibes. St Paul de Vence is simply our favorite place in this part of France. If the idea of strolling around a charming walled city full of decent art galleries, shops, and its share of restaurants/cafes, this place is worthy of a half day. The problem with St Paul de Vence is getting there by public transit is a bit complicated (train to bus) and takes a long time (depending on your connections it can take 1 1/2 hours each way). As to Nice, well we like to say that Nice is nice. Getting to Nice from Cannes is very easy via the train. Once in Nice you can do a lot of walking or even use the local buses. Personally, our favorite thing to do when we are on a full day port call in Cannes is to rent a car, drive ourselves to St Paul de Vence (about a 45 min drive), spend the morning in St Paul and usually have lunch in that town. We then will stop somewhere else before returning to Cannes (Antibes is actually a convenient stop). We usually go from Cannes to St Paul via the 4 lane Autostrade and then return using the congested (but interesting) 2 lane coastal road (this goes through Antibes). If you want to stick with public transport you might want to go directly to the Cannes train station (you can walk there from the tender pier in about 20 min) and take the regional train (no reservations and they run about every 30 min) to Nice. Spend as much time in Nice as you please and then you can either take the train back to Cannes or, if you still have a lot of time, you could take the train to Antibes which a stop on the same train that takes you back to Cannes.

 

Hank

[CruisingEh]

Thanks Hank! as always your reply is detailed, informative and extremely helpful.

 

St Paul de Vence sounds like a very interesting place to visit. However it looks like it may be the most difficult to get to using public transportation. I was wondering if we can take a taxi from Cagnes Sur Mer train station instead of the bus. Do you know how easy it is to get a taxi at the station? I know it's only a 15 min bus ride into town, but others were saying that the wait can be up to 45 minutes for the bus to come. Plus I am concerned about the queue since St Paul de Vence attracts a lot of tourist!

 

I heard taxi is expensive in the French Rivera, and that's why we are not considering taking a taxi from the pier.

 

Thanks for your advice once again.

[Hlitner]

Thanks Hank! as always your reply is detailed, informative and extremely helpful.

 

St Paul de Vence sounds like a very interesting place to visit. However it looks like it may be the most difficult to get to using public transportation. I was wondering if we can take a taxi from Cagnes Sur Mer train station instead of the bus. Do you know how easy it is to get a taxi at the station? I know it's only a 15 min bus ride into town, but others were saying that the wait can be up to 45 minutes for the bus to come. Plus I am concerned about the queue since St Paul de Vence attracts a lot of tourist!

 

I heard taxi is expensive in the French Rivera, and that's why we are not considering taking a taxi from the pier.

 

Thanks for your advice once again.

 

Good question, but we have no first hand experience using a taxi on this route. It is about 5 miles from Cagnes sur Mer to St Paul de Vence so a taxi is going to be affordable (not cheap). I would guess the cost would be about 30 Euros (each way) since taxis are pretty expensive. The bigger problem would be finding a taxi at the Cagnes sur Mer train station. On the other hand, you would always have the option of taking the bus so you could be flexible and just do what works best at the time. For what it's worth, taxis are just not a cost effective way of transportation in the South of France. Unlike in countries like Italy there just does not seem to be a great taxi culture in France. We have actually tendered into Cannes and noticed that there were zero taxis waiting near the pier. Walking a few blocks past the Marina we would then see a dozen taxis parked at a local cafe where the drivers were enjoying their morning cafe au lait and newspapers. The thought of giving up that morning coffee to meet a cruise ship is not something that would occur to many Frnech taxi drivers :)

 

One additional thought. The Ligne d'Azur bus (I think its the #400) that runs from Cagnes sur Mer to St Paul de Vence actually originates at the Nice bus station. The bus then travels through downtown Nice (where it makes a few stops) out past the airport and gets to Cagnes sur Mer where it then turns inland for those final 5 miles. I mention this because if you were to go to St Paul de Vence early in the morning and keep your visit pretty short, you might have time to catch the bus all the way back to Nice where you can spend some time in the city before taking the train back to Cannes. You would need a long port day but this might be doable for folks that want to experience both Nice and St Paul de Vence in a day. But keep in mind that while the bus takes about 20 min to go between Cagnes sur Mer and St Paul de Vence....it takes about an hour to get into Nice.

 

Hank

[cberge]

I usually agree with Hank on just about everything,and he is right about St.Paul,BUT it is hard to get to and Antibes is a great place to go for a wonderful seafood luncheon on a Sunday and then just stroll around the town until you want to get the train back.I like Antibes almost as much as St.Paul,and have been to both quite a few times.Guess it all depends on what kind of day you want to have.You can always go back for a wonderful land trip!!!!

[bonnieg]

Hank, I'll be renting a car on Monday while in Cannes. The plan is to go to St. Paul de Vence then Antibes. Have you ever been to Vence? If so, what is that town like? I know there are other charming towns, but I didn't want to do a lot of driving and wanted to keep the routes simple.

[CruisingEh]

I usually agree with Hank on just about everything,and he is right about St.Paul,BUT it is hard to get to and Antibes is a great place to go for a wonderful seafood luncheon on a Sunday and then just stroll around the town until you want to get the train back.I like Antibes almost as much as St.Paul,and have been to both quite a few times.Guess it all depends on what kind of day you want to have.You can always go back for a wonderful land trip!!!!

 

The more I think about this, the more I agree with both you and Hank. Yes, St. Paul de Vence looks like a wonderful place to go. BUT it is hard to get to from Cannes without a car. I am also worried about crowd and traffic as well given that we will be there on a Sunday. Maybe the sensible thing to do is to spend a few hours in Antibes and then come back to Cannes for the rest of the day. As you said, perhaps I should just save St. Paul for a separate land trip :-)

[cberge]

The more I think about this, the more I agree with both you and Hank. Yes, St. Paul de Vence looks like a wonderful place to go. BUT it is hard to get to from Cannes without a car. I am also worried about crowd and traffic as well given that we will be there on a Sunday. Maybe the sensible thing to do is to spend a few hours in Antibes and then come back to Cannes for the rest of the day. As you said, perhaps I should just save St. Paul for a separate land trip :-)

No matter what you decide to do.....ENJOY...as it is a really beautiful area to explore.

[Hlitner]

A couple of responses. Regarding Vence, we have driven through the town and actually stopped on one ocassion for a few minutes. We would not rate it worth going out of the way for a visit, but if you happen to be driving close you might want to make a short visit. I should emphasize for others that the town of Vence is not the same place as St Paul de Vence (an amazing walled town). As to Cberge's comments about Antibes, I do agree that its a good Sunday destination (many places are open on Sundays) and also think its a picturesque city. That being said, we do not think it comes close to St Paul de Vence in terms of charm. One thing that is often not discussed about St Paul de Vence are the numerous art galleries located in the town. Many of these galleries (most are quite small) are of a much higher quality then the places found in most tourist cities and they are a lot of fun for browsing. As to Antibes, we do enjoy visiting the market place that is located a short walking distance from the marina. Markets in France are always interesting places and you can learn a lot about the food culture by browsing the many fascinating food products being sold in these places.

 

Hank

[Cruzer Two]

We will be tendered in Cannes from 7am to 6pm on a Sunday. We are thinking about taking public transportation (bus/train) to one of Nice, St Paul de Vence or Antibes. What I found is:

 

2. From Cannes to St Paul de Vence involves a train ride follow by a bus transfer. Approx 1 hr each way?

 

I guess another option would just spend the day in Cannes as we really haven't seen the town - even though we had been there twice!

 

CruisingEh:

 

Are you totally opposed to taking a ship sponsored tour to St Paul de Vence? This medieval hill town would be my number one choice of the places you’ve named. I would suggest a tour of St. Paul de Vence and then a hop on, hop off bus tour of Cannes later in the day.

 

Click on

to see my youtube video of St. Paul de Vence and Cannes.

 

Ron

[Pearl64]

I have been reading this thread with interest. We are flying into Nice the end of March and spending a week in France before our cruise out of Barcelona on the Riviera. We are spending the day we fly in around Nice and/or Monaco using the bus. Then the following day we are picking up the rental car and head towards our rental north of Orange. My question is how to get to the small town of Rochegude. I know we can go via the "interstate" but we have all day so was wondering if going to the French Grand Canyon would be an option or would it be too wintery the end of March? Or would a tour of St. Paul de Vence be better? What about Grasse? Just trying to research our options rather than just driving to get there or driving and seeing something of interest along the way. We need to get to Rochegude by 6 pm. It will be a Saturday.

 

Thanks for all suggestions.

Pearl

[CruisingEh]

CruisingEh:

 

Are you totally opposed to taking a ship sponsored tour to St Paul de Vence? This medieval hill town would be my number one choice of the places you’ve named. I would suggest a tour of St. Paul de Vence and then a hop on, hop off bus tour of Cannes later in the day.

 

Click on

to see my youtube video of St. Paul de Vence and Cannes.

 

Ron

 

Hi Ron, no we are not totally opposed to cruise tour. But our order of preference would be:

 

1. DIY with public transportation/taxi

2. private tour

3. ship tour

 

In certain situation, 1 & 2 may end up costing the same as a ship tour. But saving money is not our only goal here! Given that we are only in port for a limited amount of time, we want to maximize our time, yet still have the flexibility to control how much time we want to spend in the places we visit. We just don't feel going on a bus with 40 other people is a good use of time. Having said that, we had taken 1-2 ship tours over the years, when our options were limited, and enjoyed them.

 

In this particular case, the ship has a tour that goes to both Grasse & St Paul de Vence. Total time of the tour, including traveling, is 4.5 hours. I just don't feel that's enough time, and hence my hesitation.

 

We are the types who like to walk around, take lots of pictures, and try to enjoy the sight and sound of the region :-)

 

[cberge]

Hi Ron, no we are not totally opposed to cruise tour. But our order of preference would be:

 

 

In this particular case, the ship has a tour that goes to both Grasse & St Paul de Vence. Total time of the tour, including traveling, is 4.5 hours. I just don't feel that's enough time, and hence my hesitation.Waaay not enough time to do justice to St.P.Greasse is ok if you have nothing else to do...even Antibes is better in this case.I have spent time as in being in St.P for all day several times and I never really get my fill,but I was also staing in the SOF,and I did one time on a cruise.Antibes i did on my ow ans well as sveral other places...my hint again to you....land trip!!!!

 

We are the types who like to walk around, take lots of pictures, and try to enjoy the sight and sound of the region :-)See above:)

 

I noted my comments in your response.I agree with Hank too..Vence was nice to go through....

[Cruzer Two]

Hi Ron, no we are not totally opposed to cruise tour. But our order of preference would be:

 

1. DIY with public transportation/taxi

2. private tour

3. ship tour

 

In certain situation, 1 & 2 may end up costing the same as a ship tour. But saving money is not our only goal here! Given that we are only in port for a limited amount of time, we want to maximize our time, yet still have the flexibility to control how much time we want to spend in the places we visit. We just don't feel going on a bus with 40 other people is a good use of time. Having said that, we had taken 1-2 ship tours over the years, when our options were limited, and enjoyed them.

 

In this particular case, the ship has a tour that goes to both Grasse & St Paul de Vence. Total time of the tour, including traveling, is 4.5 hours. I just don't feel that's enough time, and hence my hesitation.

 

We are the types who like to walk around, take lots of pictures, and try to enjoy the sight and sound of the region :-)

 

 

I can understand your delimena. I've never been to Grasse, so I can't comment on this portion of the tour. We did the ships tour to St. Paul de Vence and it was basicaly for the transportation. After arriving St. Paul de Vence we wondered around the city for the entire time taking pictures and enjoying the sights. Then we returned to Cannes for an afternoon tour.

 

Ron

[CruisingEh]

I can understand your delimena. I've never been to Grasse, so I can't comment on this portion of the tour. We did the ships tour to St. Paul de Vence and it was basicaly for the transportation. After arriving St. Paul de Vence we wondered around the city for the entire time taking pictures and enjoying the sights. Then we returned to Cannes for an afternoon tour.

 

Ron

 

It sounds like you have quite a bit of free time St Paul de Vence. We would have considered it had our ship offers a similar tour.

 

I watched some travel video tonight which I borrowed from the local library. St Paul does look very charming. But Antibes doesn't look like a bad alternative either :-) Since we are not planning to rent a car, I guess we'll just have to save St Paul for another time as Karen suggested.

 

Thanks everyone!

 

[Hlitner]

We have been to Grasse and it was one of those places we did not feel worthy of a return visit (we have spent many months in this part of France). Grasse is best known for the perfume factories, but we found the entire perfume thing to be a bit touristy. You can go into a so-called perfume factory and actually formulate your own scent but the quality leaves much to be desired. To be blunt, we would not sacrifice 1 min of time at St Paul de Vence to go to Grasse!

 

Hank

[AliceS]

We have been to Grasse and it was one of those places we did not feel worthy of a return visit (we have spent many months in this part of France). Grasse is best known for the perfume factories, but we found the entire perfume thing to be a bit touristy. You can go into a so-called perfume factory and actually formulate your own scent but the quality leaves much to be desired. To be blunt, we would not sacrifice 1 min of time at St Paul de Vence to go to Grasse!

 

Hank

 

Hank,

 

We are in Le Havre in November, 2012. I was set to go to the Monet home, but it closes on 11/1. I've done the Beaches of Normandy and loved it, but want to see something else. Do you have a suggestion for that time of year. The beach communities will be shut down. Thank you. Alice

[Hlitner]

Traveling in the off-season does have its "issues" and one unfortunate fact is that many places close. We do agree that its great to see the beaches outside of the busy summer season (we were once the only couple at Omaha Beach). We would be hesitant to recommend anything along the coast that time of the year. Have you considered just taking the train to Rouen? This is a major city known for its Catherdral, but it also has a pretty decent shopping area and a few museums. Another option is to go all the way to Paris (a bit too are for our taste but many do not seem to mind the travel time). If you are big Monet fans you could have quite a day just visiting the Musee d'Orangerie (to see the amazing circular waterlilly mural) and also the Musee d'Orsay (our favorite museum in Paris).

 

Hank

[Carolyn R]

It sounds like you have quite a bit of free time St Paul de Vence. We would have considered it had our ship offers a similar tour.

 

I watched some travel video tonight which I borrowed from the local library. St Paul does look very charming. But Antibes doesn't look like a bad alternative either :-) Since we are not planning to rent a car, I guess we'll just have to save St Paul for another time as Karen suggested.

 

Thanks everyone!

 

 

I am contemplating taking the ship's tour to St. Paul de Vence. There is a morning tour and an afternoon tour. I may book both and go with the morning tour and come back with the afternoon tour. All the private tours on our roll call are going to multiple places and I just want a leisurely day to enjoy this beautiful town.

[Hlitner]

I am contemplating taking the ship's tour to St. Paul de Vence. There is a morning tour and an afternoon tour. I may book both and go with the morning tour and come back with the afternoon tour. All the private tours on our roll call are going to multiple places and I just want a leisurely day to enjoy this beautiful town.

 

It is possible to get to St Paul de Vence on the local bus for a fraction of the cost of one tour...much less two tours. If you are tendering into Villefranche you can just take the local bus (#100) into Nice to the bus station (the last stop). At that same bus station you can then get the #400 bus to St Paul de Vence. The total cost of the two buses will be only a couple of Euros (each way). For your return you just reverse the process. Keep in mind that the #400 bus does take about an hour (each way) between Nice and St Paul de Vence.

 

Hank

[srpilo]

Good question, but we have no first hand experience using a taxi on this route. It is about 5 miles from Cagnes sur Mer to St Paul de Vence so a taxi is going to be affordable (not cheap). I would guess the cost would be about 30 Euros (each way) since taxis are pretty expensive. The bigger problem would be finding a taxi at the Cagnes sur Mer train station. On the other hand, you would always have the option of taking the bus so you could be flexible and just do what works best at the time. For what it's worth, taxis are just not a cost effective way of transportation in the South of France. Unlike in countries like Italy there just does not seem to be a great taxi culture in France. We have actually tendered into Cannes and noticed that there were zero taxis waiting near the pier. Walking a few blocks past the Marina we would then see a dozen taxis parked at a local cafe where the drivers were enjoying their morning cafe au lait and newspapers. The thought of giving up that morning coffee to meet a cruise ship is not something that would occur to many Frnech taxi drivers :)

 

One additional thought. The Ligne d'Azur bus (I think its the #400) that runs from Cagnes sur Mer to St Paul de Vence actually originates at the Nice bus station. The bus then travels through downtown Nice (where it makes a few stops) out past the airport and gets to Cagnes sur Mer where it then turns inland for those final 5 miles. I mention this because if you were to go to St Paul de Vence early in the morning and keep your visit pretty short, you might have time to catch the bus all the way back to Nice where you can spend some time in the city before taking the train back to Cannes. You would need a long port day but this might be doable for folks that want to experience both Nice and St Paul de Vence in a day. But keep in mind that while the bus takes about 20 min to go between Cagnes sur Mer and St Paul de Vence....it takes about an hour to get into Nice.

 

Hank

 

Hank a quick question.. Does the #400 bus actually stop at the Cagnes sur Mer train station in route to St Paul de Vence ? Just curious if we took the train from Cannes to Cagnes sur Mer would we have to then find the bus station for the #400 bus or does it stop right at the train station ?

 

Thanks for any help

Srpilo

[Hlitner]

Hank a quick question.. Does the #400 bus actually stop at the Cagnes sur Mer train station in route to St Paul de Vence ? Just curious if we took the train from Cannes to Cagnes sur Mer would we have to then find the bus station for the #400 bus or does it stop right at the train station ?

 

Thanks for any help

Srpilo

 

I seem to recall the actual bus stop is across the street from the station. But it's been a few years since we used the bus to stop across the street from station. But since its been such a long time it would be nice to hear from somebody with more recent experience. That being said, if you do use the train you can simply ask inside the station where to catch the bus to St Paul de Vence. Cagnes sur Mer is not a bus station but is simply a city where the bus makes multiple stops just like any local bus.

 

Hank

[French_Al]

hi, i would avoid staying in cannes. walk to the train station and take the train to nice and then on the way back i would stop in antibes.

 

it is possible to walk to the train station in nice to the main sights in nice, old nice and the castle hill. it is very good to see nice and antibes as historically nice was never france and antibes was the 1st major town in the real provence. make sure you go to the top of the castle hill, the elevator is now free and next to the castel plage beach restaurant.

 

antibes provencial old town will give you an excellent contrast to nice's (italian style) old town. the train station in antibes is also walking distance to the old town. visit the picasso museum in antibes if you have time.

[CruisingEh]

hi, i would avoid staying in cannes. walk to the train station and take the train to nice and then on the way back i would stop in antibes.

 

it is possible to walk to the train station in nice to the main sights in nice, old nice and the castle hill. it is very good to see nice and antibes as historically nice was never france and antibes was the 1st major town in the real provence. make sure you go to the top of the castle hill, the elevator is now free and next to the castel plage beach restaurant.

 

antibes provencial old town will give you an excellent contrast to nice's (italian style) old town. the train station in antibes is also walking distance to the old town. visit the picasso museum in antibes if you have time.

 

Thank you for your suggestion. We are still undecided about Nice or Cannes. We are definitely going to visit Antibes though. Off topic, how's the weather in Nice this year? Just hope it will be sunny and warm when we visit. Our cruise starts in less than a week!

[CruisingEh]

Just came back. Things didn't go as planned. When we got to the train station, there was an unusually large crowd. It turned out there was sort of accident and the trains were delayed 1+ hr. We debated whether to go ahead with our plan or just stay in Cannes, and decided to take a taxi to Antibes. Plenty of taxi available outside the station. However as Hank pointed out, the drivers were all much more interested in their morning cafe au lait than business. We finally located a driver who was talking on this cell. He noticed us but continued to talk away as we waited patiently. After a few minutes he finally turned his attention to us. We got him to take us to the old town of Antibes. The fare was about 32 euros.

 

On the way way, we decided to take the taxi again. We found 4 drivers at the taxi stand yapping away and enjoying life. They seemed kind of annoyed that we dared to interrupt them. When they heard Cannes as the destination 3 of them shook their heads and one with some reluctance, indicated he would take us, as if he was doing us a favor. We had him drop us off at the festival hall where the opening of Cannes Film Festival was held. The cost of this ride was 48 euros. Not sure why the big difference as we didn't noticed the driver taking longer routes or wasting time to run up the fare. We didn't have time to argue. So we just paid and got out.

 

And to answer my own question, the weather was fabulous! :-)