Anyone who has spent any time on European summer social media threads has yearned for the allure of the south of France. Me being no exception, I penciled in five whole days in Nice on my trip through Europe. The beauty of most coastal European destinations is the accessibility to other towns by train. During the five days I spent in the south of France, I maximized my time in five different towns, coming away with a carefully curated ranking system. As always, best for last.
Fifth place: Nice
Ironically, my least favorite destination was the one I was staying in. A few locals in Paris warned us Nice was akin to the Jersey Shores of France. This judgment may have been an exaggeration; the murky Jersey Shores have nothing on the electric blue waters of Côte d’Azur, but it became comically understandable as the week progressed.
Old Town Nice meets the expectations of romanticized European towns, but in the outskirts, awkwardly oversized vacation condos litter the skyline. I am aware that by describing commercialism as tacky, I am outing myself as a snob. But Nice is built around tourism and for that reason it felt more like Disneyland than the authentic, historic European towns I had visited so far.
As for the beaches, they were crowded and overtaken by pricey clubs, but I came to realize most beaches in the south of France are like this, so in hindsight I reserve my judgment. The most outstanding part of Nice is certainly the water, as it was the bluest we saw in the south of France. While swimming, I was half convinced that if I took a gulp of the sea water it would taste like Glacier Freeze Gatorade.
If I went back to the south of France, I would stay in a different town, but staying in Nice is worth it if you are looking for nightlife. The other towns I visited shut down early, but Old Town Nice is home to late night European dinners, bustling bars and clubs with lines out the door and music pulsating through the streets.
Old Town is best to visit at night for the energy but is worth visiting in the light of day for its narrow and winding streets that glow orange in the sunlight. In the morning, a market runs through town and sells delicious, albeit expensive produce. If Nice was the only place I visited in Europe, it would be the most beautiful place I had ever been, but the towns of the French riviera offer fierce competition.
Fourth place: Èze
Of the places I visited, Èze was most raved about on social media. I understand the hype, but such high expectations are hard to exceed. The most spectacular part of my visit to Èze was, surprisingly, the bus ride there. Winding up steep cliffs of greenery, the view from my cozy window seat boasted panoramic sights of the orange rooftops of Nice and the shoreline of Côte d’Azur. This was my biggest “holy shit I’m here,” moment of the trip thus far and I spent the whole bus ride smiling giddily.
Upon arrival, the epic stair journey began. Èze is perched atop a cliff and the streets are narrow, pedestrian only and relentlessly steep. For this reason, Èze was the most unique location I visited in the south of France. The other destinations were uniform in their pastel buildings and crowded beaches, but Èze stood out for its cliff top views and stone buildings draped in vines and shadow.
The number one thing that separated Èze from the other towns was the hilltop garden. Overlooking the rooftops of Èze with spectacular views of the sea and winding paths through a broad array of cactus and succulents, this garden is well worth the seven-euro entry fee.
I am only placing Èze so low in the ranking for the false advertising Instagram had given. Whoever was posting content in Èze must have gone early in the morning because the streets captured were deceptively empty. The village is much smaller than I had expected so there is little space to disperse the crowds. Besides the garden, there was little to see in Èze and I left after only an hour or two. If I had gone early in the morning and beat the crowds, I likely would have ranked Èze higher for its jaw-dropping beauty, so I will blame my less than perfect experience on user error.
Fortunately, the crowds in Èze are centralized in the village and the beaches below are practically deserted. A knee-aching yet scenic journey down the cliffside will place you on the secluded beaches of Èze-sur-Mer. The water wasn’t as blue as in Nice and was littered with bark scraps from the trees flanking the beach, but the quiet shore was a wonderfully peaceful change from the tourist packed beaches of Nice.
Third place: Antibes
Just one train stop over from Nice is Antibes, the perfect location for a quick day trip. Several people on Instagram rated Antibes the best village in the south of France for its markets and boutiques, which make it feel less like a tourist town than some of the more commercialized towns. For accurate advertising, Antibes gets an A+.
We began our day with pastries from a boulangerie where we were each rudely corrected on our French pronunciations, which at this point in our trip had become a daily routine. Defeated by our inability to fit in, we sat on a bench sulking with our breakfast until the buttery, rich pastries brightened our spirits.
Spending most of the afternoon in the town square, we perused the antique market and window shopped at colorful produce stands where we yearned for expensive produce, cheeses and meats. Strolling into the outskirts of town, we arrived in narrow, empty streets in creamy, more subdued hues than the rest of the south of France.
This was the only town we visited where I could imagine actual people living. Puttering through rows of houses decorated with yesterday’s laundry hung to dry, I imagined myself living in this town – sun weathered and spoiled on French delicacies, taking daily trips to the market and munching on baguettes with cured ham and fresh mozzarella.
I cannot recommend this town enough for shopping and snacking; but for your afternoon beach fix, I would take the train a few spots down. The beach in Antibes is your classic townie beach — a protected bay with murky waters clouded from little kids stirring up the sediments. Of course, a beach is a beach and if you set me up anywhere with a spot to tan and an ocean to float around in, I will be satisfied. But for the piercing waters and rocky shores of the south of France there is one place I urge you to visit: Villefranche-sur-Mer.
Second place: Villefranche-sur-Mer
I would like to start this rating by prefacing the fact I have ranked this village so high is a miracle considering the circumstances of the afternoon. Arriving in the village at noon, we promptly made our exit at 3:30 p.m. when ominous thunder crowds rolled over the sea. But we did not escape so soon; we were unable to depart Villefranche-sur-Mer for three hours due to train after train being packed to the brim.
The worst part of the whole fiasco, however, was not the rain or the trains, it was having to leave Villefranche-sur-Mer so soon. Our day had begun perfectly, winding through the two main streets of the village. This town was least touristy on the sheer account of there being so few businesses. For city people it may not appeal, but for me, lover of all things quaint and small, it was a little slice of heaven.
Villefranche-sur-Mer is like many of the other towns in the south of France with its narrow cobblestone streets and abundance of photo-ops but shrunken in size. Admittedly, there is little to do in the village in the way of shopping and exploring, but departing the village I felt satisfied with having indulged in every bit of beauty offered, with no scraps left unseen.
It is worth mentioning this is not the place to go for cheap eats, and we looked at every menu in town before finding a meal suited to our budget. But with paninis and focaccia for under 10 euros and an ocean view, not a single complaint was uttered. Climbing down from our lunchtime sea wall perch, we walked alongside the melon and orange creamsicle-painted town front of Villefranche-sur-Mer until the rickety buildings gave way to a long sprawl of rocky shore.
Before the misfortune of the storm, the sky was a calm blue and blended into the sea, meeting hazily at the horizon. We napped in the sun and played like kids in the waves, taking turns with a comically neon pair of goggles to see the fishies. The beach is crowded but the shore is only wide enough to fit two people from sea wall to water. So rather than being surrounded by people, we only had company from left to right. With the illusion of privacy and a dreamy view of the town from across the aquamarine sea, my checklist for the perfect beach was met. I only wish it had lasted longer.
First place: Menton
Being an enthusiast of all things Italian, it is no surprise my favorite southern France town should be the one teetering on Italy’s border. Candidly, the town first appeared it might disappoint. The touristy area of Menton is centralized to one street — the very street I entered the town by. Greeted by hordes of people, tacky market stands and store awnings blocking the view of the historic buildings, I was immediately dismayed. But after a coincidental trudge up a shaded street, I found myself all alone, discovering the Menton I had known I would love.
I fear I am beginning to sound like a broken record describing the towns in the south of France as they are all so alike in aesthetic. Menton’s architecture and color palette is very similar to Villefrance-sur-Mer with its sunset-painted homes and colorful shuttered windows for contrast. The discernible difference: the size. Exploring Menton was like walking a maze, with each intersection an impossible choice. Some streets peter out while others stretch out to the next fork in the road, and all of them are just as picturesque as the last.
My camera roll must have gained hundreds of photos that day. When I look in the mirror, I swear my face looks longer from the amount of jaw-dropped gawking I did. If I had to guess, the reason for the emptiness of Menton’s neighborhoods is all the stairs. After hours of up and down, I was starving and sweaty so I collected a snack and made my way to the beach.
I paid five euros for a warm, lovely, little calzone served in a paper bag on-the-go. The dough was woodfired and charred, and delightfully soft and smokey. Inside the pocket, fresh ricotta and oozing mozzarella blanketed salty layers of cured ham and thick flakes of cracked black pepper. Seasoned with the salty sea water on my lips, the calzone was the perfect lunch for my ocean perch overlooking the façade of Menton.
On a secluded rocky spit jutting away from the packed beach, I lazed around the whole afternoon reading and tanning. It was a day full of scavenging for the quiet areas of a busy town and striking gold. I returned to Nice drunk on sightseeing and packed my bags for Italy without an ounce of regret for my time in the south of France.
