Vive la France - Diverse, desirable, delightful.
Credit: Atout France/Michel Angot
Paris is for romance, especially in the summertime.
France might just be the “go-to” nation for a broad spectrum of travel ideas.
When clients ask for genres like romance, history and culture, luxury, independent exploration, adventure, or corporate getaways for example, France can fill the bill. And deliver. Let’s start with romance.
Paris Loves Lovers
You have to think Paris if you’re selling romance. You can’t walk a block without seeing couples kiss. They kiss while waiting for traffic lights to change, they kiss across tiny bistro tables while dining, they kiss in sheltered doorways. Love loves Paris and Paris loves lovers. And age is no barrier, I notice.
Some say summer is not the time to visit Paris because Parisians have left the city. I disagree. Summer is a great time to visit. Traffic is quieter, evenings are long and balmy for romantic walks along the banks of the Seine, parks are in their glory, the crowds are gone, and your clients get hotel price breaks. Everything a visitor might want to see is open, except, perhaps, for a few exclusive restaurants.
Advise clients to pick up Paris User’s Guide (free) from the tourist office on avenue des Champs-Elysees (number 127, close to the Arc de Triomphe), where they’ll also find essential information, maps, and a selection of city tours. They might also buy a three- or five-day Museum Pass. It includes admissions and lets holders jump to the front of line-ups.
A fun way to visit the major museums is by Batobus, a Aget-on-get-off@ boat stopping along the Seine at key sites.
Churches aren’t often romantic except for Sainte-Chapelle, near Notre-Dame at 4, boulevard du Palais. With its midnight-blue-and-gold interior, it’s a pearl of Gothic art, built in the mid-13th century to house the (said) Crown of Thorns brought back from a crusade.
In the same area, Musee National du Moyen Age has a magnificent collection of medieval artefacts including the 15th-century Lady and the Unicorn tapestries. (Now these are romantic.) Visitors don’t need to leave the area to dine, either: Saint-Michel teems with lively restaurants and has a wonderful atmosphere for evening strolls.
Credit: Atout France/Emmanuel Valentin
Niceâs Negresco Hotel is a classic monument along the Promenade des Anglais.
Cannes’ world renowned annual film festival (in May) sets a high style level. Shops showcase the world’s finest wares and almost everyone – from roller-bladers to stroller-pushing grandmas – appears well groomed and well heeled. Even dogs seem to be of the designer variety.
The city’s Carlton Inter-Continental is typical of the Belle Epoque style that made Cannes the place to visit for wealthy British of the early 19th-century. Its location, in the centre of La Croisette, yields a sweeping view of the Mediterranean and it’s a five-minute walk from the Palais des Festivals.
Further along the Riviera, Nice’s Negresco Hotel was born in the same era, and for the same clientele. The magnificent hotel has become a classic monument along Nice’s broad Promenade des Anglais along the Baie des Anges. Nor do you have to splurge on the high-end rates to enjoy it. Just sip an aperitif at Bar Le Relais and visit whatever rare and costly curiosities are on display in the Salon Royal, wherein lies the world’s largest Aubusson carpet, gently illuminated by a giant Baccarat crystal chandelier weighing one shimmering ton.
This beautiful part of the country offers plenty to enjoy, and those who explore the area will find acres of lavender fields off country roads, and picturesque medieval villages like Eze and St. Paul de Vence.
Resort To Wellness In Brittany
Leaving the calm Mediterranean for the pounding Atlantic, I indulged in a week of thalassotherapie – wellness from the ocean – on France’s Brittany coast. The Quiberon peninsula has drawn Europeans for decades to enjoy the healing power of the sea.
I stayed at Sofitel’s oceanside Thalassa Quiberon at Pointe de Goulvars where, after a brief health check-up, a program was tailored to my needs including sophisticated body treatments using mineral-rich local algae and seaweed. A couple of full days were set aside for sightseeing and afternoons were happily spent exploring the charming village of Quiberon, a 15-minute stroll beside the ocean.
The hotel also draws non-spa guests who come for the area’s wild beauty and local sightseeing spots like Carnac, important for its mysterious megaliths. These strange stones – many dating to 7,000 BC – have puzzled archaeologists for decades. Nobody knows why they were erected, only that it would have taken superhuman effort to do so.
Another day-trip took me to St. Malo, where Jacques Cartier’s 16th-century home, Limoelou, is a fascinating museum. The building was completed in 1541, just before his third crossing to Canada. (He died here in 1557, a victim of the Spanish ’flu.)
Credit: Atout France/Jerome Berquez
Restoration at Mont Saint-Michel is an ongoing project under the auspices of UNESCO.
Monastery On A Mount
It seemed like a logical extension to visit the Normandy coast, and I’d always wanted to see Mont Saint-Michel, that impressive monastery on a rocky, sea-girt outcrop rising dramatically from its quicksand peninsula. It’s accessed by a village that climbs the rock with steep, winding, narrow lanes.
Over the centuries Mont Saint-Michel has been adorned by various artistic periods and the result is a glorious profusion of architectural styles.
It was the eighth-century Bishop Aubert who saw the potential of this rocky islet. An ancient manuscript recounts his dedication of the mount to the Archangel, and St. Michael’s three visitations to Aubert, who prospered well – he and his chapter of 12 canons enjoyed huge revenues from the lands and neighbouring villages.
From 1622 to 1863 it was a prison (and possible inspiration for Alexandre Dumas' The Man in the Iron Mask') by which time religious life had ceased. But revival came with renewed pilgrimages at the beginning of the 19th century and by 1874 the abbey and ramparts were classified as a historical monument. Since then, monks have returned and restoration is an ongoing project under the auspices of UNESCO.
More France
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