Provence & the Côte d'Azur: A 2-Week Van Itinerary

Provence and the Côte d'Azur: a 2-week campervan itinerary

Provence is the most van-friendly corner of France and the Côte d'Azur is one of the least, which is what makes this fortnight work: you spend most of it in hill villages and lavender country where aires are plentiful and cheap, and treat the Riviera as a short, well-planned raid rather than a place to live out of the van.

The loop below runs roughly 1,100 km over 14 days — short driving days, mostly on D-roads, with two-night stops in the Luberon, the Verdon and the Camargue. It is deliberately unambitious in distance, because the driving here is slow by nature: the good roads are narrow, twisting and worth taking at the speed they ask for.

The route at a glance

Days 1–6: the Luberon, lavender and the Verdon

Start at Avignon and get out of it quickly — it is a fine half-day on foot but a poor place to sit in a van. An hour east the Luberon begins, and this is the postcard Provence: Gordes stacked up its hillside, the ochre quarries at Roussillon, and a different village market every morning of the week. Two nights minimum, on aires that mostly cost single-figure euros.

North of the Luberon the land opens out into the lavender plateau around Sault. If that is what you came for, the bloom is usually late June into July depending on altitude and the year — the fields around Sault flower later than those on the Valensole plateau, which is a useful hedge if your dates are fixed.

Then the Verdon. The gorge is the single most dramatic thing in southern France and the Route des Crêtes above it is the drive of the trip — though note it is narrow, partly one-way, and genuinely unsuitable for a large motorhome. In a long van, park at Moustiers and take the lower road instead; you lose the clifftop views and keep your wing mirrors.

Days 7–10: the Riviera, and how to survive it in a van

The Côte d'Azur is where a campervan stops being an advantage. Parking is scarce, height barriers are everywhere, overnight parking is banned along most of the seafront and enforced in season, and Nice sits inside a low-emission zone. The trick is to stop trying to park by the sea: base at a campsite or aire inland or up the hill, and use the regional trains, which run along the coast frequently and cheaply and are by some distance the most pleasant way to move between Riviera towns.

Done that way it is a fine two days. Villefranche-sur-Mer for the harbour, Èze for the village clinging to its rock, and the three Corniche roads stacked above each other between Nice and Menton — the Grande Corniche is the high one, and the one to drive.

Then get back inland. The Massif des Maures behind Saint-Tropez is cork oak forest and empty roads, and it resets the trip before the Calanques near Cassis, where the limestone inlets are best seen on foot or by boat because the access roads are restricted in summer.

Days 11–14: the Camargue and Roman Provence

The Camargue is flat, wet, salty and completely unlike the rest of the trip — a river delta of lagoons, rice fields, white horses and pink flamingos. It rewards the slow pace a van encourages, and the aires around Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer put you on the edge of the marshes. Take insect repellent; the mosquitoes are not a rumour.

Finish through Roman Provence. Arles has an intact amphitheatre and the light Van Gogh came for, Les Baux sits on a rock in the Alpilles, and the Pont du Gard aqueduct is genuinely worth the entrance fee on the way back to Avignon. Fourteen days, one loop, and about 1,100 km on the clock.

The practical layer: low-emission zones, aires and season

• Low-emission zones: Nice and Marseille both operate low-emission zones, and France's ZFE rules have been changing year on year — which vehicles are restricted, and when, is not stable. Order a Crit'Air sticker before you travel (it is cheap and takes weeks by post to a foreign address) and check the current restrictions for each city close to your dates.
• Aires: Provence inland has one of the densest aire networks in France, typically a few euros a night with water and drainage. The coast between Cannes and Menton is the exception: assume you are paying campsite rates or sleeping inland.
• Overnight parking: Coastal communes across the Var and Alpes-Maritimes ban overnight motorhome parking on seafront car parks, with height barriers and signed prohibitions widely enforced in summer. Inland Provence is relaxed by comparison, but the same rule applies everywhere: a legally parked van with nothing set up outside is a parked vehicle.
• Season: May, June and September. July and August bring full aires, coastal traffic and the mistral at its most tiresome, and the Riviera parking enforcement is at its strictest. For lavender specifically you are tied to late June and July, which means accepting the crowds.
• Vehicle size: Much of the best driving here — the Route des Crêtes, the hill village approaches, the Calanques roads — is genuinely tight. Under about 6 metres you can go almost anywhere; above 7, plan to park low and walk or take the train up.

Build your own version of this route

This loop assumes two weeks and a start at Avignon. The planner will rebuild it around a different start point, a shorter trip, or a van too long for the mountain roads — and it plans the overnight stops, the driving times and the low-emission-zone detours for the vehicle you actually drive.