Base for the coast was the Welcome Hotel in Villefranche-sur-Mer – a small fishing village seven minutes from Nice by train, with Cap Ferrat next door. The room was dated; it also looked straight onto the water and the fishing boats. Everything ran on the train – Èze, Antibes, and the Cap Ferrat coastal walk, which has places to jump in and swim the whole way round and ends at the Four Seasons on the tip of the cape. That is where you have the drink.
Then inland. A hire car and a long day's drive to the Lot, in rural central France – too long in one go, and Aix-en-Provence on the way through is the obvious place to break it with a night. The Dordogne and Bordeaux sit close by with the vineyards and the organised days out, and Bordeaux or Toulouse gets you home.
The Lot itself has almost no tourist infrastructure. Staying with friends, driving village to village, real local life.
