Our next stop for our trip to Provence brought us all the way East, to the French Riviera and the coastal city of Antibes.
The city is located on the Mediterranean Sea between the cities of Nice and Cannes.
When you look at a map it seems quite far from where we stayed in Aix-en-Provence but it was actually the same driving distance away from our previous destination of Saint Tropez, about an hour and 45 minutes.
That long of a drive isn't horrendous by any means but its probably nearing our max distance away for a day trip while on vacation. It was mostly highway driving too so it was easy and mindless, but not exactly scenic. You may want to do what we do and have a few podcasts downloaded for entertainment during the drive.
This would be our last trip to the region though, so we had to make the most of it and see all of the places left on our bucket list before leaving for good.
We started our day early, as we always do, and arrived in the city just in time for breakfast. After that we began to explore the old town.
For me, Antibes was a lot like Saint Tropez only much larger and perhaps a little less charming. But then it's hard for larger touristy cities to maintain their charm in the same way as those that are smaller and little more off the beaten path.
Nonetheless, the city was quite nice and I'm glad that we saw it, if for no other reason than to satisfy our curiosity and cross it off our list.
The old town was made up of many narrow streets lined with really cool shops selling a variety of wares.
In that regard the city was much more interesting than Saint-Tropez, simply because there was more. My wife an I like to look for cool pop art posters and old advertisements, and we found a couple of shops selling them in the city.
We didn't end up purchasing anything but we nonetheless had fun hunting them.
We also stumbled upon this cool food market while wandering around. I was standing at the entrance when I took the photos so they aren't all that special but you can imagine a typical French market selling fresh produce, fish, cheeses and charcuterie.
Like Saint-Tropez, Antibes also has a marina that's full of fancy boats and large yachts.
You can get a really good view of them from the top of the large wall surrounding the old quarter.
I always like to take pictures of sail boats docked in any harbor.
There is just something about the way that they are all lined up that makes them particularly photogenic for me.
It's always cool to see some really big yachts as well and trying to imagine what they look like in the interior.
The same could be said about some of the sailboats as well I suppose.
Near the harbor and just off the old quarter is a small isolated beach full of people sun tanning and swimming in the water.
There is also a much larger beach some distance away from there as that goes on and on for a very long ways. From what I could tell the city was sort of split in two between the old quarter and the new. We drove through the newer section on our way out of town and it appeared to host all of the fancier hotels and resorts located along the water. It was sort of an endless beach front lined with many many restaurant terraces and bars and hotels. The area definitely had a resort city vibe about it.
We aren't beach goers ourselves so we mainly stuck to the old quarter but if you're into swimming and sun tanning than the city definitely has you covered.
All you have to do is decide if you prefer the old or the new and make your way over to that specific beach location.
If you're not into the beach though another thing that you could do in the city is check out the Picasso museum.
It's located next to the Serrazine Tour and the Notre Dame Cathedral. We didn't go in ourselves but it's there if you're into Picasso or art in general.
Overall, the city wasn't my favorite location in Provence or the French Riviera, but I definitely felt like it had a lot to offer. If you are looking for water and sun and a beach resort sort of vibe than the city would probably be right up your alley.
