I had been thinking about where I wanted to go to celebrate my 30th birthday for a while. Brian and I always try to take a trip in September. It’s a great month to travel since most people are finished with their summer trips so it’s less crowded. The weather is still pretty nice in most of locations we visit. It also happens to be my birthday month so it works out perfectly! 30 is a big year and I wanted it to be a special trip marking a new decade. The Provence region in France has been at the top of my bucket list for a while so this year seemed like the perfect time to go.

I spent months planning this trip and deciding on where to go and where to stay. I shared most of the trip on Instagram and got so many requests to share details from our itinerary. With so much information to fit in I decided that it’s best to do individual posts on each day with an overall Provence guide at the end.

We started our trip in Paris for two reasons. The first reason is it’s one of my favorite cities to visit so spending a couple of days in Paris before heading south to Provence was an easy choice. Second, it is also the easiest city in France to fly into and gives you so many options for traveling to Provence.

We took a train from Paris to Avignon where we picked up our rental car. Over the past couple of years, we’ve gotten more adventurous on our trips. Last year Brian drove us around Lake Garda in Italy which was the highlight of our trip. He felt comfortable taking on the small Provençal roads in France this year so we decided to rent a car for the week. I had read that it really is the only way to see the area, and now that the trip has concluded, I agree.

We arrived in Avignon later in the afternoon so we drove straight to check-in to our amazing BNB. I’ll share more on where we stayed in a later post, because if you are going to Provence, I highly recommend staying this at this little hidden gem. Our BNB was located in between the two towns of Ménerbes and Oppède, so on our first night we decided to venture to one of the two for dinner. We chose Ménerbes since it is a little bit bigger and has a couple more restaurant options.

We drove the winding tree-lined roads to Ménerbes and when we rounded a corner and saw the town perched at the top of the hill I squealed and asked Brian to pull over immidiately. The view was so impressive and the entire village was glowing in the evening sun.

We found parking on the lower portion of the hill and walked the rest of the way up on foot. When we got to the top we were greeted with the most amazing views that truly took our breath away. I remember turning to Brian saying “I am so happy. I can’t believe I’m here!”

We wandered around the little village for a while, taking everything in and then made our way to Le Bistrot 5. We didn’t really think about needing reservations (which you definitely do) so they offered us a table in the outdoor bar which we happily accepted. The view is incredible so we sat there for the rest of the evening with our wine and cheese, toasting to our Provençal adventure ahead! xo Bryn