The French Riviera isn’t a place that flies under the radar. France’s southern shores have always attracted plenty of visitors. More than 12 million tourists visited the Côte d’Azur and Monaco in 2025, and Nice draws more visitors than any French city bar Paris.
I am one of the many visitors who have fallen in love with the Côte d’Azur and have now lived there for nearly 10 years. Our hillside home on Mont Boron sits between Nice and Villefranche-sur-Mer, fragrant pine forest above and the glistening Mediterranean below. I am obsessed with it. And in summer, I gladly bid it au revoir.
Daily life with a three- and five-year-old becomes fraught in heaving crowds, but there is somewhere to escape to, and not too far away.
Shorts
One of my family’s best-loved summer retreats in this diverse region is a spectacular natural wonder, a few hours west. The Verdon Regional Natural Park stretches across 180,000 hectares in the very heart of Provence.
