Getting here
How to reach Gordes, and how long it really takes
Marseille Provence is the airport everyone uses: about an hour and ten minutes by road, almost all of it motorway. Avignon TGV is about fifty minutes and puts Paris two hours forty away by train. The house is under ten minutes’ walk from Gordes, and a car is still necessary for everything beyond it.
Marseille Provence (MRS)
about 1 hr 10 by road
The airport everyone uses: the widest choice of flights, car hire in the terminal, and a straight run up the A7. Transfers arranged by the house manager.
Avignon TGV
about 50 min by road
Paris Gare de Lyon in 2 hr 40, and a direct train from Charles de Gaulle. London by Eurostar and one change.
Aix-en-Provence TGV
about 55 min by road
The other TGV option, and often the better one coming from the south or west.
Nice Côte d’Azur (NCE)
about 2 hr 30 by road
A long drive, but worth it for the flight times if the fares fall your way.
Gordes village
Under 10 min on foot · 1 km
Market, restaurants, château, galleries, bakery. Spar for the basics at 900m.
Coustellet
10 min by car · 8 km
The nearest full supermarket, and a night market on Wednesdays through the summer.
Driving times are typical door-to-door times outside the August weekends, when the A7 has its own opinions. Add half an hour to anything on a Saturday in high summer.
By air
Marseille Provence (MRS) has the widest choice of flights, car hire inside the terminal, and a straight run north on the A7 before you turn off at Cavaillon. Allow an hour and ten minutes, more on an August Saturday when the whole of France is changing over at once.
Nice Côte d’Azur (NCE) is about two and a half hours. It is a long drive at the end of a flight, but if the fares or the timings fall your way it is a perfectly reasonable arrival.
Avignon’s own airport is close but has almost nothing flying into it. Plan around Marseille unless you already know otherwise.
By train
Avignon TGV is about fifty minutes away by road. Paris Gare de Lyon is two hours forty by train, there is a direct service from Charles de Gaulle, and from London it is the Eurostar and one change. For a week in the Luberon this is often the civilised option: you step off the train into car hire and you are at the house before dinner.
Aix-en-Provence TGV is about fifty-five minutes and is frequently the better of the two coming from the south or west.
The last part
From the autoroute you come through Cavaillon and up the D2 towards Gordes, and the road begins to climb and turn. The village appears on its hill about ten minutes before you reach it, which is the moment most people remember.
The house is on a country lane at the edge of the village with parking on site. We send precise directions and a what3words location with the booking — satellite navigation is reliable to the lane but the last hundred metres are easier with a photograph of the gate.
Once you are here
Gordes is under ten minutes on foot, which covers the bakery, the restaurants, the Tuesday market and the château. Everything else — the villages, the markets on their various mornings, the ochre cliffs, the Sorgue — needs the car.
Juliette, our house manager, lives locally and can arrange transfers from Marseille or the Avignon TGV if you would rather not drive on the day you arrive.
More about the Luberon