France When To Go

In July, Paris’s population starts to thin out; by August, residents have positively vanished, leaving only tourists and pickpockets. During this month of national vacation, the French hop over to the Norman coast, storm the beaches of the western Atlantic from La Rochelle down to Biarritz, and hike the rocky Corsican shores. From June to September, the Côte d’Azur becomes one long tangle of halter-topped, khaki-shorted Anglophones—a constant, exhausting party. Late spring and autumn are the best times to visit Paris and the south; winter in Paris can be grim, presided over by a terrible grisaille —chilly “grayness”—and the south gets hot and sticky in the summer. The rest of the country is relatively untouristed and easy to visit year-round. In terms of weather, the north and west of France are best in summer, while the center and east of the country, generally the least touristed areas of France, are ideal in spring and autumn. During the winter, the Alps provide some of the world’s best skiing, while the Pyrenees offer a calmer, if less climatically dependable, alternative.

The farther south you travel in the summer, the more crucial hotel reservations become. Reserve a month ahead for the Côte d’Azur, Corsica, Languedoc, Provence, and the Pays Basque. Paris requires reservations year-round.

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