The short version
- Arles is 16 to 18 minutes from Avignon Centre by TER, 19 direct trains a day; from Paris that means the TGV to Avignon, 2 hours 40, the shuttle train to the Centre station and the TER on. Only two TGVs a day run through to Arles without a change, and the last direct one back leaves at 17:43.
- Our One Night in Provence ends with the Van Gogh day: a driver-guide at 9:00 from your Avignon hotel through Arles, Les Baux and Saint-Rémy, the towns where he lived and painted, and back to Avignon TGV for the afternoon train, $775 per person with the night, breakfast and admissions, eight guests at most. Legendary Art and Provence spends two of its five nights in Arles.
- The amphitheatre, built around AD 90 and still used for the ferias, is €11, 9:00 to 18:00 in October and 10:30 to 16:30 from November 2 to the end of February, the Roman theater the same price and the Saint-Trophime cloister €6; under-18s go free with a parent. The Van Gogh places in town, the café on Place du Forum and the hospital garden at the Espace Van Gogh, are free and outdoors.
- The Fondation Vincent van Gogh is closed until November 21, 2026 and reopens on the 22nd with the exhibition Harvests, to April 4, 2027, €10, daily. LUMA, Frank Gehry’s tower in the Parc des Ateliers, is free to walk through with the slides and the park; the exhibitions are ticketed, closed Tuesday, with a second closed day in winter.
- Les Baux is a pedestrian village on a 245-meter spur with the ruined château on top, €10, and the Carrières des Lumières in the quarry below, €16.50, open every day of the year with Matisse since October 9, 2026; the two together are €21. In Saint-Rémy, Saint-Paul-de-Mausole, the asylum where Van Gogh painted 150 canvases between May 1889 and May 1890, is €10 in cash only, and Glanum, the Roman town, €9, closed Monday from October to March.
- One bus, the Zou! 707 from Avignon, joins the three towns, and outside the summer timetable only two runs a day in each direction go through Les Baux to Arles. Arles to Les Baux takes 38 minutes, Les Baux to Saint-Rémy 10, Saint-Rémy to Arles 48. Parking at Les Baux is €5 for the first hour.
What to see
Roman Arles is the arena first, 136 by 107 meters with two tiers of 60 arches and three medieval towers left from the centuries when it was a walled village; its underground galleries open on guided visits. The theater, built under Augustus, keeps two standing columns, and the Venus of Arles was dug up there in 1651. Saint-Trophime’s portal on Place de la République is the great Romanesque carving of Provence, free, with the cloister ticketed; the Alyscamps, €5, is the avenue of sarcophagi Van Gogh and Gauguin painted side by side in October 1888; and the Musée Arles antique on the river keeps the Caesar bust pulled from the Rhône and a Roman barge, €5 to €8, closed Tuesday. UNESCO listed the lot in 1981. The Pass Liberté, €13 to €15, covers four monuments, the Réattu and one museum. The Saturday market runs 2.5 kilometers of boulevard des Lices from 8:00 to 12:45.
Van Gogh arrived in February 1888 and left for the asylum in May 1889 with some 200 paintings behind him. The café terrace is on Place du Forum, the Starry Night quay is the Rhône bank below the old town, and the hospital where Doctor Rey treated him is the Espace Van Gogh, its courtyard garden replanted to match the canvas, free and open every day. None of the paintings are in Arles: the Fondation shows changing exhibitions built around loaned Van Goghs, and the Musée Réattu, in the old priory of the Knights of Malta, has the 57 drawings Picasso gave the town in 1971, €8. Our art tour includes the Réattu, the Fondation, the Carrières, Saint-Paul and the Estrine.
Les Baux was the seat of the lords of Baux, and what is left of their fortress covers five hectares of the rock, with siege machines on the plateau and the view across the olive groves to the Alpilles; count an hour for the village, an hour for the château, 10:00 to 17:00 from November to February and until 19:30 in July and August. The Carrières des Lumières is a ten-minute walk down the road: an hour-long show of paintings projected over the walls of the old limestone quarry, card payment only, 10:00 to 18:00 in winter. The Musée Yves Brayer in the Hôtel de Porcelet is €8, half price with the Baux pass.
Saint-Rémy is the asylum and the ruins. Saint-Paul-de-Mausole, on the road south from the center toward Glanum, is still a working clinic around its Romanesque cloister: Van Gogh’s reconstructed room, the garden, the wheat field he painted from the window, 9:30 to 19:00 from April and with a lunch closure in winter. Across the road, Les Antiques, the triumphal arch and the mausoleum, stand free by the roadside among the olive trees, the stop on our three-, five- and six-day trips; Glanum behind them is the excavated Greek and Roman town. In town, the Estrine museum holds the Centre Van Gogh, with no original canvases, closed Monday, and the Wednesday market fills Place de la République from 8:00 to 13:00. Nostradamus was born here in 1503.
Eat what the delta and the hills make: gardianne de taureau, the bull stew of the Camargue, saucisson d’Arles, tellines in garlic, red Camargue rice, and the olive oil of the Vallée des Baux with its broken green olives. South of Arles, the Pont de Gau bird park at Saintes-Maries has hundreds of flamingos, €8.50, and the Montmajour abbey on the Fontvieille road is €7, closed Monday from October to March.
Getting there and around
From Paris, take the TGV to Avignon TGV, about 2 hours 40, the TER shuttle to Avignon Centre in a few minutes, and the TER to Arles, 16 to 18 minutes, 19 direct trains a day from 5:03 to 21:10. The two direct TGVs from Paris leave at 12:14 and 17:14 and take about four hours; coming back, the direct trains are at 6:41 and 17:43, in Paris at 21:46. Arles station is on avenue Paulin Talabot north of the arena, a short walk from it. The tourist office is on boulevard des Lices.
The 707 leaves the bus station next to Avignon Centre. On the winter timetable the 9:00 reaches Saint-Rémy at 9:50, Les Baux at 10:02 and Arles at 10:40, and the 15:25 from Arles comes back through Les Baux at 16:03 and Saint-Rémy at 16:13; the other runs end at Saint-Rémy. From July 4 the summer sheet has eight runs a day each way through all three towns. The 704 links Arles and Saint-Rémy in about an hour, Monday to Saturday, and does not go to Les Baux. Stops are request stops, so wave; tickets cost €0.40 more on board, and the fare is not published, so check the planner.
By car, Les Baux is 20 kilometers and 30 minutes from Arles, 35 kilometers and 40 minutes from Avignon. Les Baux charges €5 for the first hour and €1 for the second at the village car parks; Glanum has a €4 flat-rate car park opposite the gate; in Arles the Parking des Lices is €2 an hour with a 1.80-meter height limit, and on Saturdays the entrance moves for the market.
Our Van Gogh day does the three towns from Avignon between 9:00 and the afternoon train. The Three Days and Six Days stop at Les Antiques and Les Baux on their six-village day; the Five Days drives to Arles and Saint-Rémy after the cooking class; and Legendary Art and Provence sleeps two nights in Arles with the Alpilles day on day five.
When to go
The light is the reason Van Gogh came, and it is best in spring and autumn: April to June and September to October, with the mistral on clear days and hot, dry July and August. The Camargue needs repellent in summer.
The Rencontres d’Arles, the photography festival, runs July 5 to October 3, 2027, with the opening week July 5 to 11; the 2026 pass was €42. The Feria de Pâques fills Arles from March 26 to 29, 2027, and the Feria du Riz in mid-September, with bullfights in the arena and no visiting hours published for those days. The Carrières show Matisse from October 9, 2026; the Fondation reopens November 22.
From November 2 to the end of February the Arles monuments keep 10:30 to 16:30, the Réattu closes Monday, the Arles antique museum Tuesday all year, and LUMA Tuesday and Wednesday. Glanum closes at 17:00 and on Mondays from October to March, Saint-Paul at 17:15 until March 31 with no published hours from January 4 to February 2, the château des Baux at 17:00 from November to February and on December 25. The Carrières open every day of the year, from 11:00 on Christmas Day and New Year.
In winter the 707 reaches Les Baux twice a day, and the 704 never runs on Sundays or holidays; the summer sheet starts July 4.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can you do Arles, Les Baux and Saint-Rémy in one day?
With a car, yes: Les Baux is 20 kilometers and half an hour from Arles, and Saint-Rémy ten minutes beyond it. By bus, in winter you get two of the three, since the 707 goes through Les Baux twice a day; in summer all three, with about two and a half hours on buses. From Paris in a day, no: the first direct train reaches Arles at 15:58. Our Van Gogh day does the three with a driver-guide between 9:00 and the afternoon train from Avignon.
How do you get to Les Baux without a car?
The 707 from Avignon via Saint-Rémy, or from Arles, on the two runs a day outside summer that go through: out of Saint-Rémy at 9:52, in Les Baux at 10:02, and back from Les Baux at 16:03. The nearest stations are Tarascon at 15 kilometers and Arles at 20, with no bus from Tarascon. What you give up is the timing: the château, the show and the village in the six hours between buses, with nothing else that day. Our van puts Les Baux between Arles and Saint-Rémy before lunch.
Can you see Van Gogh’s paintings in Arles?
Only the ones the Fondation borrows for its exhibitions, and it is closed until November 21, 2026. What Arles has is the places: the café on Place du Forum, the Rhône quay, the hospital garden, the Alyscamps, and in Saint-Rémy the asylum with his room and the wheat field. The Estrine museum in Saint-Rémy tells the story without originals. Our art tour spends two days on all of it with a guide who knows which painting goes with which spot.
Is Arles a day trip from Paris?
Not a good one. Two direct trains a day, four hours each way, and the last one back at 17:43. Go through Avignon, 2 hours 40 from Paris and 18 minutes from Arles, and sleep there or in Arles; that is how all our Provence trips are built.
Is there a tour from Paris?
Yes. Our One Night in Provence, $775, meets you at Avignon TGV, does Orange and a Châteauneuf cellar the first afternoon and Arles, Les Baux and Saint-Rémy the next day. Legendary Art and Provence, six days from $2,950, is based in Aix and Arles with Cézanne and Van Gogh. The Three Days, Five Days and Six Days pass through Saint-Rémy, and two of them Les Baux, from Avignon. Rail is booked once your dates are set.
Our Most Popular Day Trips From Paris
Ride between Avignon and the Provence villages with two hotel nights along the way.