So planning a week or so in south of France, I’d like to have a couple of days in a few places. Where has a lovely sandy beach ?

[JennyTals]

Planning on using public transport or taxis

was thinking of starting in nice for a day or two
I know it’s a pebble beach there
but looks worth a look

so the next time I’m looking for is a lovely sandy beach

It’s all pebbly down there. Villefranche-sur-Mer is lovely though

It's not very sandy

If you're flexible I would recommend SW France and the beach at Cap Ferret although I'm not sure about public transport.

Otherwise Plage du Port Galice is a small sandy beach. Near Juan les Pins.

Saint-Mandrier-sur-Mer south of Toulon has beautiful sandy beaches backing onto pine woods. Very easy by public transport and you can take the water taxi over to Toulon harbour for the shops and market.

In the same area, Les Porquerolles have amazing beaches. You take the boat from Toulon and then walk or hike a bike to get around the main island. It's completely traffic-free.

There aren’t any sandy beaches in the south of France.
Villefranche is the closest to sand you will get. It does have some sand near the waterline.

villefranche and Eze village are beautiful. Cap Ferrat also beautiful. Easily accessible from Nice airport on public transport

Narbonne Plage is very sandy, often pretty empty. Rail station at Narbonne.

Not the same part of France as Nice, it’s about an hour from Carcassonne. Much quieter.

Antibes has a free sandy beach.
Whatisittomorrow is completely incorrect.

The beaches in Cannes are all sandy and lovely. Some are owned by beach clubs, some are municipal, the municipal beaches don’t have sunbeds to hire but you can put your towel down. Easy to get to on the train from Nice.

You could take the train to Cannes which has a nice beach. Taxis in South of France tend to be very expensive though - allow for three times the UK price so you aren't shocked! Further along the train line is Fréjus/St Raphaël.

Also Cannes. But I second Porquerolles. Perfect if you're going by public transport anyway.

There are sandy beaches in the south of France. we have used them from Frejus towards St Tropez, especially in Ste Maxime.

Strange people saying there are no sandy beaches. I have only been to sandy beaches there except for Antibes- la Gravette has sand but stones under the water.

From Antibes west to St Tropez are many sand beaches - Juans Les Pins, Golfe Juan, Cannes are all sandy and I believe many more along the Côte d’Azur to St Tropez. You can zoom in and click on other travellers photos on Google maps.

You can easily take the trains all along here from Nice to St Raphael/Frejus. Quite frequent and air conditioned.

Not true, we have lovely sandy beaches. Not so great for public transport though. Be aware that in summer, the coast road is very busy so you will need to allow lots of time to get around. Or use the boats instead. Taxis are very expensive and depending on where you want to go, some will refuse fares due to traffic.

Cannes is much nicer than Nice and the beaches are sandy.

Our favourite beach is Ste Maxime. You can get there from St Tropez on a boat in about 15 mins or you can get a bus from a couple nearby-ish train stations which are on the Nice route.

Antibes has sandy beaches

Plenty of sandy beaches on the med coast! Cap d’agde near Beziers. And all around there is sandy.

There are multiple sandy beaches in Antibes.

Plage de la gravette
Plage de la ponteil
Plage de la salis

Beaches near Montpellier are all sandy, and public transport is pretty good (you can get the tram to within walking distance of the beach).

Juan Les Pins beach is lovely! Antibes also sandy as previously mentioned. Further along there are lovely beaches at L'Escalet (v pretty with rocky bits too), and Gigaro on the other side of St Tropez - from then on they are mostly sandy from my memory - Le Lavandou, Cavaliere etc.

Wow thanks for all these lovely ideas
I’m going to need to google most of them
sounds like getting around by train will be one of the best ways to go as we don’t want to hire a car
could even consider just a base then day trips via boat

many thanks

thanks for all the tips everyone I’m still planning on going here and I’ve narrowed down my areas to I want to see Cannes Antibes st Raphael and st tropez

does this sound like a good plan

wondering if I should do a few different hotels so couple of nights in each destination it just pick a base

if I went for her base option where would you suggest as a good base

St Tropez is not reachable by train - You can get a bus - 2 hours - from St Raphael. Cannes would be more central than Antibes and St Raphael, but I still would prefer to stay in Antibes or Juan Les Pins. St R. is about 30 mins on the train. Cannes closer. Nice, Villefranche and Menton etc in the other direction. Antibes, Juan Les Pins have gorgeous beaches - and I can recommend lunch at the Hotel Belles Rives, which is the house F. Scott Fitzgerald rented. You can also get a boat from JLP to Les Iles de Lerins. You can walk round the Cap if you are energetic. Or there is a little open top bus that goes round to see the lovely villas and little coves. We had lunch at the Hotel du Cap last time - it was during Cannes Film Festival and a nice attempt at star spotting, but it is very expensive. I was a bit agog at the children of the rich and famous in their pool wear turning their noses up at very overpriced chicken nuggets :) But definitely a bucket list experience. For St Tropez I think you really need a car.