North Croatia or South of France

[Jelly4444]

I've been to Split/Dubrovnik before and loved it but I don't know much about Istria. We were looking at Rovinj as a base.

Alternatively, I was also looking at the South of France. I was considering flying into Nimes or Marseille then going Aix-en-Provence followed by Antibes and flying home from Nice.

Has anyone been to both Istria and the South of France? Any advice as to which area is nicer?

Hi

I have been to Croatia and South of France, Stayed in Trogir but haven’t been to north Croatia. However been to SOF loads. Have flown into both Nice (to stay in Antibes, which we loved) and Marseilles (few days in Marseilles) then went onto Saint Remy as the place in Aix we booked got cancelled.

I would say that Nice is a much nicer airport, we took the train to Antibes which was pretty easy, but we ended up getting a hire car once in Antibes as we wanted to explore the coastal areas. Antibes town is small and lovely tho bloody hot in summer (we are from Oz and used to hot hot summers).

Marseilles airport is smaller and an easy drive into the city (either by taxi and hire car) or onto other destinations eg only took us 40 mins to get from St Remy to the airport with hire car and was so easy.

I've only been to Toulon so can't comment much on the South of France, but have been to Northern Croatia many times as my in-laws have a house there. Rovinj is absolutely lovely (though very touristy in high season), as are the surrounding areas. I'd say Croatia is still (just) cheaper than France since they don't yet have the Euro, so eating out is definitely cheaper. Other lovely places nearby are Pula, Vrsar (some nice boat trips from the harbour) and Rabac.

If you fly to Pula, then everything is very easy and close, driving wise.

Croatia has just joined the Euro as of January btw

What time of year are you thinking of going?

Been to both. In short, south of France definitely

Definitely South of France. I liked Croatia - toured all over - but for me the scars of communism and war were too prevalent everywhere. South of France every time!

What time of year? Aix is in a kind of valley and unbearably hot in July and August. Istria more likely to be manageable in high summer ( haven’t been, but stayed on Dalmatian islands twice in July and it was usually around 30-33C, aix can go up to 45C ).