Luberon (Bonnieux & Ménerbes)
Luberon (Bonnieux & Ménerbes) features on the Gingerguide audio walk through Provence. Give it roughly ~180 min: enough to look, hear a two to three minute story on the spot, and ask the AI guide whatever the story leaves open.
- Type nature
- Suggested visit ~180 min
- Provence Provence guide
About Luberon (Bonnieux & Ménerbes)
The Luberon massif and its hilltop villages, immortalised by Peter Mayle's "A Year in Provence", offer lavender fields, cedar forests, medieval villages, and the wild landscapes of the Luberon Regional Natural Park.
The Luberon is a long massif of hills stretching east-west through the heart of Provence, designated a Regional Natural Park in 1977 and encompassing some of the most beautiful villages and landscapes in southern France. The region was known to French visitors for its hilltop villages (perched villages called "villages perchés") and lavender fields long before British author Peter Mayle moved to Ménerbes in 1987 and wrote "A Year in Provence", a memoir that became an international bestseller and effectively created a new wave of British and American tourism to the area. The Luberon's characteristic landscape combines rolling fields of lavender, sunflowers, and wheat in the valley floors with vertical limestone cliffs, cedar forests, and golden-stoned villages on the ridges. Bonnieux, Lacoste (home of the Marquis de Sade's castle), Oppède-le-Vieux, Gordes, and Ménerbes are among the most visited villages.
Did you know? Peter Mayle's "A Year in Provence" (1989) was so successful that it triggered a dramatic rise in property prices in the Luberon, and Mayle himself eventually had to move away from the region because of the constant stream of fans turning up at his farmhouse door.
How long is a visit to Luberon (Bonnieux & Ménerbes)?
Set aside roughly ~180 min for Luberon (Bonnieux & Ménerbes). That covers a good look and the narrated story, and because you set the pace you can always stay on.
Is Luberon (Bonnieux & Ménerbes) worth your time?
Luberon (Bonnieux & Ménerbes) is among the 12 narrated highlights the Gingerguide team chose for Provence, so it is worth a look. Hear the story for the context, then ask the AI guide for anything more.
Nearby stops in Provence
Hear the story of Luberon (Bonnieux & Ménerbes)
Preview the Provence tour free in the Gingerguide app.