southern france tours
we came for two years.
that was seven years ago.
We're Cindy and Derek. An Australian couple from Tasmania who moved to a small village in the South of France and never quite got around to leaving.
We wanted to be somewhere central, somewhere we could jump on a train and be in Barcelona for the weekend, or drive to the Alps in a few hours. Southern France made sense on paper. So we came for two years.
"We arrived, and then the world stopped. And somehow, in the stillness, we fell completely in love with the place."
What started as a temporary move turned into something we hadn't planned for: a genuine life here. We moved out of Montpellier and into the countryside... a tiny village where we know our neighbours, get invited to dinner parties, argue good-naturedly about football, and shop at the same market every Saturday morning.
We hike the garrigue. We know which vineyards pour on a weekday. We have a favourite table at a restaurant that doesn't have a website. And somewhere along the way, we stopped being visitors and became locals... which changes everything about how you see a place.
We'd already been doing
this for years
"Every single person who came to visit us asked the same things: where do we go, what do we eat, how do we find the real France? And every single time, the trip we put together for them was the best holiday they'd ever had."
It started with friends. Then family. Then friends of friends. Every year, more visitors would arrive... and we'd spend weeks before their trip putting together itineraries, making reservations, briefing them on what to order, driving them to places that didn't exist on Google Maps.
At some point we realised: we were already doing this. We just weren't doing it for everyone who needed it. So we made it official. Southern France Tours is the experience we've been creating for the people we love, now available to anyone who wants to see this place the way we do. Not as a tourist. As someone who belongs here, even just for a week.
Our approach
to travel
We don't believe in ticking things off a list. We believe in slowing down, paying attention, and leaving somewhere feeling like you genuinely understood it - not just photographed it. Every trip we put together is built around one question: what would we do if these were our closest friends visiting? The answer is never a group tour. It's always something slower, more personal, and much better.
slow over fast
One place properly is worth ten places briefly. We build itineraries with room to breathe, linger, and get genuinely lost.
personal over polished
We're not a call centre. You deal with us directly. We know your name, what you need, and what kind of wine you like before you arrive.
local over tourist
We don't send people to famous by default. We send people to good - which is usually not the same thing, and almost never has a TripAdvisor listing.
stories over itineraries
The best trips aren't the ones that went to plan. They're the ones that gave you something to talk about for the rest of your life.
The things we'd
never compromise on
let us show you the
South of France we love
Browse our packages and find a theme that resonates - or skip straight to the contact form and tell us what you're dreaming of. We'll take it from there.