If you are looking for the best luxury tours to Paris and the Riviera, it is important that know what to look for, and to be certain that you will be visiting the right places. Everybody knows about the Eiffel Tower and the Champs-Elysées, even if they can't pronounce it, but how about Saint Chapelle, which Louis IX had built to hold a piece of the true cross and Jesus' crown of thorns? Or the busy open street market on the Rue Mouffetard, known locally as La Mouffe, where just about every house and shop number on the street has a story to tell?



It is places like that which can easily be missed, and with them many of the real attractions of Paris, including the Latin Quarter, the artistic Left Bank and Montmartre (named after the hill it surrounds), the only real village left in Paris. You have to be careful with your choice of tour company if you are not be stuck with nothing more than the popular tourist attractions in Paris and miss the real city.

Most people don't get the opportunity to visit France very often, so not only is it important to visit the right places in Paris, but also to check out some of the other delights that France has to offer, and there are luxury tours available to Paris and the Riviera available that enable you to make the best of your visit to Europe. The French Riviera, known to the French as the Côte d'Azure, is the playground of Europe, where the jet set spend much of their time (and their money).

You should visit Cannes, famous for its film festival, and also pay a trip to Golfe Juan, situated between Cannes and Juan les Pins, where Napoleon stayed when he escaped from Elba, prior to raising an army and marching off to meet his Waterloo and eventual imprisonment on St. Helena. Nice is also on the French Riviera, and you can't possibly visit that part of the world without a visit to Monaco, driving round the famous Grand Prix street circuit and chancing your luck on the tables at Monte Carlo.

There is a lot more to Monaco than just the world-famous beaches and casinos, however. There is the Prince's Palace, home of the royal family, and where Grace Kelly used to reside when she was Princess here. If you like architecture, the Grand Casino and Paris Opera House are sheer architectural wonders, and for the historically minded there are Monaco Cathedral and the Napoleon Museum, while the Oceanographic Museum is also worth visiting.

Such a vacation is the holiday of a lifetime, and you don't want your luxury tour to Paris and the Riviera spoiled by poor accommodation and travel, or by unexpected costs for which you might not have budgeted. It is important, therefore, that you make sure that your vacation is all inclusive, even down to free baggage handling at your hotels.

Air travel should be at least business class, and TGV rail travel first class. Your hotels should also be of superior quality, as should your transfers to and from the hotels. A trip to Paris should be one of the highlights of your life, and by including the Riviera on your itinerary, you will make sure that this is the case. Many vacation packages leave you a little disappointed at the end, but if you plan properly and choose the right tours and resorts, organized by some of the most experienced vacation planners in the world, you should have a trip to remember.

However, for the ultimate in luxury tours to Paris and the Riviera, you want personal attention. Not just the attention that a tour guide gives to you and the rest in your group, but to you and your partner personally. You want luxury tours that are designed for two people, and that offer personal limousine travel. You want your own car, your own driver and your own guide, your own tour round Paris, Cannes and Monte Carlo, and your own dinner table with the flexibility to rearrange timings to meet your personal needs, not those of the majority.

That is true luxury, and if you can't live better while away from home, then why bother leaving? That's the type of vacation you should be looking around for, so keep that in mind when searching for luxury tours to Paris and the Riviera.