SOUTH OF FRANCE: French disconnection

Our secret weapon, or so we thought, was SNCF’s (French trains’) Autotrain.

The idea is, in principle, fantastic. You drive to Paris, give them your car, spend the evening doing the Parisian thing, then catch a superfast TGV next morning to meet your car in Nice.

A great idea, you might think, especially if you have ever tried to drive from Oxford to the South of France.

But it doesn’t come cheap. For the two of us, with first-class tickets and a normal sized car, the return bill came to just a little over €1,000.

So what do you get for the premium price tag? Well, the seats in first class are great – spacious, deep armchairs with electric motors which allow you to ride in maximum recline.

And that, sadly, is about it.

About a third of the way into the journey, we headed to the buffet car, where we queued for about half an hour, only to be told they had sold out of sandwiches and most other food. Pretty poor, really – even on the lowliest of British services, you usually get someone dropping by periodically to sell you pork pies and cans of Heineken.

Still, at least when we arrived, our car would be waiting for us.

Except it wasn’t.

The car, we were rather abruptly informed, hadn’t made it on to the train at all, and would not arrive until the following day.

The staff told us the service was routinely over-sold, and cars not arriving when they were supposed to was not uncommon. They had just sent away two other parties, both faced with the same predicament. With no offer of alternative transport, we were left at the mercy of the local taxi drivers, who thankfully managed to locate our apartment, albeit for €20.

We arrived the next morning, as advised, to pick up the car, only to be told that it was late and would take another four hours to reach us. Hardly first-class treatment (or cattle class, for that matter).

This service has the potential to be a real bonus to the English traveller who can’t face the arduous drive down from Calais.

As it stands, though, the high price, the car-train lottery and the appalling customer service mean that, unless you absolutely need to take your vehicle with you and you absolutely don’t want to drive the whole way, there are far better options available.

Despite this rocky start, however, things definitely took a turn for the better with our next stop.

Driving between Nice and Monaco is undoubtedly one of the great experiences of Riviera holidaying (even in a Vauxhall Omega rather than a Ferrari).

The three winding corniches hug the dazzling coastline and drop you right on to the set of innumerable films and television commercials.

If you happen to take the Moyenne (or middle) Corniche, you will pass through the small and unassuming village of Eze.

Stop the car and walk up the steep road into the village itself, and you will find an enchanting world of narrow cobbled walkways, ancient houses and delightful art boutiques.

And you’ll also, quite unwittingly, be standing in the middle of a rather unusual hotel, the highly exclusive Chevre d’Or.

The rooms, suites and apartments of the Chevre d’Or are scattered throughout the village, among the shops and the private dwellings that are still inhabited by the locals.

The doors to the hotel-owned properties have no room numbers, or any other indication that that is what they are, which gives the place a real sense of privacy.

The terrace, open for drinking and dining, offers what must be one of the most spectacular views anywhere on the Mediterranean. To the right is St Jean de Cap Ferrat, once home to David Niven, Winston Churchill and Charlie Chaplin; somewhere down to the left is Bono’s house. It’s that kind of view.

And there’s a restaurant with not one, but two Michelin stars – see the panel above for more details.

For a special occasion, or for a much-needed weekend of pure indulgence, it’s worth forgetting the budget and going with the flow. Not much more than half an hour from Nice Airport, it’s an easy hop from England, and well worth it.

For those of us with slightly more modest budgets, the French Riviera has an off-putting reputation for being the playground of the rich and famous.

Undeterred, we set off to see if Nice could really be done on a shoestring.

We found our accommodation online, a one-bedroom apartment for about £250 per week, which in August is pretty reasonable.

Even better, it was in the heart of the old town, with the beach a five-minute walk away. The old town used to be the poor end of Nice but these days, with the burgeoning taste for authenticity, it has become the city’s most vibrant district, a maze of narrow alleyways bustling with shops, bars, restaurants and holidaymakers.

Places to eat are plentiful, most offering main courses for about €10 to €15, with a broad range of tastes catered for, from Indian to Italian, seafood to steakhouses.

For the party animal, though, drinking out is an expensive game, with beers at peak times costing upwards of €6 a pint.

Thankfully, almost every bar runs some kind of happy hour or early-evening promotion, when prices come down to about €3 for a beer or a glass of wine.

There are, though, plenty of reasons to pay the higher prices. Many of the bars host live entertainment every night of the week, without charging admission, and the local musicians are generally excellent.

Those looking for a relaxing beach holiday may want to head elsewhere. The long, sweeping seafront looks quite stunning from a distance, promising a sun-worshipper’s paradise.

Get a little closer, though, and you’ll discover that there’s hardly a grain of sand to be found. Instead, there are pebbles the size of tennis balls, which, it becomes quickly apparent, are hopeless for either lying or walking on.

Private sections of the beach offer sun loungers and parasols for between €15-20 a day. It’s steep, but worth it if you don’t want to do permanent damage to your spine.

Marginally better are the free beaches at St Jean Cap Ferrat, where something approaching a coarse type of sand is easier to deal with. Cap Ferrat is also home to some of the world’s wealthiest people, including Andrew Lloyd Webber and Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen (whose mega-yachts are often to be seen in the bay), so if you’re in the mood for celebrity-spotting, you’re in the right place.

A short drive west brings you to Antibes and Cannes, while 20 minutes to the east is Monaco. Head a little further along the coast and you’ll find yourself on the Italian border, and it’s worth popping over to Ventimiglia for a change of culture, language and pace. With Monaco on the way, it’s quite easy to spend an afternoon in three countries, all of which possess their own charms.

And with a little self-restraint, the whole Cote d’Azur experience is manageable without breaking the bank.