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French Riviera Style: A Treehouse in St Paul de Vence

Where: 2436 chemin du Malvan, St-Paul-de-Vence, France, 06570

The Cannes Film Festival is still a ways off (it starts on May 16) but a reader's recent tip about the French Riviera got us daydreaming about escaping to Cote d'Azure. This week we'll continue talking about some of the hotels worthy of checking into. As always, we wanna know what you think, not just what Uma, Rod Stewart, P.Diddy and Paris Hilton think, of the hotels here. So send us your thoughts and questions or comment below the story, telling us what's right, what's wrong and what's just French.

A few months ago we'd already started dreaming about spending a few nights up in the trees of the Cote d'Azur in the Orion B&B Hotel. This week CNN dug a little deeper into the roots (sorry) of the Orion Treehouse.

Turns out the brainchild of this luxury treehouse accommodation is a Belgian woman named Diane Van den Berge who bought a farmland property on the Cote d'Azur and then wondered what to do with it:

Soon after buying the property she began leafing through design magazines and stumbled across a guesthouse in India where people stayed in treehouses. She knew she'd found an idea to develop her own place ... The next challenge was to find someone who could build such a structure. She thought she would need to seek help abroad, but through Internet research found a suitable builder 200 kilometers away in France.

Four treehouses have been built since 2004 and she's thinking of putting in a fifth. Apart from the baths, massage showers and internet you'll find in the treehouses, the properties are arranged around a self-cleaning, natural swimming pool, copied from one Diane found in Switzerland. Prices start at 180 Euro ($240) including breakfast for a double--it's definitely another affordable alternative to have a stay on the Cote d'Azur without being in the middle of touristy Cannes or Nice.

Related Stories:
· Orion B&B reviews [TripAdvisor]
· Cubicle Dreamin': A Night in a Treehouse [HotelChatter]
· Branching Out With Luxury Treehouses [CNN]

Tags: French Riviera Hotel Reviews / Cannes Film Festival Hotels / → All Tags

French Riviera Style: Villa St. Maxime

Where: 390 Route de la Colle, St-Paul-de-Vence, France, 06570

The Cannes Film Festival is still a ways off (it starts on May 16) but a reader's recent tip about the French Riviera got us daydreaming about escaping to Cote d'Azure. This week we'll be talking about some of the hotels worthy of checking into. As always, we wanna know what you think, not just what Uma, Rod Stewart, P.Diddy and Paris Hilton think, of the hotels here. So send us your thoughts and questions or comment below the story, telling us what's right, what's wrong and what's just French.

The French Riviera hotel scene is largely dominated by the Hotel du Cap Eden Roc and the Hotel du Cap Ferret, both of which are extremely expensive, the latter enforcing a snobbish "cash only" rule for their $800+ a night rooms.

So that's out of the question for anyone not featured regularly in the pages of Us Weekly or the Wall Street Journal. Instead, we looked at what was the #1 hotel ranked on TripAdvisor which does the rankings based on popularity, not necessarily room rate.

What we found was the Villa St. Maxime Hotel in St-Paul-de-Vence. Along with having a killer views of the sea, a cozy atmosphere (there's only six rooms so think of it as a chic French B&B), a relaxed ambience and even a pool, the room rates in the low season can be as little as $212. In peak season, May through September, the rooms bump up to $232.

Since we haven't been, we'll leave it to the words of a recent reviewer:

My husband and I stayed at the Villa St. Maxime in April 2006. It was our first visit to the area and we couldn't have been happier there. After driving through the concrete congestion of the Cote D'Azur area, we were a bit apprehensive. Not to worry! We were given a warm greeting by our great host, John, who was generous and hospitable. The light filled rooms are clean, modern, comfortable, and quiet. The modern architecture of the Villa is complemented by the eclectic decor.

The hotel's owners/hosts John and Ann get rave reviews from almost every reviewer, proving that you don't have to be a celeb to get some quality service in the French Riviera.

[Photo: Shill3]

Related Stories:
· Villa St. Maxime [TripAdvisor]

Tags: Cubicle Dreamin' / Treehouse Hotels / France Hotel Reviews / → All Tags

Cubicle Dreamin': Night in a Treehouse

Where: 2436 chemin du malvan, Saint-Paul de Vence , France, 06570

Cubicle Dreamin' is a feature in which we ask the hotel mavens to take some time out of their busy work day, surf the Internet, and tell us what hotel they wish they could beam themselves to right that very second--all on the slave driving companies dime, of course. Oh, like these people aren't surfing aimlessly anyway--at least now their purposeless clicking will be cobbled together into useful hotel stories--we hope. Have a destination hotel you are just dying to leave your cube for? Send the story our way.

In this episode, Hotel Maven Amanda K conjures up a childhood dream.

When I was a kid, I was always really mad that my parents hadn't bought a house with a big enough tree to build a treehouse in. But now that doesn't matter because some nice people in France have created an even better treehouse for me, at the Orion B&B, featured in this week's Guardian as the "ultimate treehouse". This one includes a whole bathroom and Wifi (not that I knew I wanted Wifi when I was a kid). Or as they put it:

To live in a treehouse, perched high in the branches with the birds, to come face to face with a squirrel on waking, is to see the world from a different angle. A desire born of the need to take your time, to recharge your batteries, to find yourself again. What starts as a treat for children brings out the forgotten child in you.

Perched in trees in Provence, the treehouses are also pretty environmentally friendly--for example, the swimming pool is "naturally cleaned" with gravel and plants instead of chemicals. There are five different luxury treehouses to choose from and if you want to take your childhood pals, you can choose the Colonel Haiti treehouse which sleeps up to 6. And it has a perfect view.

Related Stories:
· St Paul de Vence reviews [TripAdvisor]
· The Ultimate Treehouse [Guardian UK]