Emily in Paris Tour: Versailles, Champagne and the Riviera

Days 1-4: Paris

Your base is the 5th arrondissement, the neighborhood where Emily lives on Place de l’Estrapade. It’s one of the quieter, more residential parts of central Paris, which makes it a good base: the Luxembourg Gardens are a short walk, the Seine is close, and the Marais is easily reachable on foot or by Metro.

The show uses Paris as a backdrop so consistently that half the city qualifies as a location. The Palais Royal gardens, where several key scenes were filmed, are worth a morning. The Trocadéro gives you the classic Eiffel Tower view that opens almost every episode. The Café de Flore in Saint-Germain, one of the most famous cafés in the world, appears throughout the series and has been a gathering point for artists, writers, and anyone who wants to be seen since the 1880s.

The Louvre features in the show and needs no justification beyond itself. Go early, book in advance, and don’t try to see everything. The Marais is your evening destination: the historic heart of LGBTQ+ Paris, with some of the best bars, restaurants, and people-watching in the city. The show’s queer characters gravitate here naturally, and so will you.

One of your four days should be kept entirely free. Walk without a plan, find a market, sit somewhere with a glass of wine and watch the city go by. This is the part of Paris that doesn’t make it into the itinerary but is usually what people remember most.

Day 5: Versailles

Versailles appears in season two and earns a full day of your time. The palace is extraordinary in scale and the Hall of Mirrors is one of those spaces that photographs cannot adequately prepare you for. The gardens are vast and best explored by bike or golf cart. Go on a weekday if you can and get there early before the tour groups arrive.

The town of Versailles itself is worth an hour or two after the palace. It’s quieter than most visitors expect and has good restaurants for lunch or dinner before the train back to Paris.

Days 6-7: Champagne

A morning train from Paris brings you to Reims in under an hour. The show visits the Champagne region in later seasons and the location makes immediate sense: flat plains, chalk soils, and an industry built on extraordinary attention to detail.

A private tour takes you through the vineyards before heading underground into the chalk caves where the region’s best houses age their bottles. The tasting that follows covers a serious range. Reims itself has one of the great Gothic cathedrals in France, where 25 French kings were crowned, and a food scene that rewards an evening of exploration.

Your second day in Champagne is looser. Visit a smaller producer, explore the villages of the Montagne de Reims, or simply spend the morning in a good café before the train south.

Days 8-9: The French Riviera

The show’s later seasons lean into the Riviera heavily and it’s easy to see why. Nice is glamorous in a way that feels earned rather than performed: the Promenade des Anglais, the old town, the markets, the light. Your hotel is close to the waterfront.

Day eight is for Nice itself. The Vieux-Nice is a tight grid of ochre buildings with excellent restaurants at street level and a gay-friendly scene that picks up considerably in summer. The Matisse Museum, set in a beautiful 17th-century villa in the Cimiez neighborhood, is worth an afternoon.

Day nine is for the coast. Villefranche-sur-Mer to the east is one of the most beautiful small towns on the Riviera, with a deep natural harbour and a waterfront chapel decorated by Jean Cocteau. Antibes to the west has a Picasso Museum housed in the castle where he worked in 1946. Either direction rewards the journey.

On your final morning your driver transfers you to Nice airport for your return flight.