Tourtour: The Village in the Sky With the Best Views in the South of France

Getting there: the drive is half the joy

Stepping into Tourtour is a refreshing shift away from the glamorous busyness of the coast. It's around an hour and a half drive from the Sainte-Maxime / Saint-Tropez area and honestly the journey is half the joy — you pass through vineyards, sleepy stone villages and miles of cypress-lined backroads that feel like a different country to the Riviera you just left.

The bends in the road leading up to Tourtour seem to become sharper and sharper as you climb, but the panoramic view of the valley below the moment you reach the top makes the vague motion sickness all worth it.

The view, the church and that hilltop

Perched delicately at around 600m above sea level, Tourtour is privy to those vast views stretching all the way back to the coast. Honestly, I've now visited four times and the wow factor of that view doesn't diminish — it truly is stunning.

Behind the main viewpoint and just before you walk into the centre of the village, there's a small but beautifully ornate church that sits at the hill's highest point. Every other time I'd been here it had been closed, but this time we were lucky — the doors were open. Inside, a single domed apse in honey-coloured stone, simple decor and the calmest atmosphere — the kind of space that makes you instinctively lower your voice and stay a little longer than you planned.

A quick history of the village in the sky

Tourtour has been lived in for a very long time. There's evidence of settlement going back to the Bronze Age, but the village as you see it today really takes shape in the medieval period, when it was fortified around two châteaux — the Château Communal (the older of the two, with its distinctive round towers) and the Château de Raphélis. The 11th-century Saint-Denis church on the hilltop is one of the oldest buildings still standing.

For centuries the village ran on olive oil and silk; you can still visit the working Moulin à Huile in the lower part of town, which has been pressing oil here for hundreds of years.

The village earned its place among the plus beaux villages de France by quietly refusing to modernise its core. What you see now is more or less what travellers have seen here for the past 400 years.

What to do in Tourtour

Tourtour is small — you can walk the whole village in under an hour — and that's the point. The best thing to do is slow right down. Start at the top by the church and the viewpoint, then wind your way down through the lanes towards the central Place des Ormeaux, the shaded square that locals still treat as the village living room.

Stop at the artisan studios tucked into the back streets: there are potters, a glass-blower, a couple of jewellery makers, and — if you're lucky — local watercolour artists set up under striped awnings, painting the village as you walk past them. Buying a small piece directly from one of them is hands-down the best souvenir you can leave with.

Other things worth doing: the working olive-oil mill, the small fossil museum, the path down to the Chapelle Saint-Rosaire, and the sunset spot at the western edge of the village. If you have a full day, Tourtour is also a perfect launchpad for the Gorges du Verdon, the Lac de Sainte-Croix and the Abbaye du Thoronet — all within an easy drive.

How to get to Tourtour and when to go

Nearest airports are Toulon (about 1h15), Nice (1h45) and Marseille (1h45). You'll absolutely want a car — there's no train, and the village is reached by winding country roads through the Haut-Var. Park at the entrance and walk in.

Avoid peak August if you can. May–June and September–October are the sweet spot: warm enough for long lunches, light enough for the views to stretch, and quiet enough that the village still feels like itself.

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