After the Marathon d'Avignon: Arles

The Route: Avignon Centre → Arles → Avignon Centre Logistics: Direct TER, no transfer required, several trains daily. Marathon Month: September Duration: Day trip

Avignon Centre ──(TER, ~20 mins, several trains/day)──> Arles
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Avignon Centre ◄──(same line, return service)───────────────┘

The Marathon d'Avignon runs entirely inside the walls and along the Rhône at Avignon; Arles sits a short way downstream, on the same river, and offers the region's other great Roman city as a genuine one-day extension rather than a repeat of what the race already showed. The train ride between the two is short enough that this works comfortably as a day out even on legs that ran a marathon within the same week.

September in Arles is past the peak heat of high summer but still reliably warm and dry, the kind of Provençal light that made the town famous for reasons that have nothing to do with its Roman ruins. This is a good month for walking the old town at an unhurried pace: crowds have thinned from August, and most of what there is to see here is outdoors or lightly covered, so there is little seasonal timing to get wrong the way there is with, say, a specific flowering season elsewhere in the region.

The direct TER from Avignon Centre to Arles takes around 20 minutes, with several services running each day, frequent enough that the exact departure time is a minor detail rather than something to plan the whole day around. Check the current SNCF Connect timetable before travelling, since TER schedules are revised between seasons.

The Roman city

Arles' amphitheatre, the Arènes, is the obvious first stop: a 1st-century Roman arena still in occasional use for events today, its stone tiers largely intact and walkable rather than roped off behind glass. A short walk away, the ancient theatre carries less of its original structure but still gives a clear sense of scale, columns and tiered seating set against the open Provençal sky. Entry to the amphitheatre and theatre is typically sold as a combined ticket, priced in the region of €10 to €13 depending on the season and any combined-monument pass; check the current fee at arlestourisme.com before travelling, since prices and combination-ticket options change.

Both sites sit within walking distance of each other in the compact old town, and neither involves serious elevation, which makes Arles a reasonably forgiving choice for legs still recovering from a marathon. Ground underfoot in the amphitheatre itself is uneven stone in places, so footwear that coped with 42.195 km of road should be more than adequate here too.

Van Gogh's Arles

Arles' second identity, arguably better known outside France than its Roman one, is as the town where Vincent van Gogh lived and painted through 1888 and into 1889, a period that produced some of his most recognisable work, including the café scene that gave Café Terrace at Night its exact, still-identifiable setting on what is now Place du Forum. The Fondation Vincent van Gogh Arles, a dedicated exhibition space rather than a house museum, is the closest thing to a formal Van Gogh site in the town itself, since the artist's actual paintings from his time here are now scattered across major collections worldwide rather than held locally. Walking the streets that appear, lightly disguised, in some of those paintings costs nothing and needs no booking, which makes it an easy way to fill an afternoon without adding a second admission fee on top of the amphitheatre ticket.

Getting back

Return to Avignon Centre on the same direct TER line, around 20 minutes with services running through the evening. There is no need to plan around a specific last train for a same-day return; check the current timetable at the station or via SNCF Connect before heading back, since departure times shift between seasons.