Montpellier

The flourishing, seductively beautiful city of Montpellier is now France’s eighth largest. With an array of art expositions and kilometers of peaceful natural beaches as well as notable dance, music, and film festivals, Montpellier presents a fascinating contrast between the ancient and the modern aspects of France’s peerless panache. For example, the world’s oldest active School of Medicine (founded in 1220 and attended by both Nostradamus and Rabelais) is found alongside picturesque vineyards, olive gardens, and chic boutiques in this warmly hospitable, southerly treasure of a city on the Mediterranean coast. And what better way to finish a dreamy day at the beach than with a perfect concert experience in, for example, the fourteenth-century Montpellier Cathedral?