One of the best golf courses of Provence : Provence Country Club is just 20 minutes from Gordes. It is located between L’Isle-sur-La Sorgue and Fontaine-de-Vaucluse. So from here it is very easy to get there  through Cabrières d’Avignon and Lagnes.

You are facing the Luberon Hills and all the area

This course is a 18 holes, par 72 (6099 m.), architect: J. Garaialde ( one of the best French players in the 80’s).

The Golf  is very well maintained and has many facilities among which an excellent restaurant. You will enjoy superb view on the Luberon Hills (see image). One idea would be to have lessons. They have an top and friendly  teacher who can make for our guests a series of “refresher” courses. Our guests  like it very much. So,  every year we have several groups of golfers who want to play but not to do only that. So the ladies can have their own activities. And they can enjoy all the restaurants we describe in this website. The Golf has Hotel facilities. It is cheap in every respect. So it’s really a good bet, when you are in Provence not to be golf 100%.

On this hole, your longest drive ever ?

From  Gordes and Mas des Etoiles, we propose at least 7 different golf courses. Principally

and besides Golf de Provence Country Club, we propose Golf du Grand Avignon (35 minutes), Golf de Pont Royal and two real jewels : Golf des Baux and Golf de Servanes. Golf des Baux has a special mark as it is a 9 holes (you don’t wish to spend too much time and overpay) and the environment is truly exceptionnal. It’s quiet (of course you book your tee) . We recommend you to do your round by 5-6 : 00 PM as the evening shades are the best After that you can have a casual diner in Maussane- les-Alpilles (out of the Saint Rémy crowd and in one of the street café just facing the church among locals)  and after come back to Gordes direct through Eygalières. I have not played at Servanes but our guests who did it enjoyed a lot. Servanes is just south of Maussane, near Mouriès.

What is the reason why so many tourists come over to Provence and Luberon ?

You, dynamic Tourists who want to have the best of your time,  like or even love France  : Landscapes have a unique variety, climate is mostly enjoyable,  a large concentration of historical spots, you get a lot of unspoiled traditional places like in the old times, cost of living is finally not so high and, important point, the country is (mostly) safe. A last point : Local people in general are not at the level of the London exquisite politeness but the French,  besides their natural indifference,  will finally behave nicely with you, when you are not cheerfully welcome. So it’s good.

For a foreign visitor, in France there are many, many things to do :

Seen from my viewpoint , Paris, of course the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre Museum, Mont Saint Michel, the Loire castles, wine tasting in Burgundy, Aiguille du Midi in Chamonix, Côte d’Azur, enjoy good food….and …Provence.

Provence is unique in the unique. First impression : Light and Air Quality. You breath. Second impression : You are “really off”, on vacation. You are quick to forget all the difficulties of hard life. Then, if you are a bit organized, there are a large quantity of things to do. An advice : Don’t follow the crowds, select the best for yourselves with the time you have and don’t hurry-up. Until now, we strived our best to be helpful with our guests to take the most of their visit with us by preparing listings of things to do nurtured with our guests feed-backs : Best restaurants, best visits, potential problems etc … The aim is always : you spend 2, 4 or 7 days with us, What is the best you can do ?

Our website was not too bad but I knew for a while something had to be done to improve communication and feed-back. So at the end of January 2009, I started to build by myself and from zero this new website. Fortunately, there are fantastic tools and you don’t need anymore to be an expert to do something square. Anyway be indulgent, this is a trial, but with passion and tenacity it will get somewhere. So this new website, you have understood, is just to explain better who we are, what we are doing, what you can expect from us, what will be you environment and finally just to find the right ingredients for a perfect visit to Provence.

You might be curious to know a little bit who we are ? and your Mas des Etoiles.

First, we are both French, although Annette was born in Argentina and had an agitated life between an English College in Buenos Ayres ( The sisters taught her how to resist the appetance of sharks when swimming in the waters of the British Empire, you don’t learn that in French schools, do you ?) , horse driving in the Pampa, asados and also a few years of school in the Boston Massachussets area. As a result, I have to endure a much fighting spirit. After getting married in Palermo Chico, we mostly lived in Paris and the North of France (Lille) where was the original families centerpoint.

For us,  Life is a succession of projects (with variable success) and maybe Provence is the right one at the right time, we don’t know. In fact, we did not arrive here like that : We considered several places : New England, San Diego, Seattle, South Corsica, The Loire Valley and Provence. We selected Provence because, as many people from the North,we are attracted by Sun and Heat. Also the relative proximity with our kids and children. And it came to be Gordes, one of the best well-preserved villages in France ( In fact, for me personnaly the proximity of a nice golf course and an affordable piece of land  !)

Mas des Etoiles ( A Mas is a kind of old farm) is not the oldest XVII’s century manor in the area.

We moved to Provence in 2002. With Annette’s talents for Interior design and a good local architect, my taste for gardening, the advices of an excellent landscape architect we built the house and started the B&B (Thank you to our first guests) in Spring 2004. Now we are on our 6th year, already. Our house is like a very old one. But when you have lived in America you need everything to be ultra-convenient. So it  has,   besides a fancy Provence traditional decor,  the most modern outfits possible (air cooling by the floor, biological swimming pool etc …) Our location has a lot of advantages as we are close from Gordes center- 4 miles – , but not in the crowd. Most excellent visiting sites are within a 30 minutes drive. You can hike just outside. And all others : One hour maximum. You will not be anytime like driving between San Francisco and Yosemite ! Most of the time 10-20 minutes. This is a great thing. Our guests come, as we like it, of course from France and Belgium, our natural territories, but also as we like it from many many countries. We knew well a few nationalities for instance the USA, Canada, Australia, NZ, Germany, Italy etc … It is always easy to find a common point to start with and develop empathy. But we learnt to know and to enjoy very much citizens for instance of Israel, ZA, Romania, Japan, HK, and the list is long. All these nationalities are “fantastic” to meet.

Enough talking. What we want is you to be well here, Photos will speak by themselves. Your stay with us will make the rest. If you think close of all that, you are sincerely WELCOME in our house

Annette &  Francois

Cartes interactives réalisées avec Google Maps. Les Cartes Google vous donnent soit des plans soit des vues satellites.

Les plus beaux golfs de la région en partant du Mas des Etoiles – Clicker ici – Sur Google Map

Les meilleures ballades en partant du Mas des Etoiles- Clicker ici – Sur Google Map

Les plus beaux sites à visiter et les marchés. Best sites and markets – Clicker ici – Sur Google Map.

Les endroits secrets. The secret places – Clicker ici – Sur Google Map.