Rennes

Rennes needs 1 day: touring the Parliament of Brittany, a 17th-century palace that housed the old regional parliament and today hosts the court of appeals, and strolling through the timber-framed streets of the historic center, rebuilt in stone after the great fire of 1720, the same afternoon. April-June and September-October bring the mildest weather. It's inexpensive for France. It's Brittany's historic capital and seat of its old regional parliament, with one of France's largest student populations relative to its size, giving it a particularly lively nightlife for its scale.