Fontainebleau Travel Guides (Updated September 2026)

Excellent day, perfect way to see Fountainebleau & Provins. Ample time to explore. Doru is a great host & guide

Our tour with Fabrice to Fontainebleau was excellent. From a practical standpoint, getting an early start on a Sunday morning allowed us to have the chateau almost literally to ourselves, something anyone who has visited Versailles or La Louvre will surely appreciate. Fabrice was a friendly, engaging and well informed guide.

Beautiful castle about 1 hour drive from Paris. Our guide picked us up at our hotel at 1PM and we returned to Paris by 6PM. He provided historical information regarding the castle on the trip there as well as recommendations for additional excursions we could take that match our interests.Fontainebleau is a sprawling, stunning castle which encapsulates thousands of years of history and architectural styles. Built originally during the reign of Phillip 1 of France (1060-1108) this castle housed Kings and dignitaries through Napoleon III in 1870. Its beauty and gardens rival Versailles but it has none of the massive crowds. We visited the castle on a cold January afternoon and were able to have much of the castle to ourselves, as barely 100 tourists were there. Unfortunately due to the weather the Gardens were closed but visible from the windows above. One could easily spend a few days here absorbing the grandeur, beauty, and history of the palace and exploring the expansive gardens and surrounding forests.If this castle isn’t on your “bucket list” of things to do in Paris you should add it. I would love to return on a warmer day and explore the gardens and grounds. The lack of crowds is also preferred as you can take your time to explore and not feel rushed or overwhelmed by too many people. Numerous activities are offered on the grounds (hot air balloon ride and horseback riding). We didn’t have time to explore the little town.There is a cafe and restroom facilities on the grounds. However, the town is directly adjacent and offers additional dining options.Treat yourself to this stunning historic museum!

Our guide was wonderful. She was extremely thorough and knew the all history and information of every detail of the palace. There is such a rich history there and it is sadly overlooked.

Lucile was an excellent tour guide. She was on time and presented a lot of historical information. Highly recommend.

We had a great guide called Martine who has been giving guided tours for over 25 years. Martine " knew her stuff", most knowledgeable, polite, interesting to listen to and a good sense of humor on the life of Kings, Emperor Napoleon and ohers !

This was an amazing tour! Chris was a fountain of information and made the tour so much fun! I found Fountainbleau much more interesting than Versailles. The opulence there is incredible! I would encourage anyone to take this tour. An added bonus is that it is not as crowded as Versailles.

Our hotel concierge recommended this tour group. Our guide, Fabrics, was very knowledgeable about Paris, history, Fontainebleau, Napoleon and the area. We genuinely enjoyed our tour. The door to door hotel pickup was absolutely worth it. We shall keep them in our contacts for future trips to the region. Fontainebleau is a wonderful chateau with 800 years of French history.

Julian was an incredible tour guide. We are in Paris during the time of the Olympic Games, so picking us up was challenging, but Julian was able to communicate with us and we figured out a successful meeting point. Julian obviously loves what he does and has a real passion for the history of the many sites in France. His knowledge of Fontainebleau was quite extensive and he made our private tour easy and quite informative and enjoyable. Very stress free and relaxed. After our tour, we had a balloon ride scheduled, and Julian was able to communicate in French with the other tour guide and was able to navigate us to the meeting point. Something that would have been impossible for us to do on our own. We would highly recommend Julian for any tour (as he has several that he guides). Thank you so much Julian for making this day one of our best experiences ever!

Excellent guide - very important in such a huge palace! Great convenience being picked up and returned to your hotel.

It was fabulous! Much more history than Versailles, more rooms were available to view, and we almost had the place to ourselves. Plus, Michelle was incredible. Highly recommend it for somebody looking to do something a little different in Paris.

Tour guide Chris was great he communicated pick-up flawlessly. Almost no tourists at the estate. It is a hidden gem. The tour was life being invited to tour a friends home. Do not miss this!

For us, the visit of seeing all the old artifacts was enhanced by Julian’s commentary. The depth of his knowledge is amazing, and he spoke in a manner that gave context to what we were seeing or where we were. This was an infinitely more meaningful visit than doing a recorded audio tour. Eric’s driving was very comfortable.