Learn Hardcore French: Après les vacances, nous rentrons en ville. - After the holidays, we go back to the city.

French very often uses the present tense to talk about the near future when there is a clear time expression that puts the action in the future, like demain, ce soir, après les vacances.

So Après les vacances, nous rentrons en ville literally uses the present, but the time phrase après les vacances makes it clear that the action is future. It’s similar to English sentences like We leave next week (present form, future meaning).

You could also use the future tense:
Après les vacances, nous rentrerons en ville.
That’s correct too; it just sounds a bit more formal or more detached than the everyday present.

Why is it les vacances and not la vacance?

In French, vacances is almost always used in the plural:

les vacances = holidays, vacation
Je suis en vacances. = I’m on vacation.

The singular vacance exists but is rare and has different, more technical meanings (like a vacant position). When you are talking about time off from work or school, you use les vacances (feminine, plural) by default.

So Après les vacances is the normal, idiomatic way to say After the holidays / After vacation.

What is the difference between rentrer, retourner, and revenir? Why rentrons here?

All three can translate as to go back / to return, but they have different focuses:

rentrer: to go back home or to your usual place (city, house, country, etc.).
- Focus on going back inside / back where you belong.
retourner: to go back to a place, usually without the home idea.
- Focus on going back there again.
revenir: to come back to where the speaker is (or was).
- Often translated as to come back rather than to go back.

In Après les vacances, nous rentrons en ville, rentrer suggests:

The city is your normal base / home, and
You’re going back there after being away.

If you said Après les vacances, nous retournons en ville, it would be understood, but it sounds more like we’re going back there again without the strong sense of “that’s where we live.” Rentrer is more natural if you mean going back to where you normally live.

Could you say nous revenons en ville instead? How would that change the meaning?

Nous revenons en ville is grammatically correct, but the nuance changes:

rentrer en ville: going back to the city where you normally live / belong.
revenir en ville: coming back to the city (towards a place associated with the speaker), with less emphasis on it being your “home base.”

In many contexts they might overlap, but for after the holidays, we’re going back to the city where we live, rentrer en ville is the most idiomatic choice.

Why is it en ville and not à la ville?

En ville is an idiomatic expression that means something like in town / into town / to the city. It’s used both for movement and for location:

Je vais en ville. = I’m going into town.
Je suis en ville. = I’m in town.

You almost never say à la ville in this sense. À la ville can exist in other, more specific contexts (like certain set expressions or contrasts with à la campagne in older or formal language), but in everyday modern French, en ville is the standard way to say to town / in town.

So nous rentrons en ville is the natural wording.

Could you say nous rentrons à la ville?

No, that sounds unnatural in modern French for this meaning. For going back to town / to the city, the idiomatic phrase is:

rentrer en ville

Rentrer à la ville would be understood, but it would sound unidiomatic or outright wrong to native speakers in this context. Stick with en ville.

What exactly does rentrer en ville imply? Is it specifically “return home” or just “return to the city”?

Rentrer usually carries the idea of going back to your usual place / home.
En ville is to/in town.

Together, rentrer en ville often implies:

you were away (e.g., at the seaside, in the countryside, on holiday), and
you’re going back to the city which is your normal place to live or work.

It doesn’t necessarily mean to your specific apartment or house, but to your urban base as opposed to where you’ve been staying temporarily.

Why is there a comma after Après les vacances? Could you also put the time phrase at the end?

Yes, both word orders are correct:

Après les vacances, nous rentrons en ville.
Nous rentrons en ville après les vacances.

French allows time expressions at the beginning or end of the sentence. If you put it at the beginning, you normally use a comma after it. Putting it at the beginning slightly emphasizes when the action happens.

Meaning and grammar stay the same in both versions.

Why is the subject nous and not on? Could you use on here?

In French, both nous and on can mean we, but:

nous: more formal or neutral; also used in writing and careful speech.
on: very common in everyday spoken French; grammatically third person singular, but often means we.

You could absolutely say:

Après les vacances, on rentre en ville.

That would sound very natural in conversation. The sentence with nous is slightly more formal or written in tone, but both are correct.

How is rentrer conjugated here, and is it a regular verb?

Rentrer is a regular -ER verb in the present tense. The conjugation (indicative present) is:

je rentre
tu rentres
il / elle / on rentre
nous rentrons
vous rentrez
ils / elles rentrent

So nous rentrons is the regular nous form: stem rentr- + ending -ons.

In compound past tenses like the passé composé, rentrer usually takes être as the auxiliary when it’s intransitive (no direct object):

Nous sommes rentrés en ville. = We came back to the city.

Why is the article les used with vacances, but there is no article before ville in en ville?

Two different things are happening:

Les vacances
- Vacances (when meaning holiday/vacation) is normally used with a definite article:
  - les vacances
  - ces vacances, mes vacances, etc.
- In Après les vacances, les functions like the in English (after the holidays).
En ville
- En ville is a fixed, idiomatic prepositional phrase meaning in town / to town.
- The preposition en here doesn’t take an article; it’s just en ville, not en la ville or à la ville for this meaning.

So the article is required with vacances, but en ville is a set expression without an article.

Is Après les vacances, nous rentrons en ville more formal or more conversational?

The sentence itself is fairly neutral. It could appear in spoken or written French without sounding strange.

To sound more conversational, a speaker might prefer on:
- Après les vacances, on rentre en ville.
To sound more formal or written, the original with nous and possibly with a future tense (nous rentrerons) could be used.

As written, it’s standard, natural French that fits a wide range of contexts.