Do you enjoy drinking wine and other alcoholic beverages?

Most cruise packages include water, tea and coffee, but beyond that, policies vary. If you don’t drink wine or other alcoholic beverages, you can usually save money on a cruise that doesn’t include these or only includes wine with dinner, for example.

The usual options, depending on the cruise, are:

1. Wine with dinner only, all other alcoholic drinks extra  (soft drinks may or may not be included with meals)
2. Wine with lunch and dinner, all other alcoholic drinks extra
3. Wine with lunch and dinner, plus open bar between meals

Most cruises include at least one or two wine tastings of local vintages, but if you’re really interested in wine, look for a wine theme cruise. Many of the smaller luxury barges offer these for group charters. We even offer a “Wine and Chocolate Cruise” in the Chablis region of Burgundy. This cruise is open to both individuals and groups in the spring and fall.

Do you want to do a lot of sightseeing or just relax?

Most cruises include at least one sightseeing excursion per day, and these are usually included in the price of the cruise. However, it’s a good idea to find out if any of the excursions are “optional,” i.e., you have to pay extra for them. In addition to wine tastings at local vineyards, excursions can range from visiting a village farmers market to touring nearby chateaus and cathedrals.

If you just want to relax, you can skip the excursions, of course. And with a barge charter, your group can decide to do things like additional wine tastings instead of sightseeing.

Do you have a special interest?

Besides wine cruises, you can take a cruise focused on a special interest, like garden cruises, golf cruises, bicycle cruises, etc. Most of these require putting together a group for a charter, but this can be arranged for groups as small as four people.

As you can see, there are a lot of choices available for cruising in France, from larger boats that cruise the Seine and Rhone Rivers to small luxury barge-hotels that travel the networks of canals and smaller rivers in Burgundy, Provence, Champagne, the Loire Valley and other regions. So, whatever your interests and budget, you’re sure to find the perfect cruise that will provide a lifetime of wonderful memories.

Questions to ask yourself and your travel agent before booking your river or canal cruise:

Will this be your first visit to the country?

If you’ve never been to France, you may want to see ”don’t miss” sights like Paris, the Loire Valley chateaus, or the Champagne region on your cruise. But if you’ve “been there, done that,” then taking a barge cruise through the Burgundy countryside or the wild landscape of the Camargue will offer a totally new experience.

How many people in your group?

If you have a family or a group of friends, you may want to charter a barge. That will give you the most flexibility to choose how to spend your cruise. The barge captain will have lots of suggestions - all you’ll have to do is agree among yourselves! If you prefer a larger riverboat and have a big enough group (usually 10 or more), you may be able to get a group discount or a free cruise for one person.

If you’re traveling as a couple, you’ll be with other people. So, the question is, do you want to be with a lot of new people or just a few new people? Remember, you’ll be spending a lot of time together on the boat and on the sightseeing excursions.

A single person will want to pay close attention to single supplement fees, which can cost anywhere from a few hundred dollars more up to as much as double the single price. A few barges and riverboats have single cabins, but most do not.

Do you want a luxury experience or do you need to watch your pennies?

Generally speaking, the larger the boat, the cheaper the cruise. Because the ratio of staff to guests is much higher on the smaller barges, they typically aim for the high-end experience. Gourmet meals, fine French wines, and personal attention are the selling points of a luxury barge cruise.

Larger riverboats offer several sizes of cabins, with corresponding price breaks, while barges usually are outfitted with several similar staterooms. In many cases, the cabins on a barge can be made up as either twin or king for maximum flexibility. A few barges even offer staterooms with bathtubs.

There are no inside cabins on riverboats or barges, but window sizes vary considerably, from sliding glass doors opening onto a French balcony to small, fixed porthole-style windows. This is not as big a concern as it might be on an ocean cruise where you spend days at sea. But if you think you will want to spend time alone in your cabin instead of in the lounge area or on the sundeck, it’s something to check out.

Cruises in France are most expensive in the late spring, early summer and early fall because that’s when the weather is usually the best. If you want to save money, plan to go during the low seasons.

Next time, we’ll take up a few more things to think about when deciding on a cruise that’s right for you. In the meantime, you may want to check out our Frequent Questions page.

The colorful title of this post captures the essence of the Camargue region, a lesser known part of southern France tucked between the ancient city of Arles and the Mediterranean. La Camargue is a lowland area shaped by the Rhône River as it fans out into a large delta before reaching the sea. This tiny part of France has a different feel to it. It is totally unlike the pastoral French scenery we are used to in Normandy, Burgundy or Dordogne, for example. As a wetland, it has flora and fauna that are truly unique. With the right timing, you will indeed spot pink flamingos feeding on shrimp, white  horses galloping in the wild countryside and black cattle being herded by the local “cowboys” (more on this in a minute).

And, it is an ideal spot for barge cruising on the slow waters of Le Petit Rhône starting near Arles - where the big river veers off on its way to Saintes Maries de la Mer - or the Canal du Rhône à  Sète from Beaucaire to Aigues Mortes all the way down to Sète, farther south on the deep blue Mediterranean.

On this trip, I joined up with an 18-passenger barge moored in Aigues-Mortes. This laid back, sleepy little town has a lot of history in its background. This is where, in the 13th century, St Louis - king of France - set sail on his way to the 7th and 8th crusades in the Holy Land. Aigues-Mortes was then a thriving port on the Mediterranean. But it no longer is, due to the accumulation of  silt brought by the Rhône River over the centuries…. Hence the name Aigues Mortes, which translates literally into “Dead Waters.” It remains a delightful place to visit today and is well worth the detour.

One of the highlights of this trip was my visit to a local “manade,” the soul of Camargue.  A manade is a ranch where cattle is raised, Texas-style, complete with its own French version of cowboys called “gardians.”  (The two pictures above give a pretty good idea.) Many of these manades offer rides through their property to go see the cattle up close and personal and show the Camargue way of life. It is a lot of fun to ride in a flatbed trailer pulled by a tractor, sitting on bails of straw and shooting pictures of the cows, the horses (with an occasional egret here and there) and with luck, as I said, a flock of funny-faced, skinny-legged flamingos. True, it may not quite come to the level of a wild-life safari in Africa, but it could get close if you’d let it. Try teasing one of those bulls and you’ll find out - these creatures are very territorial! After all, they’re raised for the local bullfights - a bloodless version of the sport in which the objective is to snatch a rosette tied between the horns of the bull. Unlike other types of bullfighting, the bull is the star of the show.

Camargue really is a gem of a place… rural, wild and completely different from any other place I’ve seen. A wonderful place to commune with nature!

On a recent trip to the Midi region in southern France, I took  the time to explore a special place: the famous Canal du Midi in the area known as Languedoc/Roussillon.  This manmade waterway is a wonder of hydraulic engineering, and its entire length has been designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Here are a few facts about the Canal du Midi. It was built during the reign of Louis XIV by a wealthy individual called Pierre Paul Riquet. It was dug by some 12,000 workers using only raw manpower. (Backhoes and front loaders didn’t exist in those days.) It was conceived to enable the transportation of goods between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean, as a shortcut to a lengthy voyage around Spain and Portugal through the Strait of Gibraltar.

The southeastern part of the waterway, 130 miles between Toulouse and Marseillan (near Sète), used to be called the Canal Royal du Languedoc. The northwestern section, about the same length between Toulouse and Castets (near Bordeaux), was formerly known as the Canal Lateral à la Garonne because it runs parallel to the Garonne River. The full length, once completed, was first named the Canal des Deux Mers (the Canal of the Two Seas), but the entire system is now commonly known as the Canal du Midi.

Today there is virtually no transportation of goods on the canal. Instead, it is used almost exclusively by self-driven pleasure boats and luxury barge-hotels. As I said, it is an amazing piece of engineering, and as it lazily winds its way through vast areas of vineyards and olive groves, it is one of the loveliest and most peaceful waterways in France.

The most striking feature of the canal, in my opinion, is what I would call its “signature look” - tall rows of enormous plane trees lining both banks, arching high above the waterway and shading its entire path all the way down to the deep blue Mediterranean. Imagine floating gently down the nave of a leafy Gothic cathedral for miles on end! Also notable is the ubiquitous tow path where horses once pulled the freight barges and where one can now take leisurely walks, jogs or bicycle rides.

During this one-week trip, I only covered the southeastern section of the canal. I traveled up and down between Carcassonne and Marseillan on the Bassin de Thau. I visited a dozen places, met quite a few people and took a lot of pictures. You can get more details on my visits from the full article I posted on our website.

Canal barges vs. riverboats - Canal cruises are boat trips on barges that travel on man-made waterways. These barges usually are remodeled commercial cargo hulls that have become obsolete for modern freight transportation. The canals are narrow and not very deep. They were dug decades or centuries ago, and they normally allow for just two boats to pass each other. The barges are small. Depending on the size of the cabins, their capacity varies from 4 guests to 10 or 12… sometimes 20. By contrast, river cruisers typically have over 100 passengers and travel on much larger rivers: the Seine, Rhone, Rhine, Danube, etc. Because they are small, barges can reach deep into the countryside, away from major tourist destinations, for a more unique and personal encounter with the local culture. You can even charter the smaller ones for your own family or affinity group (wine, gardens, golf, bicycling, cooking, art, etc.) Imagine… the whole boat just to yourself!

The lap of luxury - As I said, canal barges are small. However, they are more comfortable than you might think. Again, depending on the number of guests, some of the deluxe ones have very large cabins with gorgeous private bathrooms (usually with a shower, but sometimes a bathtub). Many of these boats even have saunas and hot tubs on board. Living rooms and dining rooms are decorated with beautiful fixtures and furnished with fine furniture.

Daily life on board a barge - One of the most striking features of a canal cruise is the slow pace. The boat sails only during the day and usually covers short distances: typically 50 to 100 miles a week. So, there is ample time for strolls in the neighboring countryside, bicycle rides along the towpath or minivan excursions to a local castle, monastery, winery, museum or other historical site of interest. The other “claim to fame” of a barge cruise is the gourmet food and the wines. During the course of a cruise, guests will sample dozens of cheeses, wines, local dishes and desserts.

Your hosts - Many of these small boats are owned and operated by a husband and wife team who are totally dedicated to barging. They operate the boat as they would their own home with additional rooms for a bed and breakfast (except that, in this case, “breakfast” means all the meals… every day). Your hosts are a combination of captain, cook, butler, sommelier, social director, chauffeur… everything. They “baby” their guests in every way they possibly can.

How long and when? - Barge cruises normally last a week, starting on Saturday or Sunday and ending the following weekend. They operate from April through October. In the south of France, where the climate is milder, some of them start as early as March.

You can find more information about barging on the FAQs page of our website. You can also see itineraries for a couple dozen of these canal cruises.

Welcome! This travel blog is about river and canal cruise vacations on luxury barge-hotels and riverboats in France. With its extensive network of rivers and canals, France offers dozens of cruising possibilities from Alsace to Normandy and the Loire valley, down to Burgundy, Provence and the Languedoc. The boats navigating French waterways can be as small as upscale barges for 4 guests on the Canal du Midi or as large as 150-passenger river cruisers on the river Seine through Paris. Cruising around the French countryside is a great way to spend a vacation. Exploring out-of-the-way places, seeing the locals up close and sampling the many regional dishes and wines is a lot of fun. So, we hope you enjoy your trip (or enjoyed, if you’ve already been there) and we look forward to chatting with you.

From our “About” page you will see that we are travel professionals who specialize in tours and cruises in France, Spain and Portugal. You might want to take a look at our website.