RHONE OR RHINE?
There’s only one letter between them but each river offers a very different cruise experience
THE RHONE
To Lyon, a doddle to get to with Eurostar’s direct summer service. Uniworld’s SS Catherine was parked bang in the centre of the city which, on this sunny Sunday, seemed more like a holiday resort than the third biggest city in France.
Our cruise began by heading north, not on the Rhone but the Saone, as
Lyon sits at the confluence of the two rivers. Three, in fact, if you include the view of our guide, Geraldine, who said: ‘The city is also on the Beaujolais, our river of wine.’
Our first stop was Macon, gateway to the vineyards of the Côtes du Rhône, and to Beaune, the historic hub of the region where there’s a cave on every corner (one even in a 13th-century convent). From Macon we followed the Saone back to Lyon, where we took a bike tour. From the old town, with its hidden traboules – covered passageways used as shortcuts by the town’s medieval silk merchants – we biked to the Museum of Confluences, a futuristic work of architecture at the promontory where the Rhone and the Saone converge.
The Rhone has few major tourist trophies, but what it may lack in big-ticket items is more than compensated for by the rural gentleness of the river and a stock of lesser-known treasures.
Our one-week cruise took in France’s smallest cathedral in hilltop Viviers, and a pair of pretty villages – Tournon and Tain-l’hermitage, which enjoy a global reputation for their wines (a single bottle recently sold for €20,000).
We spent an afternoon kayaking on yet another river, the Gardon, passing under the magnificent Roman Pont du Gard aqueduct. We visited Arles, whose Roman legacies are topped by a mighty colosseum second in size to the one in Rome. It’s also where Van Gogh painted 200 works, including his Le Café De Nuit, where we had lunch.
Finally to Avignon, its skyline crowned by the immense Palais des Papes, a gothic fortress built by the popes desperate to escape from the turmoil of 14th-century Rome. Even more iconic is the Pont d’avignon, surprisingly famous for a bridge that doesn’t even make it across the river.
Uniworld’s SS Catherine (uniworld. com) is a five-star ship and genuinely all-inclusive, from drinks at any time to a daily choice of well-researched excursions. The crew were fun, and the food was some of the best I’ve had on any ship, river or ocean.
From £2,399 per person.