Ever wondered what it’s like cruising the quiet canals of Burgundy in France? Here’s my full review of a dreamy barge cruise experience on La Vie en Rose.
I’ll be the first to admit that a boutique Burgundy barge cruise was not on my bingo card for travel in my early 30s.
There’s no denying that I like *nice things* — I’m a sucker for a luxury hotel with character, good food makes my world go round, and I’m on a constant search for travel experiences that elevate a destination from being fun to being unforgettable. Buttttt I’m not exactly your typical private barge cruise customer, or at least what I thought was a typical private barge cruise customer.
I live life at a million miles an hour rather (a barge cruise averages ~4mph, considerably slower than my usual speed 🙃), my wine preference is anything sweet (I’ve been told ‘I prefer a high residual sugar‘ makes that sound classier), and while I do consider myself somewhat of a fromage connoisseur, I’d happily have a cheese plate for my main meal rather than fancy meat or seafood dishes.
So how on earth did I find myself sipping Meursault on a sun-drenched terrace in between gourmet meals, listening to Edith Piaf at maximum volume, enjoying autumn colours while we float through the French countryside? Let me tell you.
I was six months into a three-month no-fly Europe trip when a last minute opportunity arose to experience Burgundy’s canals on a boutique barge, with a focus on Premier Cru wine and gastronomic delights. And so the seed was sown, or should I say the grapevine was planted…
Two weeks in Puglia without a car had driven me to complete exhaustion, so the idea of being wined and dined while not having to make a single decision for myself was instantly appealing. Despite my initial hesitance that I wasn’t classy enough for a private barge cruise, after chatting with the legends at Barge Lady Cruises who were organising the trip for a few lucky journalists, everything fell perfectly into place.
They needed a photographer who could reach Burgundy easily, I needed cheese, it was a match made in heaven.
Fast-forward one night train and two high speed trains through three countries, and I’d made it to France to kick off my four day barge getaway.
What came next was one of the most special travel experiences I’ve ever had, and I’ve been very fortunate to have had a lot!
Sumptuous dishes made from local produce hand-picked by the chef, paired with wine I never would have chosen myself but that I actually loved, the chance to practice my high school French at market stalls, and this weird feeling of calm and contentment that I hadn’t felt in months, I think they call it ‘relaxation’? WILD.
So back to the real question, am I classy enough for a private barge cruise?! I guess we’re about to find out…
Table of Contents
Quick summary: A Burgundy barge cruise on La Vie en Rose
About La Vie en Rose: A 1930 Luxemotor built in Holland, with three air-conditioned cabins with en suites, an open galley and dining area, and a cosy salon, as well as shaded seating near the wheelhouse plus a lush sun terrace up the front.
About Barge Lady Cruises: A legendary family-owned barge cruising travel agency, experts on all things barge travel! They are the fairy godmothers of French floating holidays 🧚🏼♀️
What’s included: Our trip was a mini itinerary for press, but their usual packages include six nights’ accommodation, transfers to and from the boat from Paris, Geneva or Lyon, all meals onboard (cooked by a private chef), a brilliant selection of wine and an open bar, bikes to use if you wish, and escorted excursions like market visits, wine tasting at vineyards etc.
A detailed review of my La Vie en Rose barge cruise in France
The history of La Vie en Rose
La Vie en Rose is almost 100 years old, she was built in the Netherlands in 1930 and worked the canals as a humble cargo barge for decades, before catching the eye of Hollywood legend and passionate sailor Sterling Hayden. He bought the barge in 1969 and used it as his Paris residence throughout the 1970s and 80s. How epic is that?!
Previously named ‘Who Knows’, La Vie en Rose was refitted in 2004 to the cosy and charming barge you can experience today as a boutique hotel on the water.
What it’s like on the boat
Chic and comfortable, it really does feel like a floating home away from home. Let me take you on a tour.
You step onto the boat by the wheelhouse, where there’s some casual seating under a shade canopy, great for canapes and chats with the captain and crew.
Take a couple of steps down into the salon, a lounge space with comfy couches, a well-stocked bar cart, books, magazines and some boardgames.
Beyond that is the open galley and dining area, I love being able to see the chef in his element! A skylight keeps things nice and bright during the daytime, so despite the snug-ness, you never feel cramped.
There are three cabins, one double and two twins, each with en suite bathrooms, some storage space and air conditioning.
Above the cabins outside there’s an open-air sun terrace with a table for alfresco dining, as well as loungers for downtime.
The service onboard
The crew are the most important part of any barge cruise, especially for a small boat like this where the guest-to-crew ratio is so low. Captain Alex (the boat’s owner), Chef Sylvain, Charlotte (hostess) and Lolo (steward) were all magnifique, they genuinely made our trip so incredibly special!
Captain Alex picked us up from Le Creusot train station and drove us through the countryside to reach the vessel, where the rest of the crew welcomed us onboard with a glass of bubbles and our first taste of gourmet treats.
Charlotte kept the barge spick and span, never so much of a cushion out of place, and made sure we had whatever we needed before we even knew we needed it! She has such a talent for hospitality, and her butter carvings are a work of art.
Lolo helped Captain Alex keep everything ticking along, ferrying us between excursions and running errands, always with a smile on his face.
And Chef Sylvain? He gets his own section!
Chef Sylvain’s food
I have one word: DIVINE.
I’m a foodie through and through, my taste buds often lead the way with my travel plans and I even keep a digital list of ‘Meals that Live Rent-Free in my Head’ so I can go back and try them again in the future.
The most devastating thing about my time on La Vie en Rose is that Chef Sylvain Moretto is a private chef who splits his time between luxury barges and ski lodges, so experiencing his cooking again isn’t as easy as just going to a particular restaurant. But I’ve got his details (you can find them here) and if I’m ever in need of a private chef in Europe (I can dream 🙃), you know who I’ll be calling.
Sylvain’s such a character, he’s the perfect chef to be cooking in an open galley! Having the dining table just steps away from his workspace means he can connect and joke around with the guests, as well as witness our genuine amazement every time we see and taste a new dish.
The food was perfectly balanced: plentiful without being wasteful, satisfying but not overfilling, honestly 10/10 no notes from me. Culinary wizardry at its finest.
We had the menu written for us each day, which Sylvain planned based on the local produce he could get at the market. Here’s a quick list of some of the meals we had:
- Smoked salmon rolls with cream cheese, herbs and sundried tomatoes
- Trio of avocado, tomato and crayfish
- Turbot fillet with bell pepper cream and baby carrots
- Filet of lamb or salmon with pistachio crust
- Green asparagus risotto with scallops and tiger prawns
- Chocolate fondant with mint cream
- Caramelised tarte tatin
- Yuzu pannacotta
Breakfast was a beautiful spread of fresh pastries picked from up local boulangeries, fresh fruit, yoghurt, cold cuts, cheeses and whatever cooked eggs we wanted.
The wine on board
I’ve already admitted that my wine palate is not my strong suit, I tend to categorise wine as either ‘easy to drink’ or ‘can’t swallow it without screwing up my face’. It’s a running joke amongst my friends that my alcohol preferences haven’t changed much since my 18th birthday, give me a passionfruit cocktail any day 🍹
All of that to say that wine isn’t reeeally my thing, but my time cruising Burgundy’s canals sipping glasses from local vineyards has actually made me realise that maybe cheap, bottom shelf supermarket wine isn’t my thing? Because wow, I had more wine that I enjoyed in 3.5 days on La Vie en Rose than I’ve probably had in my entire 14 years of being allowed to drink.
I’m still no expert of course so I’m not going to embarrass myself by trying to describe the wines, I’ll just tell you that they were fantastic. On board we had wine matches with every dish, all from local vineyards, and Captain Alex described them for us to give context about why he’d chosen that particular bottle. We even got to visit one vineyard in Mercurey, old friends of Alex’s, for a wander through the vines and then a tasting on sight.
If wine isn’t your thing either, or if you just want more choice, the barge is well-stocked with beer, spirits, aperitifs and soft drinks too.
Excursions on board
Our trip wasn’t a typical La Vie en Rose experience, it was a shortened itinerary so the excursions will be different to the usual barge cruise, but aside from hanging out on the boat we also had some land excursions:
- Mercurey village visit for lunch
- Visit to Domaine du Meix Foulot winery
- Montagne des Trois Croix viewpoint
- Local markets in Chalon
- Crew dinner in Auvillars
- Walking along the towpath between locks
- There were also bikes available to use on the towpath but biking with a camera is tricky so we just walked instead!
Who is La Vie en Rose for?
This barge is a three cabin, six guest boat for private charters, you can’t just book one cabin on a departure, so it’s perfect for group trips with 2-3 couples, girls’ getaways with up to six friends, or multi-generation family holidays.
Our barge cruise day by day
How I got to Burgundy
My journey to Burgundy started in Puglia, where I’d just spent a couple of weeks exploring solo. Puglia without a car isn’t easy, it certainly pushed me to the limits of my patience 🫠 so I was dyinggggg for something more relaxing. A barge cruise ticks that box!
I always travel with a Eurail Pass for my Europe train adventures, this helps me save loads of money vs. individual train tickets. My journey looked like this:
- Bari (Puglia) to Milan via an 11h 30m night train, I booked a private cabin for €122 (without a Eurail Pass it would’ve been €212)
- Milan to Geneva 4h 15m, I paid just €15 for a mandatory seat reservation (would’ve been €149 without a Eurail Pass)
- Geneva to Lyon 2h, this was free with my Eurail Pass (vs. €51 without it)
That’s a €275 saving across just three train trips, a Eurail Pass can be so worth it!
Day 1: Pick up and arrival to the boat
A La Vie en Rose barge cruise generally includes pick up from Lyon, Paris or Geneva, but ours was a little different as a media trip. Instead we made our way to Le Creusot train station in the mid-afternoon, where we met Captain Alex for the drive to the boat.
On arrival we said bonjour to the crew, and had our barge introductions with a glass of bubbles and some delicious canapes. There was a puffy pastry-ish thing with strawberries and maybe goat’s cheese, I was too busy devouring them to remember what they actually were, but from that first mouthful I knew I was in for an absolute treat with Chef Sylvain!
Charlotte took us to our cabins to get settled. I had a friend with me so we were in one of the twins, with Stephanie (our onboard Barge Lady Legend) in the double cabin and Steve (writer and photographer for a French travel magazine) across the hallway in another twin.
The rooms are simple but very comfortable, top-quality linens, and the bathroom is by far the best I’ve ever had on a boat.
We bonded with our barge-mates over pre-dinner drinks, before our first proper meal on board.
Tonight was a crayfish/avocado/tomato starter, filet of turbot main, a delectable caramelised tarte tatin for dessert, plus a cheeseboard with three cheeses and a fruit plate.
Successful first day!
Day 2: Mercurey lunch & winery
Our first breakfast on La Vie en Rose was impeccable, with freshly-baked bread and pastries, a variety of fruit, cold cuts, cheeses, yoghurt, cereals, and delicious homemade jams, plus Chef was on hand to cook eggs if we wanted them.
It was a moody, misty morning so I mostly put away my camera and took the opportunity to chat to Captain Alex to learn the ropes (literally) of Canal Cruising 101. A light physics lesson to start the day!
Alexa, play Defying Gravity 🧙♀️
We jumped off the boat to walk the towpath for about 4km, a nice chance to stretch our legs, meeting local dogs and their owners along the way.
In the afternoon we had an excursion to Mercurey, a small village straight out of a storybook. Lunch was at Restaurant Le Val d’Or (food was delicious, resident cat was an added bonus) and then we headed to Domaine du Meix Foulot for a winery visit.
Now I’m not superstitious but there was some magic in play here, because as we emerged from the wine cellar, the thick cloud had entirely lifted to give us blue skies and sun for our tasting. Thank you, wine gods!
We ended the land excursion with a short walk up to the Montagne des Trois Croix panoramic viewpoint, overlooking a patchwork of vineyards and the medieval villages sprinkled between them.
Back on board we were greeted with some snacks and an aperitif, with a bit of downtime before dinner. Chef Sylvain’s creations were just as impressive as the first night, with a delicious smoked salmon cream cheese & cucumber roll, pistachio-crusted lamb, a chocolate fondant with mint custard, and (obviously) more cheese.
Day 3: Chalon-sur-Saône market visit & dinner in Auvillars
By day three I was well and truly embracing this slower pace of travel, I felt like I was able to put my camera down (for once!) and really savour the scenery. A drastic change from my usual routine of research, shoot, eat, repeat.
In the mid-morning we pulled up to Chalon-sur-Saône, a popular stop on any Burgundy wine cruise for its produce market and ultra-charming old town. Chef picked up some ingredients for our next meal while we wandered the shops, and I put my rusty French to the test at a chocolate stall.
Lunch on the barge was spectacular as usual, we had asparagus risotto with scallops and prawns, a wheel of Camembert de Normandie with pear and figs, and a yuzu pannacotta with macarons.
The afternoon was a quintessential barge experience, with Edith Piaf on the speaker, lounging on the sun terrace wine in hand, chatting about our childhoods and families and travels while we float through Burgundy countryside. I don’t know the meaning of life, but I think this is part of it.
We wrapped up our La Vie en Rose adventure with a crew dinner on land, allowing Chef Sylvain to eat with us for once instead of being on the tools. Captain Alex drove us to a tiny restaurant seemingly in the middle of nowhere, on the outskirts of Auvillars village, for a hearty and rich dinner of traditional local cuisine.
The wine was flowing, as was the conversation, and we debated extremely important political topics like Taylor Swift’s significance to the economy, whether Chef had seen feijoas before (he hadn’t), and a heated debate about microwaves (I was pro, the French were anti haha).
By the time we got back to the barge it was well and truly bed time considering our early departure the next day, but not before I burnt my throat with a post-dinner Calvados (French brandy) and we all made plans for our next barge experience.
Day 4: Departure
And just like that, our slow-paced, gourmet, fine wine barge cruise in Burgundy was over. We had an early breakfast and hit the road as the sun was rising to get to Le Creusot train station and head home, or in my case continue my no-flying European adventure.
So here’s the final verdict, was I classy enough for a barge cruise? Turns out I had barge cruises all wrong in the first place.
While I can’t speak for every barge on Burgundy’s canals and beyond, La Vie en Rose isn’t about being posh or pretentious, it’s about savouring a slower pace of travel in total comfort and fantastic company.
Soaking up the views as you cruise the countryside at only a few miles per hour, tasting some of the region’s best Premier Cru wines and learning about the producers who make them, and marvelling at the gastronomic creations of an expert chef. All of that with the option to rest and relax if you wish, or jump onto land for a walk, run or bike ride along the towpath, as well as excursions to local markets and medieval villages you’d never normally get the chance to visit.
This is the kind of experience that’s once in a lifetime… unless you make barge cruising an annual tradition, which I am totally on board with!
I want to say an extra special thank you to the crew for hosting us. Captain Alex for his expert canal manoeuvring (it’s a skill, seriously), Charlotte for her impeccable hospitality and thoughtful touches, Sylvain for his endlessly impressive cooking, and Lolo for his ever-present smile and helpfulness. And a biiiig thank you to Stephanie and her fellow Barge Ladies for giving this wild-minded 30-something full-time adventurer a travel experience I’ll never forget.
Now that I’m a barging convert, which canals should I cruise next?! I hear Champagne is lovely… 🍾
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MY GO-TO TRAVEL PLANNING RESOURCES
Flights ✈️ I use Skyscanner to find the best flights for my trip and then I’ll always book direct with the airline to protect myself from having to deal with dodgy third parties if anything goes wrong.
Trains 🚂 If I’m travelling through Europe, I try to travel by train wherever possible! For an extended trip (2+ weeks) I’ll calculate if a Eurail Pass is worth it, or I’ll book point-to-point tickets through RailEurope or the local train operator.
Accommodation 🛎️ I book almost all of my accommodation through booking.com, they have a user-friendly website + app and many of their options are free cancellation, easily cancelled with a simple click of a button.
Activities 🗽I use GetYourGuide, Klook and Viator to look for activities in the places I visit, or I just Google ‘things to do in [city]’! P.S. If you book anything on Klook you can use the promocode FINDINGALEXXKLOOK to get 10% off
Travel cards 💳 I’m a Wise gal through and through, they’ve been my chosen travel card for more than five years now. You can easily top up your card from your bank account or through Apple Pay, convert your money to local currency, and spend money with minimal fees and the best exchange rates around.
Travel insurance 🩺 I use Cover-More NZ travel insurance for my own trips, I have a comprehensive policy and I’ve only had good experiences with them. Cover-More also has an Australian company, but if you’re from elsewhere then two popular insurance options for global travellers are SafetyWing (cheaper policy, lower coverage) and World Nomads (more expensive but significantly better coverage).
Luggage 💼 I travel with Samsonite Cosmolite suitcases, one 75cm check in bag and a 55cm carry on bag, and I absolutely adore them and will never travel with anything else! They are SUPER lightweight (2.8kg and 1.9kg respectively) so I have much more space for my actual stuff.
Camera gear 📸 I use a iPhone 15 Pro Max for phone photos/videos, and my camera kit includes a Lumix S9 (incredible lightweight full-frame camera, a game changer for travel creators!) with a 20-60mm lens, a Lumix G9 with an 8-18mm and 12-60mm lens, a DJI Mini 3 Pro drone and a GoPro Hero 10. I do all my writing and editing on my ASUS Zenbook 14, it’s lightweight but powerful enough for photo editing and intense blogging sessions.
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