Rolling on the Rhone: A new riverboat in France cruises through history, wine country

Vincent van Gogh painted one of his masterpieces, “Starry Night Over the Rhone,” on the banks of this mighty river.

Not far from where van Gogh set up his easel in the late 1800s, the new Lumiere riverboat docked during its recent maiden voyage to Arles, France.

Lumiere, appropriately enough, means “light” in French. The light in Provence served as a muse for the Dutch post-impressionist. Van Gogh captured the luminance on canvas in everything from sun-soaked landscapes to inky, star-filled skies with the glow of gas lamps reflecting in the Rhone’s indigo water.

Van Gogh was drawn to the Rhone Valley. So are an increasing number of cruise passengers plying its namesake river, one of the oldest inland trade routes in Europe.

Connecticut-based tour operator Tauck launched two new custom-built riverboats in Europe this spring - both in France. The 130-passenger Lumiere is deployed to the Rhone. The slightly smaller Serene is stationed farther north on the Seine, where Tauck will debut another ship in 2027. (Viking, a powerhouse in the river cruise market, also is rolling out a new 168-passenger ship on the Seine this summer.) Tauck plans to put a sister ship to Lumiere on the Rhone in 2028.

“Demand has been enormous, especially after the (2024 Summer) Olympics,” Tauck CEO Jennifer Tombaugh said at Lumiere’s christening ceremony in Lyon, a typical start and end point for Rhone cruises.

The 505-mile-long river starts high in the Swiss Alps before marching through southeastern France on its way to the Mediterranean Sea. The most popular section for cruises stretches from Lyon to Arles. That’s where the river splits into two branches forming the Camargue Delta, a massive wedge of wetlands famous for its white horses, black bulls and pink flamingos.

The Rhone route is stocked with Roman ruins, medieval towns, dreamy gastronomy and world-class wine regions - the kind of stuff that makes river cruising in France so appealing.

The appeal of traveling in a floating hotel isn’t limited to France. River cruising throughout Europe keeps pulling in more customers. Annual passenger numbers totaled 1.49 million last year. That’s nearly an 8% increase over 2024 and a 22% jump over 2023, according to a market report by the trade group IG RiverCruise. Sixteen brand new vessels are slated to hit Europe’s rivers this year. Another 19 are in the works for 2027.

Tauck’s pair of new ships in France look a bit different than the rest of its fleet. The restaurant Arthur’s, a more casual venue than the main dining room, has been moved to the front of the vessel. That freed up space in the back for a new area called the Retreat, with a larger fitness area overlooking the water, a massage treatment room, indoor-outdoor lounge space and healthy snacks like fruit, nuts and yogurt.

“We’ve seen that people want to keep their wellness regimen going when they’re on vacation,” Tombaugh said.

Lumiere and Serene also have a heated pool on the sun deck. The smallest cabins are 20% bigger than usual, measuring 180 square feet. Like the rest of Tauck’s riverboats, the single supplement fee is waived on these 12 cabins - a nod to the growing ranks of solo travelers.

Tauck is a higher-end travel company; its eight-day cruises on Lumiere start at $5,350 a person. That all-inclusive price covers just about everything, from gratuities and airport transfers to multicourse meals, alcohol and shore excursions.

Lumiere’s tour offerings make the most of the ship’s proximity to prime wine territory. (The Rhone Valley is the birthplace of Syrah.) We docked in prestigious Chateauneuf-du-Pape and had a private tasting at a nearby winery. In Lyon, a bus ride took us deep into the countryside to sample Beaujolais at a family-owned vineyard.

We didn’t need to disembark the ship for fine French wine. A representative from southern Rhone’s Chene Bleu came aboard one afternoon to guide us through flights of the esteemed winery’s reds, whites and rosés. And local offerings are well represented on the dining room’s wine list.

We also didn’t need to get off the ship to experience a Rhone cruise highlight: passing through the Bollene Lock, one of the deepest in Europe. Passengers gathered on deck for an up-close view as Lumiere squeezed into this snug concrete chamber built on a side canal of the main river. Staff passed out Champagne while the ship made its slow, somewhat eerie descent on this water elevator. It took several minutes to drop 75 feet before the lock’s gate opened, setting us free.

Back on terra firma, activities included dinner and a concert at a duke’s castle in Uzes and going to the French version of cowboy country in the Camargue to watch gardians on horseback herding bulls. Some of the more active outings involved hiking through a vineyard or walking the cobblestone streets of Arles, where we visited Roman ruins and scenes painted by van Gogh.

Only a handful of us opted for the cycling tour in Avignon. It called for biking around the medieval walled city while being buffeted by 50 mph wind gusts. The Rhone Valley’s mistral can whip through the region any time of year, but the notoriously strong wind is most common in winter and spring. It hung around for nearly the entire voyage.

On the last day, the wind finally eased up enough for passengers to venture onto the sun deck as we cruised from the charming wine-and-Valrhona chocolate town of Tain-l’Hermitage back to Lyon.

I took a seat on one of the daybeds to indulge in my favorite part of river cruising: watching the scenery slowly unfold. Terraced vineyards. The occasional church steeple. Elegant suspension bridges. And the gentle curves of a river that boats have traveled for millennia, with many more to come.

_____

Copyright 2026 Tribune Content Agency. All Rights Reserved.

This story was originally published June 23, 2026 at 5:49 PM.