Burgundy and Provence

Getting There

Most of the time, if Judy and I take a long trip or a “big vacation,” we make plans ahead of time, we book our transportation and lodging well in advance, we know exactly when we’re going to be where. This time was a little different. Our river cruise in Burgundy and Provence wasn’t a trip we planned for a year, it was just a sudden thought we would enjoy another river cruise. We were really looking for a Thanksgiving trip, but there were complications, mostly involving obligations and commitments to some performances. After some crazy discussions, and a generous release from a November 12 commitment on the part of Russell Nelson, we signed up for a November cruise some time in September. Late September, actually. Not a lot of time left for preparations.

One reason we chose this cruise was the price. The November 5 sailing was the last one of the season for Uniworld’s cruise on the Rhone and Saône rivers, starting in Provence and moving north into Burgundy. We’ve enjoyed being in those areas before, and the cruise would take us to only one city we’d visited before. And that was only for one day Avignon in 1985, so we would be seeing new places and doing new things in a part of the world we enjoyed visiting.

The other reason was our growing attraction to the way Uniworld handles things on their European cruises. That feeling of being pampered was going to be even stronger this time, because we would be on a ship that was in only its third year of service. The S.S. Catherine sounds like it should be running the lakes, rivers, and canals of Russia, but its home is just the area we would be visiting. Altogether it seemed like a match made just for us, especially when we figured in the reduced expense we would incur because of a last-minute discount and our decision to find the cheapest flight we could manage.

All in all the trip from home to ship wasn’t bad. The overly long flight from Atlanta to Paris wasn’t dreadful, but it was a far cry from our recent trans-Atlantic flights, where we had more room and more comfortable seats. This one was cheaper, and that counts, but sleep was out of the question. Waiting in Paris was a drag, but bearable. The arrival in Marseilles was actually fun, if a little scattered. The Uniworld person herded 12 or so people-once we had our luggage-to a different “Arrival Hall” where we were parked in a corner to await further arrivals. When all were marked present on another rep’s clipboard, we had a further hike to the Uniworld coach for the drive to Avignon.

What a drive. I had 40-year-old memories of land here being somewhat like Texas hill country, and our experiences later in the 1980s driving around Nice bolstered those memories. Even looking out the window as we approached the Marseilles airport brought up memories of wandering out in the hills west of Austin. Some rocks, some scrubby vegetation, but we didn’t see any mesquite or prickly pear cactus. Some of the trees we saw on the hillsides were stubby enough to remind me of Texas cedars. This photo is one we made through the bus window, so the small image doesn’t show the landscape all that clearly, but if you click it to enlarge it, you’ll see some of what we saw. Even with the scenery to distract us, it was still a long bus ride after a long trip and a night that was six hours short of a full load. That made getting to the ship that much better of course.

If you’ve never been on a river cruise, you owe it to yourself to give it a try. The ships are small, most of them holding only 150 passengers or so. This time there were only 93 passengers, but I think the full crew of 59 was on board. That’s an amazing passenger to crew ratio. We got there and were greeted with Champagne and offered a fine buffet while the cabins were prepared. The food was great, and I may have pigged out on the braised beef rib lasagna. That was something that surprised me, mostly because I never thought about that kind of mix. The rest of the buffet was just as interesting, full of variety, and so far beyond airplane and airport food I almost forgot about the uncomfortable travels of the past 24 hours.

Almost.

Our stateroom/cabin was smaller than our suite on the Danube cruise a few years ago, about the same size but way better than the “suite” on the Russia cruise. It really was comfortable, and we had one of those essentials we look for in hotel rooms: two chairs and a table. Sounds silly, but it makes a difference to have those things there. We napped a little, unpacked and made it to the lounge in time to get drinks before the safety meeting started. Dinner was fun, and we got to know some of our fellow passengers before we crashed about 9:30.