Narbonne is only 30 minutes by train from Carcassonne. We’ve been there several times, usually with friends, since it’s an easy day trip that gets us to another French city for even more culture, food, and history. There’s plenty of that last item given that the Romans founded the colony as Narbo Martius in 118 BC to provide a Mediterranean coast stronghold that could provide ample amounts of olive oil and wine for the empire. About a 25-minute walk from the train station, the city recently opened a large archeological museum with 6,000 artifacts from the Roman era, including sculptures, mosaics, and everyday objects found locally. Right in the heart of downtown, however, is another reminder of those ancient times, L’Horreum, that we went to see underground.

We discovered canal cruising last year when Bill was reading an article in the online magazine The Good Life France about all of the inland sailing opportunities there are in this country. We initially chose that first ship because it was traversing an area that we’d never visited and it was all-inclusive: accommodation, meals, drinks, and daily excursions. Unpack once yet wake up in a new city each morning. Because these barges, péniche in French, are small with only 22 passengers, they can travel where larger river or sea-going vessels won’t fit and can dock very close to a town’s center. All I had to hear from Bill about this latest offering was, “Would you like to start in Paris and end up in Champagne?” Let’s go!