Seine River Cruises

There may be no river more popular, more romanticized throughout all of Europe than the Seine. Since long before Seine river cruises became the luxury vacation of choice in Europe , writers have sat along the river’s banks in the heart of Paris, letting the languid waters coax from them great prose. In some cases, they also brought the river into their works. In his controversial, though acclaimed novel Tropic of Cancer, Henry Miller wrote: “So quietly flows the Seine that one hardly notices its presence. It is always there, quiet and unobtrusive, like a great artery running through the human body. . . . I feel this river flowing through me.”

Similarly, painters have sat along those same banks or followed the river to more pastoral settings in an attempt to capture its tranquil beauty on canvas. And while painters of many divergent styles have made the Seine their muse over the centuries, it is the Impressionists—and Claude Monet, specifically—who pledged their unwavering faithfulness to the river. “I have always painted the Seine throughout my life, at every hour, at every season,” Claude Monet once said. “I have never tired of it. For me, the Seine is always new.”

Even modern day singers and songwriters have shared a profound interest in the river. “I bought a Dutch barge and turned it into a recording studio,” Pete Townshend, lead singer of The Who, once revealed. “My plan was to go to Paris and record rolling down the Seine.”

Paris is a pivotal part of any travel enthusiast’s journey down the Seine. Thomas Jefferson once said of the French capital: “A walk about Paris will provide lessons in history, beauty, and the point of life.” While 19th-century playwright Oscar Wilde opined that “when good American’s die, they go to Paris.”