Paris to Montargis: Seine and Loing by Barge and Bike

Day 1 – Paris to Evry | Embarkation
Board from 1 p.m. at the mooring in the centre of Paris. The captain, crew and tour leader welcome you, then the barge leaves the city and sails along the Seine to Evry for the night. Come to Paris a day or two early if you can — the city deserves it.

Day 2 – Evry to Melun | 30 km
Your first ride starts at the lock of Evry and keeps to the banks of the Seine for a good while. You stop at the typical French market of Corbeil-Essonnes, then roll on to Melun, once known as the domain of the widowed queens of France.

Day 3 – Melun to Moret-sur-Loing | 40 km
A day in the forest of Fontainebleau. First Barbizon, where painters have found inspiration since the first half of the 19th century and a group of landscape painters formed the Barbizon School, with a local museum that tells the story. Then the palace of Fontainebleau, long the favourite of French kings for the hunting around it, with a museum devoted to Napoleon. You rejoin the barge at Moret-sur-Loing, a walled medieval town on the river where Sisley found his subject.

Day 4 – Moret-sur-Loing to Nemours | 38 km (49 km long option)
You stay in the Loing valley, calling at Grez-sur-Loing, an artists' haunt in the early 1900s, then at the charming town hall of Bourron-Marlotte, which holds a handful of fine impressionist canvases. The barge is waiting at Nemours, where the castle of 1120 now houses the prehistory museum of the Île-de-France.

Day 5 – Nemours to Néronville | 35 km (45 km long option)
Breakfast while you sail. Today's cycling crosses wooded country broken by rugged rocks. Before lunch you visit the sculpture garden Jardin Bourdelle, with its 57 monumental bronzes by Antoine Bourdelle, then reach Egréville, a commercial crossroads whose markets and fairs were renowned for centuries. You end the day in rural Néronville.

Day 6 – Néronville to Montargis | 31 km (55 km long option)
You climb first to Château-Landon, a fortified town beautifully set on its rock, with the 13th-century Abbey of St-Séverin. On to Ferrières, a medieval town whose old centre has been kept intact and whose narrow streets hide a splendid monastery. The day ends in Montargis, the biggest town of the Loiret after Orléans: the 16th-century fire took the royal residence, but the canals are still there, banked with flowers. No dinner on board tonight, so pick a restaurant in town.

Day 7 – Montargis loop | 45 km
From Montargis you ride to Château-Renard to see the ruins of a 10th-century castle, then stop at a living apiculture museum where beekeepers work the hives and you taste the honey. The river Ouanne leads you quietly back to Montargis.

Day 8 – Montargis | Disembarkation
Breakfast on board, then disembarkation by 9.30 a.m.