Dorothy Society · July 18 – 25, 2028
Seven glorious days to nourish your body, stir your soul, and indulge every sense. Feast on exquisite French cuisine, raise a glass of celebrated wine, wander through places filled with beauty and art, lose yourself in music, and share it all with wonderful people who believe friendship is one of life’s greatest pleasures. This is more than a journey through France. It is a celebration of everything that makes life worth savoring—and of those of us who are still hungry for more.
If you are a traveler in the second half of life who is tired of trips that look better in the photos than they felt in the moment — who has money set aside for "someday" and a growing suspicion that someday is now — then join us for Delicious Decadence, eight days and seven nights on a French river with a group small enough to learn everyone's name.
You will come home having cooked in Avignon, tasted Chardonnay in a castle cellar, and eaten a Bocuse-inspired dinner served once on the voyage — with six or eight new friends and the distinct feeling that you have been under-scheduling your own life.
The Dorothy Society difference
Do you belong on this cruise with us? Mais, Oui!
You have stopped waiting for someone to be free. Half the people you would once have called about a trip like this are caring for a parent, or a knee, or a business. You are not organizing anyone. You are showing up to a table that is already set.
You will not be the odd one out. Single occupancy is priced and available, and on a hosted group this size nobody eats alone unless they want to. Open seating means you sit where you like, with whomever you like, every single night.
You are done with the version of travel that is mostly logistics. One unpacking. Eight days. The country comes to the ship. No 6 a.m. transfers, no rolling a bag over cobblestones, no arguing about who has the tickets.
You want to actually learn something, not watch someone else do it. Two hands-on classes with real chefs — one after you shop Les Halles yourself, one in Lyon. Most culinary cruises hand you a chair and a demonstration. You will be holding a knife.
You are tired of pretending pleasure needs a justification. Wine with lunch. Sparkling wine with breakfast. Cheese before dessert. Nobody here is going to ask whether you should.
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Days on the river
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Guests aboard, no more
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Tastings & chef-led outings
The route
Avalon offers this culinary sailing only once in 2028: July 18–25.
You’ll sail from Arles to Lyon, following the Rhône north into the Saône, with two of your seven nights spent in Lyon—the food capital of France.
Along the way, you’ll taste olive oil where it is pressed, shop an Avignon market and then cook with what you discovered, tour the Valrhona chocolate works, sip Chardonnay in a castle cellar, and enjoy a menu inspired by the tradition of legendary chef Paul Bocuse.
Explore the days below to see what awaits you.
Day 1 · July 18 · Arles
Welcome to Provence
The first glass, tied up in Provence
You board in the afternoon and the week starts slowly, which is the correct way to start this particular week. Arles is where Van Gogh made three hundred paintings in fifteen months, and the light he was chasing still does the same thing to the buildings at six in the evening. Welcome reception before dinner, and the ship stays docked overnight.
Flights into Marseille must land by 3pm. Aboard by 5pm. Dinner.
One departure. One small group. Claim your place at the table.
Culinary programming
Two hands-on cooking classes.
Most river cruises marketed as culinary give you demonstrations to watch. This one gives you two sessions where you actually cook.
Day three · Avignon
The morning you shop, the afternoon you cook.
You walk into Les Halles before the good stuff is gone, with a guide who knows which of the forty stalls is worth your time and is willing to say so. You will buy things. You will not entirely know what they are.
Then you carry them to a chef, and for the next two hours you cook — not watch, cook — and at the end of it you sit down and eat what you made, in Avignon, on a Thursday, having earned it.
Back aboard by early evening. The rest of the day is yours, and the ship does not leave without you.
Day seven · Lyon
The city that wrote the cookbook.
You meet the chef in a kitchen that smells like butter and stock long before you arrive. Lyon is where French cooking became serious, and for the next few hours it becomes your classroom.
You will make dishes this city is famous for — not perfectly, but personally — and then sit down to eat them with the people who have become your crew over the last week.
By the time you carry the last plate to the table, you will understand why Lyon does not just have restaurants. It has a reputation.
“Food is proof that pleasure doesn’t always require an apology.”
The food
You notice the food before you ever see a menu.
It is a little after four on the sixth afternoon and you are coming back aboard from a castle cellar in the Mâconnais, still holding the tasting notes you did not really need. The gangway is warm underfoot. Somewhere below, someone has started the bread.
You go up to the sky deck instead of to your room. The vineyard you were standing in an hour ago is still visible from here, a pale green seam on the hillside, and the river is doing that flat silver thing it does before evening. A cheese tasting is being set out along the rail. You tear one of the gougères open too soon and it burns your fingers, and you eat it anyway.
The woman who sat across from you at lunch on Tuesday comes up with two glasses of the Chardonnay from the cellar you both just left. You did not know her nine days ago. You will be texting her about tomatoes next August.
Tomorrow the ship ties up in Lyon and stays two nights. Tonight there is a Bocuse-inspired dinner being cooked below you, served exactly once on this voyage, and you have nowhere else to be.
Eleven tastings across seven nights, each one tied to the place you woke up in that morning.
The ship
An intimate 128-guest river ship designed entirely for the view. Floor-to-ceiling windows, an open-air sky deck, and a crew that remembers how you like your morning coffee.
- 128 guests, 1:3.5 crew-to-guest ratio
- Panorama suites with wall-to-wall windows
- Open seating, farm-to-table cuisine
The bar
Someone who knows what you drink by Tuesday.
Wine and beer come with every lunch and dinner, sparkling wine arrives with breakfast, and happy hour is on us every evening. Come up before dinner, stay after, and let the barman make you something you would not have ordered.
Life aboard
Staterooms & suites
These fares are a close estimate based on current Avalon pricing. The crossed-out prices are the regular published fares; the new prices reflect a Dorothy Society group savings of $1,500 per person, plus additional perks I am negotiating for our hosted cohort.
Fares are per person based on double occupancy, vary by departure, and are subject to availability and change until booked.
Meet your host
Nick Vannello
Founder · Dorothy Travel
Nick is the person actually on the ship with you—and he has spent more than four decades learning how to make travel feel easy.
His work has taken him to more than 30 countries, and he has slept in all 50 states multiple times. Along the way, he has organized travel for Broadway touring productions, fitness programs, educational groups, and travelers who simply wanted someone else to worry about the details. He has also led group journeys through Morocco, Indonesia, Mexico, the Netherlands, and across the United States.
Through all those years, his philosophy has stayed remarkably simple: comfort and convenience matter. A beautiful itinerary means very little if everyone is exhausted, confused, or dragging luggage through a train station they never needed to visit.
That thinking is behind Dorothy Travel. The journeys are thoughtfully paced, warmly hosted, and planned with a watchful eye on the little things—the arrival night that lets you recover, the clear instructions that keep you from guessing, and the introductions that turn a collection of travelers into a table full of friends.
Aboard the Avalon Poetry II, Nick will be making introductions at the welcome cocktail, helping you sort through excursion choices, and quietly keeping an eye on the details so you can concentrate on Provence, French wine, Valrhona chocolate, and whatever delicious thing has just landed in front of you.
Come with questions. Nick has answers, opinions, four decades of travel stories, and—if you catch him in Lyon—probably a second glass of wine.
What's included
The best trips are the ones where you stop reaching for your wallet from the moment you land to the moment you wave goodbye. Nearly everything is handled.
Included
- Seven nights aboard the Avalon Poetry II in the stateroom or suite category you book
- Chef-prepared breakfast, lunch, and four-course dinner daily, with regional cuisine and Avalon Fresh® lighter options at every meal
- Open-seating Panorama Dining Room, so you sit where you like, with whomever you like
- Panorama Bistro, a more intimate alternative for the nights you do not want a full sitting
- Sky Grill dining on the top deck, weather permitting
- Complimentary regional wine, beer, and soft drinks with lunch and dinner
- Sparkling wine with breakfast
- Daily happy hour, plus welcome and farewell cocktails with sparkling wine and canapés
- Select happy hour cocktails hosted by Dorothy Society, so you never have to guess at the menu
- 24-hour Club Lounge with self-serve cappuccinos, lattes, hot chocolate, and fresh treats
- Complimentary coffee, tea, and iced tea throughout the day
- Afternoon tea daily, with proper sandwiches, scones, and pastries
- Complimentary continental room service for breakfast in bed or a quiet night in
- Classic, Discovery, and Active excursions at every port of call, led by Certified Local Guides
- Personal audio headsets on guided excursions, so you can wander without losing the commentary
- The full culinary programme: olive oil tasting, Les Halles market walk and cooking class, Viviers tasting walk, chocolate and wine tasting aboard, Valrhona Chocolate Factory, sommelier-led pairing dinner, Mâconnais castle-cellar Chardonnay tasting, cheese tasting, Bocuse-inspired dinner, and the Lyon Culinary Walk or second cooking class
- A Certified Sommelier aboard for the voyage
- Live evening entertainment and onboard cultural programming
- Complimentary Starlink Wi-Fi throughout the ship
- Avalon Adventure Center with bicycles, e-bikes, hiking and jogging maps, walking sticks, binoculars, daypacks, yoga mats, and fitness bands
- An Adventure Host to lead active excursions
- Fitness centre access and daily yoga or stretching
- Sky Deck with whirlpool, shade awnings, game area, and premium loungers
- Covered Observation Lounge with panoramic river views
- Elevator access, and a fully non-smoking interior
- Porterage of one piece of luggage per person, so you never carry your own bags on or off
- All port charges, taxes, and shipboard gratuities for the Cruise Director and crew
- English-speaking crew and a dedicated Cruise Director
- L'Occitane bath products, robes, and slippers in every stateroom
- A greener footprint, with Avalon contributing to Trees4Travel on your behalf
Not included
- International airfare into Marseille and home from Lyon
- Airport transfers, which can be added at the time of booking
- Travel insurance. Not included, and strongly recommended. We will not book you without a conversation about it
- Optional excursions, including the Pont du Gard Roman aqueduct and the wine cellars at Châteauneuf-du-Pape
- Gratuities for local port guides and drivers
- Bar drinks outside of meal service and happy hour, including cocktails, spirits, and wine by the bottle
- Laundry service, available aboard for a modest fee
- Personal expenses, souvenirs, salon services, and premium specialty drinks
Before you board
Come early. Pack less.
Why rush into Arles on embarkation day when you could begin your French adventure a few days early—and possibly without your pants? Within the Arles region, Piémanson Beach stretches along the wild Camargue coast, with an officially designated naturist area at its eastern end. It is gloriously undeveloped, beautifully untamed, and proof that France understands how a beach should be enjoyed: naturally.
Then, if it appeals, head south to Cap d'Agde for a few days of clothing-optional sunshine and Mediterranean ease. If it doesn't appeal, Provence is right there and full of things to do with your clothes on. Either way, meet us in Arles on July 18, relaxed and ready to put your napkin back on.
The cruise is the trip. Eight days, seven nights, eleven tastings, and a ship where everyone is dressed for dinner and behaving themselves — more or less.
The naturist days are an add-on, and a genuinely optional one. We mention them because Dorothy Society travelers tend to be people who find the human body considerably less scandalous than the French find a bad lunch, and because if you’re one of those people, you should know that two of Europe’s best clothing-optional beaches sit within easy reach of your embarkation port. It would be strange not to tell you.
So: come three days early and go to Cap d’Agde. Or come three days early and go to Paris. Or fly into Marseille on the 18th and skip the whole conversation. All three are the right answer, and once you’re aboard, nobody will ask which one you picked.
Need a hotel recommendation? Mention it when you register and we’ll point you toward a few favorites.
Arrive a little earlier
Bastille Day is July 14. The perfect excuse to arrive early.
France throws its biggest party on Monday, July 14, and it is the ideal reason to fly in a few days before the cruise. Watch fireworks light up a French city, join the street parties, and let the country remind you that pleasure is a national priority here.
Then head south to Cap d’Agde for a few days of clothing-optional sunshine and Mediterranean ease. By the time you reach Arles on July 18, you will be relaxed, sun-kissed, and ready to put your napkin back on.
Need help sequencing Paris, Provence, and Cap d’Agde? Mention it when you register and we’ll share a few favorite routes.
Is this your trip?
Let’s make sure this is your kind of cruise.
Yes, please
This trip is for you if…
- You believe the best years should be savored, not saved — and you travel to feel something.
- You love good food and good wine, and you want a ship that takes both seriously.
- You would rather someone else handle the logistics so you can do the actual experiencing.
- You enjoy the company of curious, funny, well-traveled people — including at dinner.
- You are happy to try the market, the cooking class, the cellar, and the second glass.
Maybe not
This trip is not for you if…
- You want every minute of every day scheduled and accounted for.
- You are looking for a party boat — this is spirited, not a floating nightclub.
- Southern France in July is warm, and heat is a dealbreaker for you.
- You would rather stay in one town for a week than move gently through a region.
- You prefer to travel entirely on your own and would rather skip a hosted group.
Holding your cabin
The deposit, and what happens if life changes.
Deposit
$500
Per person, refundable for 48 hours after you book. After 48 hours, the deposit is non-refundable. That deposit holds your cabin category at the Dorothy Society group fare — it is not the full payment, and nothing else is due at that moment.
Final payment is due approximately six months before we sail, and we will remind you well in advance.
Cancellation, in plain language
- Cancel within 48 hours of paying your deposit and it is returned in full, no questions asked.
- After that, and until final payment, the deposit is transferable to another Dorothy Society departure.
- Once final payment is made, the cruise line’s published cancellation schedule applies, with fees increasing as the sailing approaches.
- Travel protection is strongly recommended, and we can point you to a policy that covers cancellation for covered reasons, medical care abroad, and delays.
- The complete written cancellation policy is provided at registration, before any money beyond the deposit is due.
Fares are per person based on double occupancy, vary by departure, and are subject to availability and change until booked.
Good questions
Things you were going to ask anyway.
Interested in other Dorothy Society sailings? A Christmas Cruise is planned for 2027 — learn more at cruisewithdorothy.com.