People told us it could not be done in a single summer. Channel to Greece, mast down through France, mast up at the bottom, then east across the Med to the Ionian, all between the last frosts and the first autumn gales. They were wrong, but only just. We made Corfu in mid-September, tired and happy, and we learned exactly where the margins are thin.
If you fancy the same trip, here is the plan that worked, written as a timetable rather than a daydream.
The shape of it
Forget the romance for a moment and look at the geometry. You have three very different chunks of voyage stitched together.
- The French canals: a sheltered, slow, lock-heavy transit from the Channel coast down to the Mediterranean, mast lashed on deck.
- A short Med coastal hop from the Rhone delta eastward, getting the rig back up and the boat re-rigged as a sailing yacht.
- The open-water leg across to Greece, the only part that feels like proper passage-making.
The canal transit is the part that eats the calendar, so that is where the planning bites hardest. Our overview of crossing France by canal from the Channel to the Med sets out the routes in detail, and I will not repeat all of it here. The short version: you converge on the Saone, drop to Lyon, then run the Rhone to the sea.
Stage one: the Channel to the Saone
We came in at Le Havre and went up the Seine. The Seine is wide, tidal at the bottom, and shares the water with serious commercial barges, so you keep your wits about you and your VHF on. From there the route threads south through the canal network to the Saone basin.
The numbers that frame the whole inland job: roughly 1,300 to 1,400 km of waterway depending on route, and somewhere between 150 and 200-plus locks across the full transit. That lock count is the real clock. You manage maybe 15 to 30 locks on a good day, fewer when they are manual or you hit a queue, so the maths alone tells you the canals will take four to six weeks at a steady pace.
Before any of this, the mast comes down. Air draft on the most-used routes is limited to about 3.5 metres, which forces every sailing boat to unstep. We had ours craned out at Rouen and lashed along the coachroof on a timber gantry. Crane and a month's mast storage at a Rouen yard came to a little over 200 euros when we did it, which is money well spent versus carrying the rig the whole way.
You also need to be legal on the water. A VNF vignette is required for the French waterways, and you need an appropriate licence. Read the CEVNI and ICC licence for French waterways before you set off, because turning up without the right endorsement is an avoidable hassle.
Stage two: down the Rhone to the sea
The Saone is gentle and green; the Rhone is a different animal. It runs fast, especially after rain, and the locks are vast commercial structures that drop you many metres at a time. You share them with barges and you go with the flow, literally, which makes the Rhone the quickest leg of the whole canal transit. Our detailed run-down of the Rhone from Lyon to the Mediterranean covers the big locks and the current.
We popped out at Port-Saint-Louis, one of the most easterly Rhone exits, and re-stepped the mast there. Allow a full day for re-rigging and tuning, and do not rush it. The temptation, after weeks of plodding, is to throw the rig up and bolt for Greece. Resist. A badly tuned rig that has been off the boat for six weeks wants checking properly before you commit to open water.
Stage three: across the Med to the Ionian
This is where the trip becomes sailing again. The straight-line distance from the south of France to mainland Greece is roughly 1,600 to 1,700 nautical miles by the Marseille-to-Piraeus measure, but you are not going to Piraeus and you are not going straight. Aiming for Corfu in the northern Ionian shortens it considerably, and almost nobody does it in one hop.
The sensible route island-hops along the Italian coast. Down the Cote d'Azur, across the Ligurian Sea to Italy, along the Italian Riviera and down towards the heel, then across the short gap to Corfu. Breaking it into legs means you can wait out the weather, and the Gulf of Lion is the bit to respect: the mistral funnels down it hard and fast, and you do not want to be caught out crossing it. Pick your weather window and treat that crossing seriously.
Rough leg planning we used:
- Port-Saint-Louis to the Italian border: a few short coastal days, easy harbours, plenty of bolt-holes.
- Italian Riviera and down the west coast: a week or so of pleasant hopping, with the Strait of Messina a notable tidal pinch point.
- The final crossing to Corfu: a day-and-a-bit open-water leg from the Italian heel, watching for the afternoon thermal building.
Life on the canals, and why it is the best part
I went into the transit treating it as a chore to be endured before the real sailing. I came out of it understanding why some people sell up and live on the French waterways for good. You move at the speed of a bicycle. You tie up to a tree in the evening, walk into a village, buy bread and wine, and watch the sun go down over a green bank with nobody around.
The rhythm is what gets you. A canal day is locks in the morning, a long cruising stretch in the afternoon, and a mooring by five. You learn to read the lock-keepers, who range from cheerfully efficient to entirely absent on the automated stretches. You get good at handling lines, at fendering, at judging the surge as a lock fills. By week three you stop counting locks and just live aboard, which is exactly the point at which the trip stops being a delivery and becomes the holiday.
Practical notes that made it work:
- Carry long lines and plenty of fenders, because lock walls are rough and high.
- A folding bike each transforms provisioning and sightseeing.
- Fuel and water points are spaced out, so top up when you can rather than when you must.
- Many locks close for lunch, often around midday to early afternoon, which forces a civilised stop whether you planned one or not.
The cost side of the canal transit
Budgeting the inland leg is straightforward once you know the components. The VNF vignette for the season is the main statutory cost, scaled to boat size, and the 2025 tariffs rose modestly over the year before. On top of that you have the mast crane at each end, mooring fees where you choose marinas over free banks, and diesel for weeks of motoring.
We kept it cheap by mooring on the bank or at free village quays most nights and only taking a marina when we wanted showers and shore power. The big one-off costs were the two mast cranes, bracketing the transit, and the fuel, which adds up over 1,300-odd kilometres of engine hours. Set against the cost and risk of the long way round Spain, the canals came out comparable on money and far ahead on stress.
The timetable that actually fits a summer
Here is how the season broke down for us, and it is tight but doable for a couple who can put in long days.
- Late April to early May: rig out, start up the Seine.
- May into June: the canal transit, four to six weeks of locks.
- Mid-June: re-step at Port-Saint-Louis.
- Late June to August: the Med hop east, taking weather as it comes.
- September: arrive Corfu before the autumn pattern sets in.
The thing nobody warns you about is Schengen. If you are non-EU, the 90-in-180 rule applies the whole way, and the clock starts the moment you enter France. Crew rotation helps, but the skipper needs to watch the days carefully, because overstay fines start around 200 euros and a ban is no way to end a voyage. We worked it out in advance against the Schengen 90/180 day rule for boaters and built crew changes around it.
We made Corfu with days to spare on the calendar and the days clock both. Whether you do the canals at all, instead of the long haul round Spain, is a real decision, and our piece on canals versus the Biscay route south lays out both sides. For us, the canals were not the slow option we feared. They were the trip.
