04 CANAL DU MIDI - CAMARGUE : - DE TOULOUSE À LA MÉDITERRANÉE

inland waterways guide

The Canal du Midi (from Toulouse to the Etang de Thau), the Robine canal, the Etang de Thau, the canal from Rhône to Sète, the Lez (from Palavas-les-Flots to Lattes), the Grau du Roi maritime canal, the Vidourle, the Beaucaire branch, the Petit Rhône and the canal from Arles to Fos. 

The Canal du Midi – the legendary "Royal canal of the Languedoc" – is the masterpiece in the river link between the two seas. For those who like the inland-waterways culture, the Canal du Midi, classified by UNESCO as a world heritage site in 1996, is an anthology of everything that human ingenuity has invented to build a waterway where geography appears not to allow it.

In the East, at the outlet of the Canal du Midi, the Etang de Thau is a little inland sea that must be approached with care if the wind is blowing. This vast basin devoted to raising shellfish shelters several small, quiet ports. Then, from Sète to the Rhône, the junction canal flows, enclosed between the lakes and the sea, in the middle of a vast expanse of water, which looks superb at sunrise and sunset.