From the Barefoot Blogger Archives
This year marks the 30th anniversary of the Canal du Midi’s designation as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. But the story of this extraordinary waterway began more than 350 years ago, with a French tax collector named Pierre-Paul Riquet, who imagined what engineers and rulers had sought for centuries: a navigable route connecting the Mediterranean and the Atlantic.
Riquet wasn’t a professional engineer, yet he devised a solution to one of the project’s greatest obstacles: supplying enough water to operate a canal crossing the hills of southern France. Construction began in 1667, employing thousands of workers who dug, built, and shaped a waterway that would transform transportation and trade. Riquet died on October 1, 1680, just months before the canal’s inaugural voyage in May 1681.
Today, the Canal du Midi stretches about 240 kilometers between Toulouse and the Étang de Thau, passing through some of southern France’s most beautiful countryside. Its ingenious locks, bridges, and tunnels remain reminders of the ambition behind its construction.
Over the years, the canal has set the stage for several of my Barefoot Blogger adventures, including a memorable week aboard the luxury barge Athos; a stay in one of the region’s historic circulade villages; and a road trip to Castelnaudary for cassoulet, a dish associated with the Canal du Midi area. Each offered a different perspective on this remarkable part of France.
For this week’s archive, I’m returning to the story of the canal itself and the man whose determination made it possible.
Read the original story: Discovering the Canal du Midi
Have you explored the Canal du Midi? Whether by boat, bicycle, or on foot, I’d love to hear which places along the waterway have stayed with you.
