Richseen Private Journeys · France

French Riviera Yacht Journey

Côte d'Azur · Nice · Cannes · Saint-Tropez · Monaco
8 Days · 7 Nights
From USD 28,000+ per person
"The Côte d'Azur by private yacht — Cannes at the Croisette anchorage, Saint-Tropez on the Pampelonne beach road, and Monaco from Port Hercule at the hour the lights come on."
The Journey

The Côte d'Azur,
from the Water

The French Riviera invented modern yachting culture — the combination of mild climate, dramatic coastal topography, and the specific social infrastructure of the belle époque that made the Côte d'Azur the reference destination for European aristocracy in the 1880s and for the international leisure class in every decade since. The 180-kilometre coastline between the Italian border and Toulon — Nice, Antibes, Cannes, Saint-Tropez, and the principality of Monaco in between — is the most compressed concentration of luxury coastal culture in the world, where every cove, port, and headland carries the accumulated associations of 150 years of deliberate pleasure and where the yacht is the vehicle that makes the coastline most legible as a continuous experience rather than a series of individual resort towns.

The French Riviera Yacht Journey is structured around the specific characters of the Riviera's four principal destinations: Nice for the Old Town and the Promenade des Anglais; Cannes for the Croisette, the Îles de Lérins, and the specific beach club culture of the Palais des Festivals forecourt; Saint-Tropez for the Place des Lices, the Pampelonne beach road, and the village whose character Brigitte Bardot's arrival in 1956 transformed so completely that the transformation itself has become the destination's primary cultural reference; and Monaco for the Casino Square, the Hôtel de Paris, and the harbour whose social density during the summer season makes it the most vivid single expression of Riviera culture available from the yacht deck.

This eight-day itinerary integrates the yacht with three of the Riviera's most architecturally distinguished addresses — the Grand-Hôtel du Cap-Ferrat (Four Seasons) on the Cap Ferrat peninsula; the Hôtel de Paris Monte-Carlo on the Casino Square; and the Hôtel du Cap-Eden-Roc on the Cap d'Antibes headland — whose individual histories and landscape positions provide the land-based context that makes the yacht programme most rewarding as a complete Riviera experience.

Signature Moments

Six Encounters
with the French Riviera

Saint-Tropez at dawn before the Pampelonne road fills, the Îles de Lérins in clear Provençal water, and Monaco from Port Hercule when the Riviera lights come on.

01
Saint-Tropez at Dawn — Before Bardot's Village Wakes
Saint-Tropez at 7am from the yacht anchored in the Baie de Pampelonne — the fishing village that Brigitte Bardot's arrival in 1956 to film Et Dieu... créa la femme transformed from an obscure Provençal port into the most famous beach destination in the world, and which is most itself in the hour before the day's visitors arrive from Saint-Raphaël and the Pampelonne road fills. The Place des Lices market on Tuesday and Saturday mornings (pétanque, Provençal produce, the particular quality of a French provincial market that international celebrity has made surreal); the Old Port's fishing boats alongside the superyachts; and the Annonciade Museum (Matisse, Signac, Bonnard, the painters who came for the light).
02
Îles de Lérins — The Island Monastery Off Cannes
The Îles de Lérins 15 minutes by tender from the Cannes Croisette — Sainte-Honorat (the working Cistercian monastery established in 410 CE whose monks produce the island's wine from the Mediterranean vineyard) and Sainte-Marguerite (the fort where the Man in the Iron Mask was imprisoned from 1687 to 1698, whose identity has been disputed since Voltaire first raised the question). The clearest water accessible from the Riviera coastline in the conditions that the islands' natural reserve status maintains; the monastery restaurant for the lunch that the monks serve using the island's own produce and wine.
03
Cap d'Antibes — The Hôtel du Cap-Eden-Roc at the Headland
The Hôtel du Cap-Eden-Roc on the Cap d'Antibes headland — the 1870 hotel whose seawater swimming pool carved into the limestone cliff at the Mediterranean waterline has been the reference image of the French Riviera summer since F. Scott Fitzgerald used the hotel as the model for the Hôtel des Étrangers in Tender is the Night (1934). The Eden-Roc restaurant on the cliff; the Pavilion for lunch in the sea; and the particular quality of the Cap d'Antibes headland whose pine forests, limestone cliffs, and the specific light that the Mediterranean sea reflects onto the south-facing rocks produce the most considered natural landscape on the Riviera.
04
Monaco from Port Hercule — When the Riviera Lights Come On
Monaco in the early evening from the yacht anchored in Port Hercule — the Principality's cliff-face buildings illuminated as the Mediterranean light fails, the Casino Square visible from the harbour, and the Hôtel de Paris terrace above the port where the Riviera's social season reaches its most concentrated expression during the summer months. The walk from Port Hercule to the Casino Square: the 400 metres that separate the harbour from the most famous gambling address in Europe, through the streets of the Principality whose 2.02 square kilometres constitute the world's second-smallest sovereign state.
05
Grand-Hôtel du Cap-Ferrat — The Peninsula Between Nice and Monaco
The Grand-Hôtel du Cap-Ferrat (Four Seasons) on the Cap Ferrat peninsula — the 1908 hotel whose seawater pool, the pine-shaded gardens descending to the sea, and the position at the tip of the peninsula between Nice and Monaco produce the most privately situated luxury hotel experience on the Riviera. The Le Cap restaurant; the Club Dauphin seawater pool whose terrace provides the most complete expression of the Riviera swimming culture available at a hotel; and the peninsula's own village of Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat whose waterfront café and the coastal path around the headland make the surrounding geography accessible without leaving the most exclusive address on the coast.
06
Pampelonne Beach — Saint-Tropez's 5-Kilometre Beach Road
The Pampelonne beach — the 5-kilometre strand of sand south of Saint-Tropez whose beach clubs (Club 55, Nikki Beach, Tahiti Plage) define the French Riviera summer culture as it has been practiced since Bardot made the beach internationally known in 1956. The specific quality of the Pampelonne experience: the morning arrival by yacht tender from the anchorage in the bay, the beach club lunch at the trestle tables on the sand, and the return to the yacht in the late afternoon when the beach empties and the Provençal light on the Maures massif behind the beach produces the colour that the painters came to Saint-Tropez to document.
Key Highlights

What Makes This Journey

01 ⛵
Private Yacht — Nice to Monaco Along the Côte d'Azur
A private yacht along 180 kilometres of the most celebrated coastline in the world — the Croisette anchorage at Cannes, the Pampelonne beach tender landing at Saint-Tropez, the Îles de Lérins for the clearest Riviera swimming, and Port Hercule at Monaco. The yacht as the vehicle that makes the Côte d'Azur legible as a continuous coastal culture rather than a series of disconnected resort towns connected by the A8 autoroute above the cliff.
02 🏖️
Riviera Beach Culture — Pampelonne, Club 55, and the Croisette
The French Riviera beach club culture experienced at its most historically grounded — Club 55 on the Pampelonne beach (opened 1955, the year before Bardot's arrival, still operating on the same formula of rosé, grilled fish, and the specific afternoon light on the Maures massif); the Eden-Roc cliff pool at Cap d'Antibes (the original Riviera swimming image since 1870); and the Cannes Croisette waterfront whose association with the Film Festival makes it the most concentrated single boulevard of global cultural ambition on the Côte d'Azur.
03 🏨
Three Legendary Riviera Addresses — Cap-Ferrat, Monaco, Eden-Roc
The Grand-Hôtel du Cap-Ferrat (Four Seasons) at the tip of the Cap Ferrat peninsula; the Hôtel de Paris Monte-Carlo on the Casino Square; and the Hôtel du Cap-Eden-Roc on the Cap d'Antibes headland. Three hotels whose individual histories — spanning from 1870 to 1908, each defining the Riviera's luxury standard in its era — make the choice between them itself a statement about what the guest values in the Côte d'Azur experience.
Sample Itinerary

Key Moments & Movements

The French Riviera yacht season runs May to October; peak season is July and August when the Mistral wind is least frequent and the coastal conditions most settled. The itinerary runs west from Nice to Saint-Tropez and east to Monaco; the total coastal distance is approximately 180 kilometres. Embarkation at the Port of Nice or Antibes; disembarkation at Monaco or Nice depending on departure logistics.

Every Richseen yacht journey is individually crafted. Yacht specification, route variants, and hotel availability are confirmed at the time of booking. The Mistral wind may adjust the day-by-day sequence; the itinerary represents the typical programme in settled Riviera conditions.

Day 1
Nice Arrival — Grand-Hôtel du Cap-Ferrat · Vieille-Ville · Promenade
Arrive at Nice Côte d'Azur Airport with private transfer to the Grand-Hôtel du Cap-Ferrat (25 minutes east on the coastal road). Afternoon: the Cap Ferrat peninsula walk — the coastal path around the headland, the Villa Ephrussi de Rothschild gardens (the 1912 Venetian-style villa whose nine themed gardens between the two bays of the peninsula represent the most complete single expression of the Belle Époque garden tradition on the Riviera). Evening: Nice's Vieille-Ville and the Cours Saleya market square for the Niçoise cooking — socca (chickpea flatbread from a wood-fired oven), pissaladière, and the pan-bagnat that the Nice harbour food tradition has been producing since the Savoyard annexation.
Grand-Hôtel du Cap-Ferrat, A Four Seasons Hotel
Day 2
Embarkation — Nice · Antibes · Cap d'Antibes · Eden-Roc
Morning embarkation at the Port of Nice; the crew briefing and route overview. Sail west along the Baie des Anges — the sweep of coast between Nice and Antibes whose 11-kilometre beach was the defining image of the Promenade des Anglais when the English community who built the coastal walk in 1820 first established the Riviera as a destination. Antibes: the Picasso Museum in the Château Grimaldi (where Picasso worked in the summer of 1946 and left the resulting 23 paintings and 44 drawings to the city as a thank-you for the studio). The Cap d'Antibes for the afternoon — anchor below the Hôtel du Cap-Eden-Roc for swimming from the cliff platform and the Eden-Roc Pavilion lunch.
Aboard Yacht · Cap d'Antibes
Day 3
Cannes · Croisette · Îles de Lérins · Monastery Lunch
Sail west to Cannes — the Croisette waterfront where the Palais des Festivals whose red-carpet steps and the Boulevard de la Croisette define the Film Festival's geography, and where the Carlton, Majestic, and JW Marriott hotels provide the visual vocabulary of the most famous film event in the world. Tender to the Îles de Lérins for the afternoon — Sainte-Honorat for the Cistercian monastery (established 410 CE) and the lunch using the monks' own wine and produce in the monastery restaurant; Sainte-Marguerite for the Man in the Iron Mask cell and the clear water swimming in the protected reserve. Return to Cannes for the evening — the Rue d'Antibes and the Marché Forville for the Provençal market dinner.
Aboard Yacht · Cannes
Day 4
Saint-Tropez — Place des Lices · Pampelonne · Club 55
Sail west to Saint-Tropez (35 nautical miles, 4 hours). Morning approach to the Old Port — the fishing boats alongside the superyachts, the Annonciade Museum visible from the harbour entrance, and the Place des Lices market (Tuesday and Saturday) in the plane-tree-shaded square behind the port. The tender to Pampelonne beach for the afternoon: Club 55 (established 1955, the beach club that has maintained the same formula of grilled fish, rosé, and the afternoon Maures light for 70 years) or equivalent. The Pampelonne anchorage overnight — the bay visible from the deck at dusk when the beach clubs have closed and the beach returns to the condition its painters came to document.
Aboard Yacht · Saint-Tropez
Day 5
Coastal Cruising — Porquerolles · Port-Cros · Hyères Islands
The Hyères Islands west of Saint-Tropez — Porquerolles (the westernmost and most agriculturally active, whose national park designation since 1963 maintains the pine forest, lavender fields, and vineyards that the island's mid-19th-century colonial-era development planted); Port-Cros (the most strictly protected natural reserve in France, where the underwater marine park extends the national park designation below the waterline and the snorkelling conditions in the protected coves are the clearest on the Riviera). The return east toward the Var coast for the overnight anchor — the approach to Monaco beginning the following morning.
Aboard Yacht · Hyères Islands
Day 6
Monaco — Port Hercule · Casino Square · Louis XV
Sail east along the Riviera coastline — the Var coastline, the Estérel massif's red porphyry cliffs above the sea, and the approach to the Alpes-Maritimes where the mountains descend most directly to the Mediterranean. Monaco arrival at Port Hercule by early afternoon. The Oceanographic Museum (founded by Prince Albert I in 1910, whose aquarium and historical marine research collection make it the most distinguished single scientific institution in Monaco); the Casino Square (Charles Garnier, 1878, the architect of the Paris Opéra, whose Belle Époque gaming rooms still operate on the original premise); and the Louis XV at the Hôtel de Paris for the farewell dinner — Alain Ducasse's three-Michelin-star room whose Provençal cuisine is the most considered single dining experience available on the Riviera.
Hôtel de Paris Monte-Carlo
Day 7
Disembarkation · Hôtel du Cap-Eden-Roc · Final Riviera Day
Disembarkation at Monaco or Antibes for transfer to the Hôtel du Cap-Eden-Roc on the Cap d'Antibes headland — the 1870 hotel whose limestone cliff platform seawater swimming, the Eden-Roc restaurant on the cliff face, and the pine-shaded grounds descending to the Mediterranean provide the most complete single expression of the Riviera's leisure tradition. The Club Dauphin seawater pool; the Pavilion lunch on the rock above the sea; and the final afternoon on the Cap d'Antibes coastal path in the conditions that made F. Scott Fitzgerald write the most evocative description of the Riviera summer available in any language.
Hôtel du Cap-Eden-Roc, Cap d'Antibes
Day 8
Departure — Nice Côte d'Azur Airport
Final morning at the Hôtel du Cap-Eden-Roc — the coastal path walk around the Cap d'Antibes headland (3 kilometres, the chemin des douaniers) whose pine forest and limestone cliff views provide the most complete geological account of the Riviera available on foot, or the final swim from the Eden-Roc cliff platform. Private transfer to Nice Côte d'Azur Airport (25 minutes) for onward international connections.
Nice Côte d'Azur Airport
Luxury Stays

Where You Rest Matters

Cap Ferrat Peninsula, Alpes-Maritimes
Cap Ferrat — 1 Night (Arrival)
Grand-Hôtel du Cap-Ferrat, A Four Seasons Hotel
71 Boulevard du Général de Gaulle, 06230 Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat
The Grand-Hôtel du Cap-Ferrat — the 1908 hotel at the tip of the Cap Ferrat peninsula between Nice and Monaco, whose pine-shaded grounds descend to the Club Dauphin seawater pool at the Mediterranean waterline. The Le Cap restaurant; the spa; and the position on the most privately situated peninsula on the Côte d'Azur, where the surrounding village of Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat and the coastal path provide the scale of the Riviera's original natural setting before the urbanisation of the coast between the wars.
Place du Casino, Monaco
Monaco — 1 Night
Hôtel de Paris Monte-Carlo
Place du Casino, 98000 Monaco
The Hôtel de Paris Monte-Carlo — the 1864 palace hotel on the Place du Casino, whose Louis XV restaurant (Alain Ducasse, three Michelin stars), the Bar Américain, and the cave containing vintages undisturbed since the Second World War constitute the most historically resonant single hotel experience on the Riviera. The Casino Square directly outside; the Opéra de Monte-Carlo (Charles Garnier, 1878, adjacent to the Casino) for the cultural programme; and Port Hercule for the yacht disembarkation 400 metres below the Casino Square by the harbour road.
Boulevard J.F. Kennedy, Cap d'Antibes
Cap d'Antibes — 1 Night (Departure)
Hôtel du Cap-Eden-Roc
Boulevard J.F. Kennedy, 06600 Antibes
The Hôtel du Cap-Eden-Roc — the 1870 hotel whose seawater pool carved into the limestone cliff at the Mediterranean waterline and the Eden-Roc restaurant on the cliff face have made it the defining image of the French Riviera summer since F. Scott Fitzgerald used the hotel as the setting for Tender is the Night. The pine-shaded grounds descending to the sea; the Club Dauphin; and the position on the Cap d'Antibes headland whose 3-kilometre coastal path provides the most complete walking account of the Riviera's natural landscape available within distance of any luxury hotel on the coast.
Exclusive Experiences

Moments Designed for You

⛵
Yacht
Nice to Monaco — The Côte d'Azur as a Continuous Experience
A private yacht along the Côte d'Azur — the 180-kilometre coastline experienced as a continuous composition rather than a series of individual resort towns. The Croisette anchorage at Cannes; the Pampelonne beach tender landing at Saint-Tropez; the Îles de Lérins for the clearest swimming on the Riviera; the Hyères island reserve; and Port Hercule at Monaco. The yacht that makes the coast legible as the connected landscape that the Belle Époque Grand Tour travellers discovered when they first came by steamer from Marseille and found a coastline whose character had been forming since the Greeks planted olives on the Provençal hills in 600 BCE.
🌊
Eden-Roc
The Original Riviera Pool — Cliff Swimming Since 1870
The Hôtel du Cap-Eden-Roc cliff seawater pool — the limestone platform carved into the Cap d'Antibes headland at the Mediterranean waterline whose image, reproduced in every Riviera travel feature since Fitzgerald wrote about it in the 1930s, is the single most enduring visual definition of the French Riviera summer. The Eden-Roc restaurant on the cliff above; the Pavilion on the rock below; and the swimming from the platform at the hour the Provençal morning light reaches the southern-facing limestone and the water temperature makes the entry most rewarding. The experience that every subsequent luxury coastal pool has been measuring itself against since 1870.
🍷
Provence
Îles de Lérins — Monastery Wine on the Island Since 410 CE
The Cistercian monastery on Sainte-Honorat — the working religious community established in 410 CE on the island 15 minutes from the Cannes Croisette, whose monks produce the island's wine from the Mediterranean vineyard and serve it with the monastery's own produce in the restaurant whose setting (the monastery courtyard, visible from the tender as the island's most intact medieval structure) makes it the most historically specific single lunch available on the Riviera circuit. The wine: a Côtes de Provence whose terroir — the island's shallow soil, the sea on all sides, and the specific salinity that the Mediterranean air deposits on the vine leaves — produces a character available nowhere else on the coast.
🎰
Monaco
Casino de Monte-Carlo — Garnier's 1878 Gaming Rooms
The Casino de Monte-Carlo — Charles Garnier's 1878 building (the same architect, the same year as the Paris Opéra, on the commission from Prince Charles III of Monaco who needed a revenue source after losing Nice to France in 1860). The gaming rooms: the Salle Europe (the original 1878 room whose Belle Époque ceiling paintings and the roulette tables have been operating on the same visual terms for 145 years) and the Salle Médecin (the 1890 expansion). The Casino as the cultural experience that precedes or follows the Louis XV dinner at the Hôtel de Paris directly opposite — the two institutions that define what Monaco actually is when the superyachts have departed.
Visual Journey

Through the Lens

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Every detail — from your first morning above the Cap Ferrat peninsula to your final afternoon at the Eden-Roc cliff pool — is composed entirely around you. Speak with your dedicated Richseen journey consultant today.

From USD 28,000+ per person

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