Dijon is the capital of Burgundy, a city of about 160,000, and for most of the fifteenth century it was the seat of dukes who were richer than the kings of France and ruled territory from the Low Countries to the Alps. That is the key to the place: the Palace of the Dukes still dominates the centre, and the city around it was built by people with money and no particular need to defer to Paris.
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It came out of the war almost untouched, so the centre is a dense and genuinely old mix of timber-framed houses, Renaissance mansions and glazed Burgundian roof tiles in geometric patterns. The old town is pedestrianised and compact enough to cross in twenty minutes.
About the mustard, since it is why most people know the name: Dijon mustard is a recipe rather than a protected origin. Anyone anywhere can make it and sell it under that name, most of it is produced outside the city, and the seed has for a long time been largely imported. The protected Burgundian product is Moutarde de Bourgogne, which does require local seed. So there is less mustard tourism here than you might expect, and the city's real subject is wine.
The Route des Grands Crus starts at the southern edge of Dijon and runs through Gevrey-Chambertin, Vougeot, Nuits-Saint-Georges and Vosne-Romanee, past vineyard parcels that produce some of the most expensive wine in the world. The Climats of the Burgundy vineyard were inscribed by UNESCO in 2015.
What you pack is set by a continental climate with cold winters, cobbles, and vineyard walking.
The Palace, the Owl Trail and the Museums
A ducal palace, one of France's oldest art museums, and a bronze owl worn flat.
The Palais des Ducs anchors the Place de la Liberation, a curved classical square by one of Versailles' architects. Inside it is the Musee des Beaux-Arts, which is free, was founded in 1787 and is one of the oldest and best collections in France. The real reason to go is the Salle des Gardes: the tombs of John the Fearless and Philip the Bold, with processions of carved alabaster mourners around their bases, each one individual. The ducal kitchens with their six vast fireplaces are in the same building.
The Parcours de la Chouette is the city's self-guided walk, marked by twenty-two bronze owl plaques set into the pavement and following a route through the old town. It is free, it takes about an hour, and it is the most efficient way to see the centre. The owl itself is a small carving on the side of the church of Notre-Dame, and the local custom is to touch it with your left hand while making a wish. Several centuries of this have worn it almost smooth.
Notre-Dame is also worth going inside. Its facade carries three tiers of gargoyles and a Jacquemart clock on the roof, a family of mechanical figures that have struck the hours since 1383. Saint-Benigne cathedral has a rare circular crypt below it. The Rue des Forges and the Rue Verrerie hold the best of the timber-framed houses, and the Hotel de Vogue has the most photographed tiled roof in the city.
Les Halles, the covered market, was built with input from Gustave Eiffel and runs on Tuesdays, Fridays and Saturdays. It is the best place to eat in Dijon and the cheapest.
Recommended Tours and Experiences
The Vineyards and Burgundy Beyond
The Route des Grands Crus, an abbey, and a canal.
The Route des Grands Crus begins immediately south of the city at Marsannay and runs about sixty kilometres. The village names are the labels: Gevrey-Chambertin, Morey-Saint-Denis, Chambolle-Musigny, Vougeot, Vosne-Romanee, Nuits-Saint-Georges. The vineyard lanes between them are walkable and cyclable, flat to gently sloping, and the Voie des Vignes is a signed cycle path along the whole stretch. Tastings generally need booking in the famous villages and often do not in the less famous ones.
One honest note on cost: this is the most expensive wine region in the world and the tasting prices reflect that. Marsannay, Fixin and the Hautes-Cotes villages give you the same landscape and the same geology at a fraction of the price.
Beyond the vines, the Abbey of Fontenay is a complete twelfth century Cistercian abbey, a UNESCO site, about an hour northwest and one of the most atmospheric buildings in France. Vezelay with its Romanesque basilica is an hour and a half. The Canal de Bourgogne runs through Dijon itself with a towpath that is flat, shaded and good for cycling, and Beaune, the wine capital with its polychrome-tiled hospital, is forty minutes by train.
Getting around: Dijon's centre is flat, pedestrianised and small, and two tram lines plus buses cover the rest; a day ticket is cheap. The station is a ten minute walk from the Palais des Ducs and Paris is an hour and forty by TGV, which makes Dijon an easy add to a Paris trip. The vineyards are the one thing needing planning: regional trains stop at Gevrey-Chambertin and Nuits-Saint-Georges, buses are infrequent, and the pleasant answer is a bike on the Voie des Vignes.
When to Go
May to June and September to October, with late September the best of all.
Burgundy is continental: daytime highs from about 5C in January to 26C in July, cold winters with some snow and fog, warm summers, rain spread through the year.
Spring, May and June, is comfortable for the city and the vineyard lanes, with the vines in leaf and long evenings.
September and October is the best window. The vendange runs through late September, the slopes turn copper, the heat has gone and the villages are working rather than posing. The Foire Internationale et Gastronomique de Dijon in early November is a large food fair and the Fetes de la Vigne is in late summer.
Summer is warm and pleasant, and the city is quieter than the coast because it is not a beach destination. The one caution is that Burgundy gets genuine heat spells now, and the old town has little shade.
Winter is cold, grey and often foggy at 2 to 6C, with the Christmas market on the Place de la Liberation and around the church through Advent. Many vineyard estates close to visitors from December to February, so a winter trip is a city trip.
Is Dijon Safe for Women Travelers
Dijon is a comfortable university city and an easy place to travel alone.
The FCDO publishes no advised-against areas anywhere in France, and its terrorism wording is the strongest it uses: terrorists are very likely to try to carry out attacks in France, with shopping centres, entertainment venues, sporting events, transport hubs and crowded gatherings named as possible targets. The everyday risks are more specific than that sounds. Pickpocketing is organised on the Paris Metro and on trains, typically in pairs with one person distracting you, and the FCDO records SERIOUS ASSAULTS on RER lines B and D, which matters because line B is the train most visitors take from the airports. Drink spiking is named with the drugs rather than hinted at: be alert to the possible use of date rape drugs including GHB and liquid ecstasy. Strikes and demonstrations happen at short notice and can stop trains and close roads, usually peacefully. And wildfires affect the south in hot dry summers.
The Paris-specific parts do not apply: Dijon has trams rather than a metro and the RER assault warning is a capital matter. What carries over is pickpocketing in crowds, which here means the market, the Christmas market and the station, and a closed bag in front of you handles it. The drink-spiking caution applies in any bar, and it is worth knowing the FCDO names the drugs explicitly rather than implying them, because Dijon has around 30,000 students and a busy bar quarter around the Place Emile Zola and the Rue Berbisey.
Day to day the city is relaxed and safe. The pedestrianised centre is busy into the evening, eating alone is unremarkable, and the trams run late. The area immediately around the station and the Gresilles district further out are the scruffiest parts and neither is somewhere a visitor has reason to be after dark.
France is in the EU, so a UK Global Health Insurance Card or an EU European Health Insurance Card gives you state-provided medically necessary care on the same terms as a resident, which means you pay the same patient share a French resident pays rather than nothing. That is not the same as free and it does not cover repatriation, so travel insurance sits on top of it. French hospitals are excellent and a pharmacie, marked by a green cross, handles minor problems without an appointment and will tell you where the duty pharmacy is out of hours. Tap water is drinkable everywhere. Dial 15 for a medical emergency or 112 for anything.
The physical cautions are modest. The old town cobbles are uneven and slick in rain, and the city gets freezing fog in winter which ices them. The vineyard lanes are easy but entirely exposed, with no shade and no shelter for long stretches. And the obvious one for this region: tasting and driving do not mix, the gendarmerie tests on the D974 through the grand cru villages, and the French limit is lower than the limit in the UK or most of the United States. A bike or a tour removes the question.
The Dijon Packing List
Base layers, for a continental swing
Dijon is properly cold in winter and warm in summer, and the useful layer is a thin one that spans both. Merino at 160gsm insulates when damp, which matters in winter fog, and resists odour over several days, which matters when a day runs from a market to a vineyard to a restaurant. Our merino base layers are 100% Australian merino at 17.5 micron with no synthetic blend. A long sleeve merino wool base layer for women is the single layer worth bringing in any month.
A warm mid layer, October to April
A fleece mid layer. Burgundy winters are cold and damp rather than extreme, and the Christmas market is outdoors at night.
A hooded waterproof
A packable rain jacket for women. Rain is spread across the year and the vineyard lanes have no shelter at all.
Shoes you can walk cobbles in
Walking shoes with grip. The old town is cobbled and polished smooth in the busiest streets, the Parcours de la Chouette keeps you on them for an hour, and winter fog ices them. Merino wool socks, which keep working damp.
Sun protection in summer
A wide brim sun hat and sunscreen. The vineyard lanes are completely exposed and Burgundy summers now reach into the thirties.
A bag that will take bottles
Not a gear recommendation so much as a planning one. If you go anywhere near the Route des Grands Crus you will buy wine, and a padded wine sleeve or a few packing cubes keep bottles from knocking about in a case. Packing cubes do the job and are useful anyway.
The small things
Cash in euros for the market and smaller domaines. A European two-pin adapter. A refillable bottle; tap water is drinkable. Tasting appointments booked ahead for the famous villages, and a look at Marsannay or the Hautes-Cotes if the grand cru prices put you off. And note that many estates close to visitors from December to February.
Essential Resources for Women in Dijon
Emergency numbers: 112 for police, ambulance and fire, free from any phone including a locked mobile, with operators who will find an English speaker. It is the single number across the whole European Union.
Non-emergency police: dial 17 for police and 112 for any emergency. Dijon has a Police Nationale commissariat in the centre. A theft needs an in-person report, the declaration de vol, to produce the document an insurer requires. English is reasonably common in a university city, less so at the commissariat, so a written note of events helps.
Main hospital or clinic: the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Dijon Bourgogne, the Hopital Francois Mitterrand, has a full emergency department. Dial 15 for the medical emergency service, SAMU, or 112. A pharmacie, marked with a green cross, handles minor problems and posts the duty rota for nights and Sundays.
Official health authority: Sante publique France, the national public health agency. France is in the EU, so a UK GHIC or EU EHIC gives you state-provided care on the same terms as a resident, which means paying the same patient share rather than nothing, and does not cover repatriation
US Embassy: the United States Embassy in Paris. Paris, which is an hour and forty minutes away by TGV and is the practical one for Burgundy
Official tourism authority: Atout France, the national tourism body. With the Dijon tourist office for the Parcours de la Chouette map, the Les Halles market days and which grand cru domaines take visitors without an appointment
Tasting and driving: the gendarmerie tests on the D974 through the grand cru villages and the French limit is lower than the UK or US one. A bike on the Voie des Vignes or an organised tour removes the question entirely.
Winter underfoot: freezing fog is common here and it ices polished cobbles in the pedestrian streets.
On mustard, so you are not misled: Dijon mustard is a recipe rather than a protected origin, most is made elsewhere and the seed is largely imported. Moutarde de Bourgogne is the protected local product. There is far less mustard to visit here than the name suggests.
US State Department travel advisory: the France advisory. Read the current level there directly rather than relying on a figure printed in any guide.
UK FCDO travel advice: gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice/france, and read the safety and security page rather than only the landing page, because that is where the substance sits.
Solo women safety assessment: Dijon is a comfortable, well-run university city and an easy place to travel alone. The pedestrianised centre stays busy into the evening, the trams run late, eating alone is unremarkable, and violent crime against visitors is rare. The Paris-specific parts of the FCDO advice do not reach here, since Dijon has trams rather than a metro and the serious-assault note for RER lines B and D is a capital matter. What does carry over is pickpocketing in crowds, which here means Les Halles market, the Christmas market and the station, and a closed bag worn in front of you is the answer. The drink-spiking caution is worth reading properly rather than skimming: the FCDO names the drugs explicitly, and Dijon has roughly 30,000 students and a busy bar quarter around the Place Emile Zola and the Rue Berbisey, so the ordinary practicalities of watching your own drink apply. The area immediately around the station and the Gresilles district further out are the scruffiest parts and neither is anywhere a visitor has reason to be after dark. The practical risks are underfoot and behind a wheel: cobbles polished smooth in the busy streets ice up in the freezing fog this city gets, the vineyard lanes are completely unshaded, and tasting then driving on the D974 is both the obvious trap and an actively policed one, with a French limit lower than the UK or US.
Reading On
For the country-level picture, start with the France travel guide for women. For why one thin wool layer handles a foggy market morning and a warm vineyard afternoon, read the guide to merino wool base layers for women. Every destination we cover is indexed at the travel packing guide for women, and the base layers are at the Roman Trail collection.
If the outer journey is calling you, the inner one usually is too. Explore SoulMap at romantrail.com/blogs/soulmap.
