Vienne - Avignon

At Vienne Alex asked the man at the bike shop, where he was buying a new brake cable, ‘How do I get up to the ancient chateau on the hill?’ ‘Oh’ he replied, ‘Right at the roundabout, then next right at the hospital and up you go.’ So Alex set off and 40 minutes later he had reached the end of the road at a large hospital – but nowhere near the chateau, so it was back down the hill – only 5 minutes to get down, and back to the McDonald’s where Louise was still trying – unsuccessfully - to get all her emails answered. The link had just irredeemably failed!

We both gave up and went back to supper on Riccall.

The following day we discovered that the château on the hill was in private ownership and not possible to visit anyway! But the Roman amphitheatre was spectacular (though it had been renovated in the 1940s) and the views from the church on the adjacent hill were impressive. The Saturday market spread through most of the town (the 2nd largest in France apparently) and was well worth a couple of hours perusal as was the Saint Maurice Cathedral with its spectacular entrance stonework.

We left next morning at about 8.30 and ended that day’s cruise moored up on a high ex-sand quay with slipway adjacent down into the water. This turned out to be an excellent mooring for us, despite the ever present fishermen, and at about 6.40pm we were joined by VAGABOND a Swedish sailing boat with Lars and Ingrid on board who we invited to moor on us.

Next day the couple of provisional moorings we had in mind were either full or impossible, and so we eventually came upon a Port de Commerce quay, and after a very quick late lunch, Louise went off to ask the Chef du Port if we could stay the night. ‘Oui’, he said, ‘pour un nuit’. But later in the evening, long after he and the other workers had left, and 10 minutes before our supper was ready, ARTEMIS – 110m x 10m – arrived to moor up behind us. Blimy! Are we OK? Do we need to move? Or what?

Alex went up to ask. ‘Well, we are going to load up in the morning at 7am and will need to move forward into your position, so it might be better if you moved behind us now’. ‘OK, OK anything you want. We know this is a commercial quay and we are just so grateful for somewhere to spend the night’. So a quick manoeuvre to moor behind with their Polish crewmen helping with our ropes and all is well again – we hope! But we are now right under the sign that says ‘Port de Commerce. Stopping forbidden. All pleasure boats to go 3 kms up the river to the Port de Plaisance’. Funny though, but having the agreement of the ’Chef du Port’ gives one a certain confidence . . .!

The following day while waiting for a huge commercial to come out of a lock, we realised it was one we had seen a couple of times before and the captain actually came out of his wheelhouse to give us an enthusiastic wave of greeting as he went past. How nice!

That evening we moored up behind GERMINAL (a boat we had met in a lock) on a hugely high quay (about 6m to the top). The ‘girls’ did the climbing up the vertiginous ladders to place all the ropes while the men manoeuvred the boats into place against a strong current, but although it was a very high quay indeed and not usually recommended, it gave us a reasonable night.

We set off first thing in the morning and later moored as arranged on a rather lightweight pontoon at St Etienne des Sorts early that afternoon with GERMINAL alongside. Not a marvellous stop, but the village did have a good wine co-op and a wonderful, close view of passing TGV (high speed) trains! Later, a Canadian sailing boat, which we had also seen a number of times, called DO-LITTLES, insisted on trying to moor on the last 5ft of the pontoon. Alex moved Riccall a few feet off the end of the pontoon to give them some more room and they squeezed in with a tangle of ropes and a loud American-sounding woman barking instructions, all above the background barking of 3 dogs and shouting of 3 other people! A small boat, four people, 3 huge dogs – Phew! Alex joked with Rose-marie of GERMINAL that he was glad we were upwind of their boat! They were desperate to moor there, and it became evident why - to take on crates of wine from the co-operative, which were delivered by van.

So after another uncomfortable night with hotel barges and large commercials passing at irregular intervals, we decided that day to turn up an arm of the old Rhone, which ended in a couple of commercial quays and a Port de Plaisance ‘Port 2’ to see if the mooring up there in the protected ‘dead-end’ might give us a quiet night.

The current against us up the 6 km of the old arm was amazingly high – about 4-5 kph. This meant we were only making 5.5 – 6 kph ourselves, but eventually we got there and booked a night’s mooring at €24 including wi-fi, water and electricity – not too bad for hereabouts! The capitaine-ess explained that the river level had been up by nearly one metre that morning and the powers that be were draining it all off through the weirs, which was why the current was so strong. So we settled down for a peaceful night - no motorway, no trains, nearby factory closed down at 9.30 – bliss. Then at 4 o’clock in the morning the heavens opened. The rain lashed down – we both shot up to ensure that all portholes and roof openings were firmly closed, and then the sheet lightning lit the sky above our heads in a continual series of flashes, with an almost continuous rumble and crash of thunder to go with them. Then suddenly, Alex, who was up in the wheelhouse marvelling at all this, saw a single spear of lightning about 1000ft high strike behind the trees on the opposite bank with simultaneously the most incredible clap of thunder. What a show of energy! So much for a peaceful night.

Avignon is another port up an old arm of the river and they were still running off excess water so our trip up it next day was very slow, not made any easier by firstly a trip boat racing down river just as we made our turn and giving us more rock and roll than we had had on the sea crossing (everything flying everywhere) and secondly a hotel cruise ship which pulled out behind us and harried us towards the remains of the Pont d’Avignon, of children’s song fame. We were nearly flat out and only making 3kph against the flow. Well, he just had to follow in our slow wake! and as it transpired he was going only as far as the famous bridge so that his passengers could have a bird’s eye view of it for their photographs before he turned round!

Here at Avignon the sound of the road right next to the expensive mooring means we shall only stay one or two nights. Amazingly, there are five other boats here which we either know well or have exchanged pleasantries with!

We have also discovered that Ken and Rhonda of SOMEWHERE (now off the Canal du Midi and onto the Canal Lateral de la Garonne beyond Toulouse) have been following our progress down the Rhone on a website called www.inforhone.fr. Each lock logs the names and times of passing of all the boats going up and down the Rhone (commercial and plaisance). This information is open to anyone who looks at the site. So Ken and Rhonda know pretty well to the nearest lock where we are in real time. The powers of the internet!