We set off for the Cirque de Gavarnie in the Pyrenees region between France and Spain, some 200kms south of our moorings at Buzet intending to be away for 5-6 days visiting sights of interest and friends. Louise had a cold but thought she was shaking it off, so off we went. Lourdes was on our route and we stopped there at about 3 o’clock. We took the funicular railway to the top of the hill beside the town where after a short walk up the last half kilometre we were able to climb a small tower to obtain fabulous views of Lourdes itself and the surrounding hills. There was a slight breeze blowing the low hanging clouds on and off the hilltops and sometimes obscuring our view down. Very atmospheric! A very grubby teenager had accompanied us in the funicular, with his equally mud-caked mountain bike. He had bought a multipack of ascent tickets and this was to be his 6th bicycle descent, mad fool, but what an adrenalin rush. We watched with awe as he careered off down the tiny muddy track.
Later we got to Lourdes itself and as it was out of season, the place was pretty quiet. Presumably at this chilly time of year miracles hardly ever happen (or is that hurricanes?). However, all the rows of healing water spouts and places to burn candles and rows of urinals in the gents were all open for business even if nearly deserted.
A lone preacher was orating to a small semi-interested congregation outside the cave of the miracle of the sighting of the Virgin Mary, by St Bernadette, while a straggle of tourists was guide-led round the cave behind him!
The cathedral was pretty impressive, and the walls were covered in 10” x 15” marble tiles, each inscribed with thanks from somebody who may (or may not) have been cured by a miracle. We looked. We left.
The small hotel we had booked in the village of Argelès Gazost appeared to be unattended when we arrived until after much banging of the desk bell for 10 minutes a surly concierge finally appeared and directed us to our room. Surprisingly after this inauspicious start the attached restaurant gave us quite a good meal.
The next day we set off for the principal object of our tour – about 25kms further south and into the mountains. Louise was not better – in fact worse - but having got so close we agreed at the very least we should look at the Cirque.
We parked in the village of Gavarnie, which appeared to be deserted, and walked into a café which was open (we thought) but no! We were turned away in no uncertain terms but not without our pointing out that their ‘OUVERT’ sign was clearly displayed on the door!
Louise found the one-hour walk to the centre of the Cirque pretty difficult but soldiered on with encouragement from Alex. It was all worth it in the end – a truly amazing sight – a 2000ft high circle of mountains with one way in and out, sheer cliffs rising skywards. But Alex decided that we had best head for home to let poor Louise suffer on in Riccall. Fortunately the new motorway route back had been completed and we were able to leg it at 130kph back to Riccall before nightfall. And a good decision it was as Louise spent the next two days laid up in bed and it was at least a week before she was up to even 80%.
We like to try and give as much purpose as possible to our trips so when Louise had fully recovered we started planning our next foray. Alex had just read a book which was set in Tuscany, close to Florence, and it reminded him of a calendar seen years ago in his mother’s kitchen at Plantreees which depicted one walled (fortified) town in Italy for each month of the year. Although Louise has over the years tried to track such a calendar down she had not had any success. However, Alex still felt interested enough to propose a trip to Tuscany and via the internet produced a list of possible sites.
On the way we would have lunch with Gill and Brian and after the staying the first night in a B & B in the countryside we would drop in to Mazamet to pay some money into our HSBC account to keep our SFR direct debits on track!
Madame at the B & B spoke good English but had to leave almost as soon as we arrived to take her daughter to the doctor and left us with her husband and his good friend – neither of whom spoke any English at all. She also asked as she left if we could help with another Englishman who was arriving shortly and could speak no French. We heard his arrival and went out to try and translate but when the young man heard our attempts at French he realised his own French was as good if not better than ours! But we like to feel that because we didn’t mind making fools of ourselves and were doing the best we could, we encouraged him to do the same himself. So we all sat with the older two Frenchmen talking and drinking an aperitif of home-made wine for a while and the older guys spoke clearly and slowly and if necessary used different terms in explanation, so the conversation went well.
After the young man left we all sat down to supper and wine en-famille and eventually Madame returned. A great evening.
We did the biz in Mazamet with HSBC, spent a night in Nice, then visited a couple of places on the coast recommended by Jane and Guy (who had had a house in Tuscany for a while). Camogli and Portofino were lovely coastal towns and we had lunch of bread and cheese on the sea front at Portofino in the warm sun.
We dropped into Lucca on our way to our next night near Florence and decided we would have to return on our way back to spend more time there. We finally got to our B & B near Florence about 6.30pm.
By the way, I think we should mention that, though the road above the Cote d’Azur and eastwards into Italy is spectacular, as it cuts through the hilly landscape – bridge, tunnel, bridge, tunnel, bridge, tunnel – the road surface and quantity of traffic is appalling. Can you believe this? Worse than England! And the drivers? Well . . . .
Our B & B was an old fortified mansion but unfortunately the usual provision of a basic meal was finished for the season, but the local pizzeria in the village sold us the best pizza we have had for ages.
We set off the following morning on a whistle-stop tour of the fortified towns that Alex had earmarked.
First off was Certaldo (coffee) then San Gimignano (lunch) Monteriggione (tea) and finally Volterra, this last on our way to our overnight in Pisa. We drove to the gates of Volterra, parked in the 15 minutes waiting slot and followed the signs to the Tourist Information Office. We walked in, and said to the girl. “We are just passing through. We have 5 minutes here in Volterra. What should we look at?” I think she thought we were mad (well we were really) so we softened the blow and told her we would be back on a longer trip some other day. She gave us a map, pointed to the cathedral and main square and off we went.
We got to Pisa about 6.30pm (dark, narrow, one-way streets like a rabbit warren). The GPS still said half a kilometre to go for our destination but amazingly Louise spotted the hotel just as we passed it - a beautiful hotel with private parking at the rear for €10. Am American guest in Reception said to Louise as she booked in, “Pay the €10 for the parking. Believe me, it’s worth it.” So we did and he was right! Parking in Pisa? Forget it.
That night we walked the 2kms to the Duomo and Tower to see it leaning in the dark, had supper in a Sicilian bar on the way back to our hotel, got lost, eventually found the hotel at about 11.30pm and fell into bed (a long day).
After an excellent breakfast (included in the €59) we ‘did’ the Tower and the Duomo, had coffee in the square and lunch overlooking the river . . . picked up the car from the hotel and set off for a longer look at Lucca.
On our way through Lucca the first time as we headed for Florence we had at first wondered where the fortified part of the town was, but when we found it, we were amazed just how big it was. We drove in through the gates and into the maze of narrow streets, not sure if we were allowed there or not. Eventually Alex chickened out and headed back to the gate, down what appeared to be pedestrian-only roads.
This time we went to the Tourist Information Office, got the map provided, parked in the free car park half a kilometre away and walked in to do the job properly. As usual this included going up the highest tower – this one with trees on top!
We got to our next hotel in Bagni di Lucca just as dark was falling. Alex had had slight misgivings about this hotel as 30 minutes after making the booking on-line that morning, the manager rang to say the hotel we had booked had no central heating (broken down) so was closed, but he could give us a room in his other hotel 1km away and give us a similar deal at the same price. This call came half-way through breakfast so we just said OK. The room was very tired and obviously not refurbished since the 70s. But so were we so we just accepted it! Then when Alex went on-line again he discovered this hotel could be booked for €20 less than the other for a standard room.
We had a good dinner in the hotel restaurant for €50 and in the morning, bill time, Alex took on the manager. He tried to claim he had upgraded us to an equivalent room complete with balcony (true) overlooking the river (true). Alex pointed out though that with evening temperatures falling to below freezing, the balcony wasn’t much use and that the noise from the weir coming through the ill-fitting door had kept us awake all night!
The manager relented with poor grace and reduced the bill accordingly.
Our next village was Barga. Not so much a walled town as an ancient one, very self-contained with narrow steep alleys leading between houses dotted about on the undulating terrain. A good view of the surrounding hills, also.
On one of these Alex was intrigued by a cluster of buildings clinging to the summit with a tower in their midst.
After two failed attempts up the precipitous tracks in the wooded mountainside we finally found the right one to what turned out to be a small village of about 15 houses called Sommocolonia.
As we investigated the ruins above the village and a plaque in honour of the US army, we realised that the village had been involved in heavy fighting during the war.
There were a couple of old guys roasting chestnuts in the small square by the bell tower and a younger one carrying out some maintenance on the tower. As we strolled past, the old guys offered us hot chestnuts and wine and the maintenance man dashed off, beckoning us to follow as he wanted to open the tiny museum for us.
Here was a potted history of the US operation towards the end of the war to relieve the village and drive the Germans from the opposite ridge. And of course, there were photographs of the US commander and his troops who had returned en mass with about 20 jeeps in 1984 to revisit the village he had helped to save. We left – for us – a generous donation for the upkeep of the museum (or whatever).
Then as we wandered near the bell tower Alex noticed the door open and rickety stairs leading up into the dark. He poked his head round the corner and caught the maintenance man’s eye. “Can we go up?” He was with us in a trice and leading the way up before you could say “Jack Rabbit”, clearing the debris from the steps as he went!
When we got to the top there were three large bells and one smaller one. We looked at our watches. 11.55am!!!!! Perfect! 5 minutes later the big bells chimed the 12 strokes with an electric clapper. Then the smaller one started to chime and swung back and forth at the same time. The whole tower shook while it did this for the next full minute. A great experience – the bells, the bells! So partially deafened, we made our way down and back to the car to continue our journey. We had a lovely lunch in ‘new’ Barga village, then forced our GPS to take us on a spectacular country route to our next port of call, Lerici on the coast, followed by Portovenere.
Our next hotel booking was in Savona. After a bit of coastal hopping we realised we had better get moving, so back onto the motorway and hot-foot it to our next night at the Hotel Miro. This had been booked because it had an on-site restaurant. On no it didn’t! Closed on the night we were there!
We walked the half kilometre to a restaurant recommended. We sat and ordered our meal and shortly, when mine host poured the wine, (€14 a bottle) it was fizzy – red but fizzy. Alex thought he recognised the name but in the UK it’s not fizzy – it’s just good quaffable stuff. However, bless him, the waiter said, “No problem, I will get a bottle of local wine (€16) for you to try.” This was fine! Still, and fine, and he just took the other bottle away. No quibble, amazing! (The meal was OK too.)
The next day was Louise’s day! The Côte d’Azur. So we headed down onto the old coast road (off the motorway to Menton) and then all along the coast – Monte Carlo, Monaco, Nice, Antibes, not quite into Cannes as the road section of a triathlon had closed the coast road, but eventually we got back to the coast, had lunch in a café and coffee on the sea wall, where Alex was treated to a good long look at a topless bather (female)!
We regained the motorway after Fréjus and arrived at our rather tacky night’s accommodation in a Premiere Class in Arles at 4.50pm. They don’t open till 5.00pm so we drove into Arles to have a look at the moorings and re-fuel the car. That evening the restaurant next door opened at 7pm. At 7.15 we were the first in and wondered if it would be OK. By 7.45 the place was buzzing! We had a good meal and house wine – at €5 a half litre, very good value for a restaurant.
The next day we drove to Capestang to look at the recent tree devastation (removal of the famous plane trees because of a fungal disease) and on to La Croisade to have lunch with Peter on AURIGNY and thence back onto the French motorway system for a quick 3 hours back to Riccall.
There is no doubt the French autoroutes are absolutely fantastic – not crowded, good surface, fast travel, worth every franc!
Saturday 10 December 2011
Monday 7 November 2011
Autumn Sightseeing
So after months of laziness and after hundreds of requests (well none actually) I will once again take up my pen and bore everybody with an account of what we have been up to since our last missive.
On our return to France after our adventures on the narrowboat in the UK, we had to make ready for a trip down the canal to Meilhan to attend Malcolm’s (BODY AND SOUL) 70th birthday party. Also to this bash had been invited our very good friends Nicci and Peter of AURIGNY, but as their boat was miles away on the Canal du Midi we offered them a few days on Riccall as we travelled there and back.
They joined us by motorbike at a little Halte Nautique, Lagruère, where unexpectedly Ken and Rhonda also dropped in (by car) and we all had a jolly supper at the restaurant. The following day we set off for Meilhan passing CONNIE, also en route to the same party and said hello to Charles and Caroline who had stopped for a late lunch.
When we arrived in Meilhan and had moored into our reserved berth we said hello to all and sundry boat owners and settled down to some serious socialising. Late that evening we discovered to our horror that the do was to have a 1920s flavour complete with 1920s clothing. Some intensive research on the internet the next morning then ensued to discover just what men did wear in the 20s. Ladies’ wear is OK, we all know about that – long and lean and boyish (spot on for me then! – Louise) but the men’s kit was not so easy. However, we did a rootle around and managed to put together an outfit each of reasonable authenticity (to a blind man on a galloping horse anyway). But you must judge yourselves from the pictures. Everyone had made such an effort we were glad we had too and hadn’t let the side down.
The lunch time party was great with lovely nibbles provided by Malcolm’s wife Lucie and helpers and the main course was excellent fish and chips provided by a mobile fish and chip van from nearby Moissac. What a great idea of Lucie’s for feeding 60 guests.
Excellent musical entertainment was provided during and after the feast by Malcolm on piano, his brother on clarinet and a wandering minstrel or two on double bass. Also having a go were a couple of young lads whose voices, self-confidence and skill were way beyond their age of 13 or 14. Later on, Malcolm’s vocalist daughter joined in too – a real family do.
The weather held until about 6pm when rain stopped play which was a shame, as many people returned to their boats, so we decided with so many friends around we would stay on at Meilhan an extra day and enjoyed catching up with some and having a lovely lunch at the nearby restaurant, courtesy of Peter and Nicci.
So next day we returned to Lagruère for an excellent evening barbeque then a morning farewell as Peter and Nicci set off on their motorbike to return to Aurigny around 4 hours drive away, and we returned upstream to Buzet. A really great 5 days ‘holiday’.
We took a couple of day trips by car, including one to a town called Condom (we just had to have a look at it!) which wasn’t too exciting in the event apart from its wonderful sculpture of the three (4) Musketeers, but nearby was a charming hilltop fortified village called Larrassingle and another lovely village with a completely circular central ‘square’ – Fources. One of the main aims of this day trip was to stock up on some excellent wine, a bottle of which Stuart and Christine from HILDA MAY had given us when they came for drinks.
There has been no chance for us on Riccall to get onto the River Lot this year. The river/canal situation here is very complicated: we are moored on the Canal Lateral a la Garonne at Buzet. The River Garonne flows in a roughly parallel course a mile or so away. The River Baïse is essentially a tributary of the River Garonne but has to pass under the canal to reach its confluence. The River Lot is another tributary of the Garonne but a little further downstream. So to get onto the River Lot, which is beautiful, from Buzet you have to descend two locks onto the Baïse, travel down the Baïse for about 4 kms, descend a lock onto the Garonne, travel 4 kms on the Garonne, and then ascend a lock onto the River Lot. Now everyone says this is all very worthwhile because the Lot is so lovely, but the problem is that if the Garonne is low, as it has been all this summer and autumn, there is not enough water in it to enable Riccall to traverse the 4kms downstream. But we have friends on PEABODY, Ced and Suzie, whose boat draws less than Riccall and who made it onto the Lot in the early spring. Their problem was, and still is, that they cannot get back off the Lot until there is more water in the Garonne river!
We joined them on a Tuesday morning and had a truly lovely cruise up the Lot as far as Villeneuve sur Lot, then moored for the night and had a barbeque in the mild evening air. The next day Ced returned us to our car and we drove back to Buzet. So we have had a little taster of the Lot and very nice it was too.
Shortly after that Jane and Guy, our mooring ‘neighbours’ on our pontoon at Buzet on their wide beam narrow boat ROSE OF TRALEE, came for supper and then a few days later Ken and Rhonda (SOMEWHERE) came for supper and stayed the night.
Next in the list of autumn out and about-ing was a day trip to Condom (yes, we just couldn’t miss that one out!) and another on ROSE OF TRALEE onto the Baïse, the other river in the area that we can’t do due to Riccall’s draught. We thoroughly enjoyed our trip, even if Alex did manage to take a bit of the shine off ROSE’s bow as he brought her into moor!
While making last minute touches to the preparations for our next visitors Nick and Gail of MAGELLAN one morning a few days later, we received a text from Judith of NOORDSTER, moored just half a kilometre upstream from us in the second Buzet port. The boat was aground and she wondered if we could help with any suggestions. We went along there on our bikes and after several attempts with ropes strung across the canal and well-intentioned but useless help from hire boats we gave up, and had to leave poor Judith to try and enlist the help of the VNF. We couldn’t stay longer as our visitors were driving over shortly for lunch and we knew they would be with us for most of the afternoon. However, when they left after a good lunch and chat, we texted Judith to see how she was doing. No luck with the VNF, so we offered to go up in Riccall and pull NOORDSTER free. So we extracted RICCALL from her fairly enclosed mooring and trundled up to NOORDSTER. Here we drew up alongside and tied slightly loose ropes for and aft. Then with a heave backwards then forwards NOORDSTER slid of the bottom and into the channel so fast that Judith was left on the shore! Fortunately Terry, acting as temporary crew, was still aboard NOORDSTER so Jude had to shout instructions on how to start the engine then get the boat back to a place where she could get aboard. All of this, much to the amusement of the crowd of motorhome gongoozlers who were looking on!
Meanwhile, we had unhitched ourselves, done a 180 degree turn in the wide section beyond and were heading back to our own port. The whole operation took less than an hour – amazing!
The American couple Walt and Gail on LES VIEUX PAPILLONS are moored here in Buzet for the winter and invited us round for what they referred to as ‘drinks’, but curiously asked us if we were vegetarian! So, intrigued, we set off for what we would normally expect to be a couple of hours at most, but Walt kept bringing more goodies to eat and different things to drink, including $100-a-bottle Tequila, so we didn’t leave until after 10.30! Still it was a great fun evening and no way did we need anything more to eat or drink that night!
Another 70th birthday party arrived the next week – Ken’s of SOMEWHERE. Rhonda had booked a table for 9 of us at a lovely little restaurant lockside a short distance downstream from here. Le Pichet et La Chope (Pitcher and Jug) is owned and run by a Belgian couple and we have eaten there before – jolly good too. Alex doesn’t really like drinking at lunchtimes so he elected to drive – it’s only 15 minutes away. Louise had been hunting for a suitable gift(s) for Ken and had found a lovely ‘coffee table’ book on the Ile de Ré and a barbecuing apron, and Alex had come up with some English beers. As we were getting ready to set off, Louise jokingly tried on a pair of pink hotpants which she had bought in the UK for the French summer. Knowing that Ken really admires Louise’s legs (comments on which have even been made on their own blog!) Alex suggested that she went dressed like that! Er no! The compromise was that she wore a calf length brown skirt over the hot pants, then when we arrived Louise handed over the presents to Ken and said that she had one more present for him, at which she proceeded to undo and drop the skirt! Well that brought the house down – Ken was gratifyingly amazed, but one of the male guests, who we had only met briefly before, was transfixed – open jawed!!! Anyway, everybody thought it a good joke and Louise sat next to Ken so he could get an eyeful until the afternoon cooled off a bit and the skirt went back on!
All in all a busy few days, so we did nothing the next week until we set off for a few days helping Gill and Brian near Gaillac with their new house plans. We then drove to Bergerac via lovely Monpazier and Cahors and spent a night in the best chambre d’hotes we have been to for 17 years, near Monbaziac. In fact, when we were shown our room Alex wondered if the price had actually been €55 per person rather than for the pair of us! Actually we probably wouldn’t have minded too much if it had been, such good value was it: huge bedroom, queen sized bed, generous en-suite bathroom, separate en suite loo, private outside patio with table and chairs, shared swimming pool, other outside seating areas and shady terrace, use of barbeque with own food if required (which could be stored in the fridge till required), the list goes on, and a very pleasant English couple running it.
The next day we had lunch with Sue and Richard Adams (Louise and Sue worked together at Fenwicks) at their small farm near Duras, then found ourselves another B & B near St Emilion. This one wasn’t such good value, but facilities for us to cook our own supper somewhat made up for it.
And then – we drove up to the Ile de Ré. We had been very impressed by the book we’d bought Ken on this island, though initially we had no idea where it was! It turned out to be an island off the coast opposite La Rochelle. There used to be a causeway over to the island, like Holy Island, but that has now been replaced by a huge bridge - €9 charge to get onto the island, but it’s free to get off again!
It’s an amazing place with a lot of old fortifications, but its main claims to fame are its mussel and oyster beds and its sea salt production.
The villages are small, the houses typical fishermen’s cottages in the main, all painted white with GREEN doors. It doesn’t seem to matter what shade of green, just so long as they are all green! Its easy to get lost if you stray from the main road, but the villages are not very big, so you soon emerge into the daylight again as it were, and wonder where you have got to. Between the villages, each with its own little harbour, are the mussel and oyster beds along the shore line and a bit further inland are the salt drying lagoons with sluices to let the seawater in, then hold it there while the water evaporates, leaving the salt crystals.
At the end of the island, needless to say, is the lighthouse, up which we could and had to go and what a view from the top!
It is the most charming place – a world of its own somehow, away from the run-of-the-mill rest of France and a delightful destination.
Although we had a list of 4 chambres d’hotes on the island we hadn’t booked anywhere, hoping to do so ad hoc. Then Louise spotted a hotel which had been listed in the Tourist Information handout, and before Alex could blink, she’d popped in and booked a room for the night – not expensive, but breakfast at €8 each a bit much for us – after all, you only get bread, maybe a croissant if you’re lucky and coffee! We dropped into the local supermarket and bought cornflakes, muesli, orange juice and milk. Alex sweet-talked the hotel staff into a spot in their fridge for the milk and orange so that was OK. In the morning we just had breakfast in our room (we always carry spoons and bowls in the car) and coffee and tea in the local café. Cheapskates? Us?
The previous evening we had had a nice meal in a local restaurant with rather a nice bottle of Ile de Ré wine. Our waiter was a really nice young man who spoke excellent English. We had earlier helped him to get his outside menu lit up (!) so he was happy to chat, and told us where we could buy this wine at the cooperative cave on the island and that of course it would be much cheaper than the €17 we had paid in the restaurant and only available on the island.
As we were leaving the island, we had one last village to look at and almost by chance we also found the cave close by. Indeed the wine was only about €4 a bottle for 12 or more so we bought 2 dozen.
We left the Ile de Ré over the magnificent bridge and headed off on a wild goose chase into the suburbs of La Rochelle where Alex thought were some WW2 submarine pens to be seen. Well we didn’t see them – more research required. All we got for our trouble was being flashed by a sign that said we were in a 30 kph zone and that we now had a fine and points on the licence for exceeding the limit! and the cheapest diesel we have found in France so far. So you win some, you lose some.
We drove down the coast a bit, then out to a nice restaurant at the very end of a spit of land which juts out into the ocean, where we had a lovely seafood lunch, then further down the coast and a ferry across what is essentially the mouth of the Dordogne and Garonne rivers. The diversion to avoid the €29 charge would take hours so the audience is somewhat captive – plenty of people were clearly prepared to pay this extortionate charge for a 20 minute crossing. And then after a tedious hour and a half’s driving we found ourselves negotiating the Bordeaux ring road at 5pm on a Friday evening. I mean, how good was that!
An hour and 20k later and we were at last on the homeward stretch of motorway when a sign popped up saying that our exit, No 6, was closed and the alternatives were either to take No 5, 20kms before ours, or No 7, 30kms after. So a rather tedious end to the journey as well, but hey ho, it’s all fun really, especially some of the backwoods roads our GPS takes us on. At one point we were sure we were on the canal towpath, not on a proper road!
On our return to France after our adventures on the narrowboat in the UK, we had to make ready for a trip down the canal to Meilhan to attend Malcolm’s (BODY AND SOUL) 70th birthday party. Also to this bash had been invited our very good friends Nicci and Peter of AURIGNY, but as their boat was miles away on the Canal du Midi we offered them a few days on Riccall as we travelled there and back.
They joined us by motorbike at a little Halte Nautique, Lagruère, where unexpectedly Ken and Rhonda also dropped in (by car) and we all had a jolly supper at the restaurant. The following day we set off for Meilhan passing CONNIE, also en route to the same party and said hello to Charles and Caroline who had stopped for a late lunch.
When we arrived in Meilhan and had moored into our reserved berth we said hello to all and sundry boat owners and settled down to some serious socialising. Late that evening we discovered to our horror that the do was to have a 1920s flavour complete with 1920s clothing. Some intensive research on the internet the next morning then ensued to discover just what men did wear in the 20s. Ladies’ wear is OK, we all know about that – long and lean and boyish (spot on for me then! – Louise) but the men’s kit was not so easy. However, we did a rootle around and managed to put together an outfit each of reasonable authenticity (to a blind man on a galloping horse anyway). But you must judge yourselves from the pictures. Everyone had made such an effort we were glad we had too and hadn’t let the side down.
The lunch time party was great with lovely nibbles provided by Malcolm’s wife Lucie and helpers and the main course was excellent fish and chips provided by a mobile fish and chip van from nearby Moissac. What a great idea of Lucie’s for feeding 60 guests.
Excellent musical entertainment was provided during and after the feast by Malcolm on piano, his brother on clarinet and a wandering minstrel or two on double bass. Also having a go were a couple of young lads whose voices, self-confidence and skill were way beyond their age of 13 or 14. Later on, Malcolm’s vocalist daughter joined in too – a real family do.
The weather held until about 6pm when rain stopped play which was a shame, as many people returned to their boats, so we decided with so many friends around we would stay on at Meilhan an extra day and enjoyed catching up with some and having a lovely lunch at the nearby restaurant, courtesy of Peter and Nicci.
So next day we returned to Lagruère for an excellent evening barbeque then a morning farewell as Peter and Nicci set off on their motorbike to return to Aurigny around 4 hours drive away, and we returned upstream to Buzet. A really great 5 days ‘holiday’.
We took a couple of day trips by car, including one to a town called Condom (we just had to have a look at it!) which wasn’t too exciting in the event apart from its wonderful sculpture of the three (4) Musketeers, but nearby was a charming hilltop fortified village called Larrassingle and another lovely village with a completely circular central ‘square’ – Fources. One of the main aims of this day trip was to stock up on some excellent wine, a bottle of which Stuart and Christine from HILDA MAY had given us when they came for drinks.
There has been no chance for us on Riccall to get onto the River Lot this year. The river/canal situation here is very complicated: we are moored on the Canal Lateral a la Garonne at Buzet. The River Garonne flows in a roughly parallel course a mile or so away. The River Baïse is essentially a tributary of the River Garonne but has to pass under the canal to reach its confluence. The River Lot is another tributary of the Garonne but a little further downstream. So to get onto the River Lot, which is beautiful, from Buzet you have to descend two locks onto the Baïse, travel down the Baïse for about 4 kms, descend a lock onto the Garonne, travel 4 kms on the Garonne, and then ascend a lock onto the River Lot. Now everyone says this is all very worthwhile because the Lot is so lovely, but the problem is that if the Garonne is low, as it has been all this summer and autumn, there is not enough water in it to enable Riccall to traverse the 4kms downstream. But we have friends on PEABODY, Ced and Suzie, whose boat draws less than Riccall and who made it onto the Lot in the early spring. Their problem was, and still is, that they cannot get back off the Lot until there is more water in the Garonne river!
We joined them on a Tuesday morning and had a truly lovely cruise up the Lot as far as Villeneuve sur Lot, then moored for the night and had a barbeque in the mild evening air. The next day Ced returned us to our car and we drove back to Buzet. So we have had a little taster of the Lot and very nice it was too.
Shortly after that Jane and Guy, our mooring ‘neighbours’ on our pontoon at Buzet on their wide beam narrow boat ROSE OF TRALEE, came for supper and then a few days later Ken and Rhonda (SOMEWHERE) came for supper and stayed the night.
Next in the list of autumn out and about-ing was a day trip to Condom (yes, we just couldn’t miss that one out!) and another on ROSE OF TRALEE onto the Baïse, the other river in the area that we can’t do due to Riccall’s draught. We thoroughly enjoyed our trip, even if Alex did manage to take a bit of the shine off ROSE’s bow as he brought her into moor!
While making last minute touches to the preparations for our next visitors Nick and Gail of MAGELLAN one morning a few days later, we received a text from Judith of NOORDSTER, moored just half a kilometre upstream from us in the second Buzet port. The boat was aground and she wondered if we could help with any suggestions. We went along there on our bikes and after several attempts with ropes strung across the canal and well-intentioned but useless help from hire boats we gave up, and had to leave poor Judith to try and enlist the help of the VNF. We couldn’t stay longer as our visitors were driving over shortly for lunch and we knew they would be with us for most of the afternoon. However, when they left after a good lunch and chat, we texted Judith to see how she was doing. No luck with the VNF, so we offered to go up in Riccall and pull NOORDSTER free. So we extracted RICCALL from her fairly enclosed mooring and trundled up to NOORDSTER. Here we drew up alongside and tied slightly loose ropes for and aft. Then with a heave backwards then forwards NOORDSTER slid of the bottom and into the channel so fast that Judith was left on the shore! Fortunately Terry, acting as temporary crew, was still aboard NOORDSTER so Jude had to shout instructions on how to start the engine then get the boat back to a place where she could get aboard. All of this, much to the amusement of the crowd of motorhome gongoozlers who were looking on!
Meanwhile, we had unhitched ourselves, done a 180 degree turn in the wide section beyond and were heading back to our own port. The whole operation took less than an hour – amazing!
The American couple Walt and Gail on LES VIEUX PAPILLONS are moored here in Buzet for the winter and invited us round for what they referred to as ‘drinks’, but curiously asked us if we were vegetarian! So, intrigued, we set off for what we would normally expect to be a couple of hours at most, but Walt kept bringing more goodies to eat and different things to drink, including $100-a-bottle Tequila, so we didn’t leave until after 10.30! Still it was a great fun evening and no way did we need anything more to eat or drink that night!
Another 70th birthday party arrived the next week – Ken’s of SOMEWHERE. Rhonda had booked a table for 9 of us at a lovely little restaurant lockside a short distance downstream from here. Le Pichet et La Chope (Pitcher and Jug) is owned and run by a Belgian couple and we have eaten there before – jolly good too. Alex doesn’t really like drinking at lunchtimes so he elected to drive – it’s only 15 minutes away. Louise had been hunting for a suitable gift(s) for Ken and had found a lovely ‘coffee table’ book on the Ile de Ré and a barbecuing apron, and Alex had come up with some English beers. As we were getting ready to set off, Louise jokingly tried on a pair of pink hotpants which she had bought in the UK for the French summer. Knowing that Ken really admires Louise’s legs (comments on which have even been made on their own blog!) Alex suggested that she went dressed like that! Er no! The compromise was that she wore a calf length brown skirt over the hot pants, then when we arrived Louise handed over the presents to Ken and said that she had one more present for him, at which she proceeded to undo and drop the skirt! Well that brought the house down – Ken was gratifyingly amazed, but one of the male guests, who we had only met briefly before, was transfixed – open jawed!!! Anyway, everybody thought it a good joke and Louise sat next to Ken so he could get an eyeful until the afternoon cooled off a bit and the skirt went back on!
All in all a busy few days, so we did nothing the next week until we set off for a few days helping Gill and Brian near Gaillac with their new house plans. We then drove to Bergerac via lovely Monpazier and Cahors and spent a night in the best chambre d’hotes we have been to for 17 years, near Monbaziac. In fact, when we were shown our room Alex wondered if the price had actually been €55 per person rather than for the pair of us! Actually we probably wouldn’t have minded too much if it had been, such good value was it: huge bedroom, queen sized bed, generous en-suite bathroom, separate en suite loo, private outside patio with table and chairs, shared swimming pool, other outside seating areas and shady terrace, use of barbeque with own food if required (which could be stored in the fridge till required), the list goes on, and a very pleasant English couple running it.
The next day we had lunch with Sue and Richard Adams (Louise and Sue worked together at Fenwicks) at their small farm near Duras, then found ourselves another B & B near St Emilion. This one wasn’t such good value, but facilities for us to cook our own supper somewhat made up for it.
And then – we drove up to the Ile de Ré. We had been very impressed by the book we’d bought Ken on this island, though initially we had no idea where it was! It turned out to be an island off the coast opposite La Rochelle. There used to be a causeway over to the island, like Holy Island, but that has now been replaced by a huge bridge - €9 charge to get onto the island, but it’s free to get off again!
It’s an amazing place with a lot of old fortifications, but its main claims to fame are its mussel and oyster beds and its sea salt production.
The villages are small, the houses typical fishermen’s cottages in the main, all painted white with GREEN doors. It doesn’t seem to matter what shade of green, just so long as they are all green! Its easy to get lost if you stray from the main road, but the villages are not very big, so you soon emerge into the daylight again as it were, and wonder where you have got to. Between the villages, each with its own little harbour, are the mussel and oyster beds along the shore line and a bit further inland are the salt drying lagoons with sluices to let the seawater in, then hold it there while the water evaporates, leaving the salt crystals.
At the end of the island, needless to say, is the lighthouse, up which we could and had to go and what a view from the top!
It is the most charming place – a world of its own somehow, away from the run-of-the-mill rest of France and a delightful destination.
Although we had a list of 4 chambres d’hotes on the island we hadn’t booked anywhere, hoping to do so ad hoc. Then Louise spotted a hotel which had been listed in the Tourist Information handout, and before Alex could blink, she’d popped in and booked a room for the night – not expensive, but breakfast at €8 each a bit much for us – after all, you only get bread, maybe a croissant if you’re lucky and coffee! We dropped into the local supermarket and bought cornflakes, muesli, orange juice and milk. Alex sweet-talked the hotel staff into a spot in their fridge for the milk and orange so that was OK. In the morning we just had breakfast in our room (we always carry spoons and bowls in the car) and coffee and tea in the local café. Cheapskates? Us?
The previous evening we had had a nice meal in a local restaurant with rather a nice bottle of Ile de Ré wine. Our waiter was a really nice young man who spoke excellent English. We had earlier helped him to get his outside menu lit up (!) so he was happy to chat, and told us where we could buy this wine at the cooperative cave on the island and that of course it would be much cheaper than the €17 we had paid in the restaurant and only available on the island.
As we were leaving the island, we had one last village to look at and almost by chance we also found the cave close by. Indeed the wine was only about €4 a bottle for 12 or more so we bought 2 dozen.
We left the Ile de Ré over the magnificent bridge and headed off on a wild goose chase into the suburbs of La Rochelle where Alex thought were some WW2 submarine pens to be seen. Well we didn’t see them – more research required. All we got for our trouble was being flashed by a sign that said we were in a 30 kph zone and that we now had a fine and points on the licence for exceeding the limit! and the cheapest diesel we have found in France so far. So you win some, you lose some.
We drove down the coast a bit, then out to a nice restaurant at the very end of a spit of land which juts out into the ocean, where we had a lovely seafood lunch, then further down the coast and a ferry across what is essentially the mouth of the Dordogne and Garonne rivers. The diversion to avoid the €29 charge would take hours so the audience is somewhat captive – plenty of people were clearly prepared to pay this extortionate charge for a 20 minute crossing. And then after a tedious hour and a half’s driving we found ourselves negotiating the Bordeaux ring road at 5pm on a Friday evening. I mean, how good was that!
An hour and 20k later and we were at last on the homeward stretch of motorway when a sign popped up saying that our exit, No 6, was closed and the alternatives were either to take No 5, 20kms before ours, or No 7, 30kms after. So a rather tedious end to the journey as well, but hey ho, it’s all fun really, especially some of the backwoods roads our GPS takes us on. At one point we were sure we were on the canal towpath, not on a proper road!
Thursday 15 September 2011
Lechlade to Home (UK)
Now at last, we are back at home on Riccall in sunny southern France! but to get here first we had to get home to Castleford from Lechlade on the narrowboat.
We left Lechlade and spent two idyllic nights on the Thames, away from it all in the depths of the countryside on our way back to Oxford. There is a ‘short cut’ (is that the derivation of the expression I wonder?) north of Oxford called the Duke’s Cut, from the Thames to the Oxford Canal which we took, thus avoiding the rather busy moorings of the city itself. That night we moored up near Heyford just as a downpour started but got the ropes tied before we got too wet.
Next day we got to Banbury where we moored just below the town lock and Louise discovered a bus to Tesco for the following day which would start from a point just 50m from our moorings and drop us off actually in Tesco’s car park, then pick us up an hour and a half later – perfect.
We eventually set off again from Banbury and moored up for the night just north of Cropredy, which afficianados will know holds an annual music festival (following on from the farewell concert Fairport Convention held there many years ago). The whole canal through the town and for miles before and after was packed with boats, some moored two deep ready for the following weekend.
At this point we had learned that ‘Stan’ a close friend of Louise’s parents had recently died. So we looked at the map and realised that if we could get to a certain marina – Wheltondale Wharf – Steve (Alex’s sister Julia’s partner) might be able to pick us up and Louise could catch a train back to Co Durham for the funeral, which she was keen to attend.
Bit of a problem with lack of water and restricted locking times imposed by BW meant that, when we got to the Claydon flight of 5 locks up to the summit level, we were 6th in line and it took 2 hours to complete. After traversing the summit level we arrived at the Napton flight down, at about 3pm, and discovered we were 24th in the queue!! But by 4.30 when the locks closed we were now 11th in line to descend. Eventually we were through by 1.30pm the following day and found a lovely mooring at 4 o’clock that evening and in the evening sunshine painted the whole of one side of the boat.
The effect was slightly spoiled, we discovered the following morning, by the torrential downpour we had endured not just quite long enough after the paint had been applied! Still, it made for a good undercoat.
We got to our Wheltondale Marina mooring about midday: Steve picked us up and ferried us back to their home near Bedford. Louise left by train the next morning (Mon) and duly arrived back at 6pm on Tuesday.
It had all gone like clockwork until Louise, with her cousin Dorothy, arrived at the church only to eventually discover that they were a week early! The funeral was actually booked for the following Tuesday! Clearly there had been a misunderstanding somewhere along the line – but Louise had a nice lunch with her cousin before setting off back to Bedford.
So she returned to Julia and Steve’s, where of course everyone thought the whole thing was hilarious!!!! and we resumed our journey north, but felt that another attempt at attending the funeral the following week was perhaps a step too far.
We had problems with restriction on the Watford flight which took hours to climb, then had to moor within earshot of the dreadful M1. Not many people realise as they travel the M1 that the Grand Union canal runs right behind the northern carriageway services at Watford Gap and then runs under the motorway itself.
We diverted to Market Harborough after an easy descent of the famous Foxton Locks, where we spent the night and had a good meal at the Waterfront restaurant.
The next day we contacted Louise’s cousin Ruth and she and her granddaughter Rachel, Rachel’s husband Jason and their little daughter Harriet came down to the boat for a short trip. Harriet was enchanted with the whole business of being on a boat and it was great fun.
After a few days we arrived in Nottingham, but not without passage through some very shallow pounds, one of which a rather grumpy lockkeeper (a rare sight on British canals – the lockkeeper not the grumps!) had to fill for us before we could proceed at all. But from Leicester onwards we were on the river Soar and then the Trent, and there was no shortage of water there.
After a night in Newark, we decided to head for Cromwell Lock the next day and trust to luck on the tides, for the onward journey north (downstream).
The lockkeeper at Cromwell suggested we pen out at about 12.30pm to catch the tide and if we over-nighted half way down at Gainsborough, we should set off again at 12pm the following day. OK – we took his advice and penned out at 12.30 and started off down the Trent with about 1½ miles per hour of help from the river. Then after about 15 minutes, we noticed our SOG (speed over the ground) reduce and reduce until it was down to about 3mph.
What we then realised was that the lockkeeper had penned us out about 2 hours too soon and at first we had been travelling down with the normal flow of the river, then we had met the incoming tide!
So we punched on and eventually after a couple of hours we started to be helped by the ebb. We got to Gainsborough at about 5.30 and moored up on the floating pontoon.
The Cromwell lockkeeper had told us to set off again at 12pm the following day so to fill in the morning we re-painted the whole of the side of the boat which had been rain-spoiled. But as 12pm arrived we could see that the tide was still racing in, so we waited until 1.15 when it eventually turned before setting off down to Keadby.
I don’t think in all the times we have travelled up and down the tidal Trent we have ever been given accurate departure times by the local lockkeepers, who are supposed to know, and we think that is pretty poor.
We got into Keadby by about 4pm and Alex had a long chat with the guys working on a Humber keel called Onesimus. We had talked to the owner about 5 years ago but since then the inside had been completely stripped out. In fact, as well as renewing several plates and most of the ribs, and removing the old ‘doubled’ plates from the inside (dangerous stuff - with it still in the water!) the lads were next going to replace all the rivets (250,000!)
Eventually we got back to Methley Bridge moorings having painted the whole of the other side of the boat while moored overnight at the end of the New Cut – our last night aboard. Having got back we also managed to repaint the wood of all the windows, so hopefully she is all set to withstand the winter!!
During most of this trip on ‘The Boat’ Louise has been looking at the names of other boats (as you do) with a view to re-naming the narrowboat now that it belongs to her (sold to her by Alex for £1) Some of them are pretty bizarre like ‘Avdunna’; and endless Meanders, and of course Dunwurkin and Duncommutin etc. Alex’s contribution was ‘Less Cargo’ with a picture of a small snail but Louise didn’t like it much. Then she came up with the best yet - Dunbonkin which really had us laughing. (Fortunately we disproved it the next day!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)
We had about 5 days to go before we drove back to France so Alex decided (as only Alex could – Louise) that this would be a good time to build the decking where the patio used to be at the back of our pied-a-tèrre in Co Durham. So while Louise rushed around getting together all the things we needed to bring back to France, Alex grafted away laying a base, then the decking boards atop, followed by a handrail with diamond lattice infill to surround it. It is an enormous improvement on what was there before, and we even managed to have our morning cup of tea/coffee on it to christen it the day before we set off for France!
We left Lechlade and spent two idyllic nights on the Thames, away from it all in the depths of the countryside on our way back to Oxford. There is a ‘short cut’ (is that the derivation of the expression I wonder?) north of Oxford called the Duke’s Cut, from the Thames to the Oxford Canal which we took, thus avoiding the rather busy moorings of the city itself. That night we moored up near Heyford just as a downpour started but got the ropes tied before we got too wet.
Next day we got to Banbury where we moored just below the town lock and Louise discovered a bus to Tesco for the following day which would start from a point just 50m from our moorings and drop us off actually in Tesco’s car park, then pick us up an hour and a half later – perfect.
We eventually set off again from Banbury and moored up for the night just north of Cropredy, which afficianados will know holds an annual music festival (following on from the farewell concert Fairport Convention held there many years ago). The whole canal through the town and for miles before and after was packed with boats, some moored two deep ready for the following weekend.
At this point we had learned that ‘Stan’ a close friend of Louise’s parents had recently died. So we looked at the map and realised that if we could get to a certain marina – Wheltondale Wharf – Steve (Alex’s sister Julia’s partner) might be able to pick us up and Louise could catch a train back to Co Durham for the funeral, which she was keen to attend.
Bit of a problem with lack of water and restricted locking times imposed by BW meant that, when we got to the Claydon flight of 5 locks up to the summit level, we were 6th in line and it took 2 hours to complete. After traversing the summit level we arrived at the Napton flight down, at about 3pm, and discovered we were 24th in the queue!! But by 4.30 when the locks closed we were now 11th in line to descend. Eventually we were through by 1.30pm the following day and found a lovely mooring at 4 o’clock that evening and in the evening sunshine painted the whole of one side of the boat.
The effect was slightly spoiled, we discovered the following morning, by the torrential downpour we had endured not just quite long enough after the paint had been applied! Still, it made for a good undercoat.
We got to our Wheltondale Marina mooring about midday: Steve picked us up and ferried us back to their home near Bedford. Louise left by train the next morning (Mon) and duly arrived back at 6pm on Tuesday.
It had all gone like clockwork until Louise, with her cousin Dorothy, arrived at the church only to eventually discover that they were a week early! The funeral was actually booked for the following Tuesday! Clearly there had been a misunderstanding somewhere along the line – but Louise had a nice lunch with her cousin before setting off back to Bedford.
So she returned to Julia and Steve’s, where of course everyone thought the whole thing was hilarious!!!! and we resumed our journey north, but felt that another attempt at attending the funeral the following week was perhaps a step too far.
We had problems with restriction on the Watford flight which took hours to climb, then had to moor within earshot of the dreadful M1. Not many people realise as they travel the M1 that the Grand Union canal runs right behind the northern carriageway services at Watford Gap and then runs under the motorway itself.
We diverted to Market Harborough after an easy descent of the famous Foxton Locks, where we spent the night and had a good meal at the Waterfront restaurant.
The next day we contacted Louise’s cousin Ruth and she and her granddaughter Rachel, Rachel’s husband Jason and their little daughter Harriet came down to the boat for a short trip. Harriet was enchanted with the whole business of being on a boat and it was great fun.
After a few days we arrived in Nottingham, but not without passage through some very shallow pounds, one of which a rather grumpy lockkeeper (a rare sight on British canals – the lockkeeper not the grumps!) had to fill for us before we could proceed at all. But from Leicester onwards we were on the river Soar and then the Trent, and there was no shortage of water there.
After a night in Newark, we decided to head for Cromwell Lock the next day and trust to luck on the tides, for the onward journey north (downstream).
The lockkeeper at Cromwell suggested we pen out at about 12.30pm to catch the tide and if we over-nighted half way down at Gainsborough, we should set off again at 12pm the following day. OK – we took his advice and penned out at 12.30 and started off down the Trent with about 1½ miles per hour of help from the river. Then after about 15 minutes, we noticed our SOG (speed over the ground) reduce and reduce until it was down to about 3mph.
What we then realised was that the lockkeeper had penned us out about 2 hours too soon and at first we had been travelling down with the normal flow of the river, then we had met the incoming tide!
So we punched on and eventually after a couple of hours we started to be helped by the ebb. We got to Gainsborough at about 5.30 and moored up on the floating pontoon.
The Cromwell lockkeeper had told us to set off again at 12pm the following day so to fill in the morning we re-painted the whole of the side of the boat which had been rain-spoiled. But as 12pm arrived we could see that the tide was still racing in, so we waited until 1.15 when it eventually turned before setting off down to Keadby.
I don’t think in all the times we have travelled up and down the tidal Trent we have ever been given accurate departure times by the local lockkeepers, who are supposed to know, and we think that is pretty poor.
We got into Keadby by about 4pm and Alex had a long chat with the guys working on a Humber keel called Onesimus. We had talked to the owner about 5 years ago but since then the inside had been completely stripped out. In fact, as well as renewing several plates and most of the ribs, and removing the old ‘doubled’ plates from the inside (dangerous stuff - with it still in the water!) the lads were next going to replace all the rivets (250,000!)
Eventually we got back to Methley Bridge moorings having painted the whole of the other side of the boat while moored overnight at the end of the New Cut – our last night aboard. Having got back we also managed to repaint the wood of all the windows, so hopefully she is all set to withstand the winter!!
During most of this trip on ‘The Boat’ Louise has been looking at the names of other boats (as you do) with a view to re-naming the narrowboat now that it belongs to her (sold to her by Alex for £1) Some of them are pretty bizarre like ‘Avdunna’; and endless Meanders, and of course Dunwurkin and Duncommutin etc. Alex’s contribution was ‘Less Cargo’ with a picture of a small snail but Louise didn’t like it much. Then she came up with the best yet - Dunbonkin which really had us laughing. (Fortunately we disproved it the next day!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)
We had about 5 days to go before we drove back to France so Alex decided (as only Alex could – Louise) that this would be a good time to build the decking where the patio used to be at the back of our pied-a-tèrre in Co Durham. So while Louise rushed around getting together all the things we needed to bring back to France, Alex grafted away laying a base, then the decking boards atop, followed by a handrail with diamond lattice infill to surround it. It is an enormous improvement on what was there before, and we even managed to have our morning cup of tea/coffee on it to christen it the day before we set off for France!
Thursday 25 August 2011
Worcester to Lechlade
We had two options for getting to the most important (for us) wedding – Richard and Diana’s – either back up the Birmingham and Worcester Canal and turn right onto the Stratford on Avon and then the Grand Union, or down the River Severn and back up the River Avon, then onto the Grand Union. As we never like to retrace our steps if possible, we decided on the rather longer rivers’ route. It’s around 40 miles as the crow flies between Worcester and Lechlade – and three weeks by boat!!
So - down the Severn to Tewkesbury (scene of quite recent calamitous flooding) where we did a sharp left into the River Avon (license £50 for a week), moored up for the night (£3) and perused the rather poor Avon booklet we had been persuaded to buy (£6). We had a stroll round Tewkesbury that evening to see if there might be a nice restaurant, and were rather surprised, as we sauntered down the high street, to keep coming across groups of people in sackcloth carrying staves or pikes or such like! We popped into one of the few shops still open at 5.30pm on a Sunday night, an antiques shop, and were informed by the owner that we had just missed Tewkesbury’s amazing Medieval Festival, where one of the largest gatherings of period war re-enactors in the country had staged the Battle of Tewkesbury (1471). Typical!!!!!! We always miss these types of events by a couple of days or so – but in this case by only a matter of minutes!
Needless to say there were no restaurants in the town, only ‘pub grub’ which we didn’t fancy, as we can almost always do better than that on the boat! (Thank you Alex! - Louise)
We stopped for a brief shop and spent the next night at Evesham at the ‘Workman Gardens’ moorings, and then pressed on to Stratford.
At Stratford we managed to find moorings opposite the famous theatre, which of course we looked round. We also went up the ‘new’ tower which had been incorporated in the rebuilding of the theatre, for an excellent bird’s eye view of the town and treated ourselves to a good meal in a restaurant called ‘Lambs’ - a short stroll from the boat moorings.
The next day we were off the Avon River and back onto the British Waterways Stratford on Avon Canal. First stop was one mile up by a bridge where we knew we were close to an Asda and a Tesco for more supplies. That evening we eventually reached Wooton Wewen for the night after a long slog behind a very slow hire boat, so the next morning we started at 8am to get ahead of it, then we did 17 locks up to the junction with the Grand Union, where we had lunch, then we did 17 locks of the Hatton flight down the Grand Union mostly in a pair with another boat – Gemma. (They are double locks here and it’s much better if you can go as a pair). Alex was in fighting form so he did all the locks while Louise manoeuvred the boat. We stopped for the night four locks up from bottom lock and the town of Warwick. Louise had been stung on her foot a day or so before and it had started to swell up quite badly, so we made enquiries of walkers on the towpath as we cruised through Warwick and were told there was a Tesco with a pharmacy at Bridge 46. And sure enough there it was, and they recommended a visit to a doctor’s surgery half a mile up the road. An appointment was available in half an hour. Amazing!! Antibiotics prescribed. They did the trick pretty quickly.
We got soaked to the skin doing the 10 Stockton locks in the morning but by the afternoon it had brightened up for the last 3 locks to Napton Junction. Alex vowed that he would not get wet like that again and we would just stop if it started to rain heavily. Then the next day he FELL INTO THE CANAL trying to lasso a bollard from the side of the boat when it had drifted too far away to step off. So he did get soaked again and cracked a rib into the bargain as he just failed to leap to the shore!
We also had our first dose of canal rage that day when an irate woman in a boat coming the other way accused Louise of ‘stealing’ her lock. Louise had gone ahead to prepare the lock for Alex to bring the boat in, and as it had only about 6”of water leakage in the bottom, she emptied it before opening the gate. This ‘woman’ was convinced the lock had been full and as they were coming the other way they should have had priority. Alex could hear her screaming at Louise from where he was 150m yards away! She was wrong, but would not admit it, of course. But it does leave a sour taste in the mouth for a bit.
In due course we got to Oxford, having spent one pleasurable night on the way in Banbury, where they have done a marvellous job on the canalside and have even retained the historic Tooley’s boatyard in the middle of the new shopping centre! We entered the Thames (£95 for 15 days) and moored close to Osney lock for three nights. This gave us a chance to visit Oxford itself and also to catch a train to London to see Emily and new son Herbie (Alex is a grandpa!!!!!!!!!!) Alice also managed to come along and we all enjoyed a very sociable lunch.
A few days later we were in Lechlade after a lovely trip up the Thames. The river is very picturesque here with low lying water meadows on either side and plenty of places to moor ‘away from it all’ – apart from the local livestock that is.
We had arranged to leave the boat in a boatyard at Lechlade so that we could have power to keep the fridge going and Jamie and Janine arrived to pick us up to give us a lift to the hotel at Cricklade ready for the wedding the following day. With him Jamie had an exchange ‘Calor’ gas bottle (our Yorkshire Energas bottles were the wrong sort to exchange in this area) and two parcels we had had delivered to him: one was an inverter for Louise so that she could use her hairdryer on the boat, and the other an inverter welder so Alex could do a welding repair on the weedhatch cover.
However, as Alex was closing up the boat prior to joining Louise, Jamie and Janine in the car, he was just tidying away a rope that Louise had been drying clothes on, when the end flicked up into the corner of his eye. At first he thought nothing of it, but then as his vision started to blur he wiped his eye with a tissue. Instead of tears on the tissue there was blood!!! The corner of his eye was actually bleeding though it didn’t hurt.
Well, it looked terrible, but the show must go on: the bleeding stopped very quickly and normal vision resumed. An hour’s visit to A & E at the Great Western Hospital the next morning produced the necessary antibiotic ointment and life could return to normal.
Out hotel room for the wedding was excellent: Alex could have as long a hot shower as he wanted and Louise a long hot soak in the bath without worrying about use of precious water. (No room for such luxury on the narrowboat).
We had fish and chips, professionally catered, at the bride Diana’s parents’ home on the Friday evening, where Nigel, her father, made us feel most welcome and we met other members of the wedding entourage.
Louise’s ex-husband Stuart and his wife Tracy didn’t make it to the fish and chip supper but Louise and Alex did manage to bump into them in the hotel just before setting off for the evening so, after 15 years a meeting before the wedding did finally take place.
On the day itself, our close friends Michael and Sylvia and Derran and Angela met up with each other for the first time ever in 25 years (!) and we all had a very jolly lunch together.
The wedding at 4pm went very well in the lovely village church and then we all repaired to Diana’s parents’ home where a marquee had been set up for the occasion. Drinks and canapés first, then an excellent meal and dancing and all the usual paraphernalia of such an event. Altogether a lovely weekend. (Thanks are due to Derran who was responsible for most of the wedding photos attached here – our own were few and pretty poor.)
Poor Jamie was a bit hung over in the morning (!) so Derran and Angela kindly gave us a lift back to our boat where we prepared for the return part of our journey.
Thursday 4 August 2011
UK adventure – Castleford to Worcester
We needed to return to England for the whole of July for two weddings and Alex suddenly decided to turn this into an 'excellent adventure' by going to the two weddings in the narrowboat! The canal system allows us to get within a few miles of each one. It may take a little longer than going by car, but should be more fun!
Peter of Zee Otter very kindly gave us a lift to Aiguillon station and we caught train, airport navette and plane back to Leeds/Bradford airport. The plane was late leaving France so we missed the last airport bus to Harrogate and had to get a taxi. The driver dropped us off in the street where Matt (our car mechanic) had told us he had left our car, but we couldn’t find it! Then we realised we were in the wrong street, and as soon as we got to the right one, there was the car! So a late arrival back at Newton Aycliffe.
We realised that the trip by boat to our first wedding in Worcester was going to be a bit tight so we only spent two days at home, sorting everything out before we set off.
We made good time from our home mooring at Castleford to the start of the New Junction canal getting there about midday. Louise called the lockkeeper at Keadby to book passage for the following morning only to be told that it would be too early for British Waterway’s attendance - 5am – so there would only be an afternoon pen out at 5pm. We were due to arrive in Keadby by early evening anyway so we would have had to wait a whole 24 hours or so until the next evening’s pen out. Alex rang the lockkeeper back to ask what time today’s pen out was – 4 o’clock! Perhaps we could just make it by 5pm and still go. The lockkeeper said OK and booked us in. He had asked where we were and we said at the New Cut – but not at which end! I think he assumed ‘his’ end because he felt sure we could make it in time. But the New Cut alone takes 1.5 hours at the best of times. We opened the throttle wide and went for it.
It’s a commercial waterway, so the speed limit is higher than we can achieve but the first fisherman we passed at about 6 mph complained, ‘Is this a race or summat?’ Actually, yes – a race to catch the tide! We were lucky with the bridges and the lock was in our favour and we managed to shave 10 minutes off our best time for the New Cut! Then we were on the Stainforth and Keadby Canal. As we approached Thorne we came up behind a charity barge going very, very slowly, but they let us overtake – great! So we got first to the lock in Thorne as well. Another boater helped us through and warned that the swing footbridge just beyond was faulty but was about to be fixed open. It was. Excellent! As we arrive another boat was trying to set off through it but had a novice at the tiller, who completely cocked up and her partner waved us through. Phew! We watched for them at the next lift bridge but even after we had got through it and lowered it, they were not in sight so we motored on. The last thing we needed was to be boating with a novice through all the lift and swing bridges to Keadby. Finally we got to the sliding rail bridge just before Keadby and as we arrived it opened as if by magic. (We have waited three quarters of an hour for a long enough break in the trains to let us through at this bridge before now.)
Alex rang the lockkeeper and as we arrived he swung the road bridge and we motored straight in to the lock. 4.30pm!!
When the keeper gave the all clear we shot out onto the tidal Trent with about 4mph of incoming tide to help us and by 7pm we were at Gainsborough. We could have gone on to Torksey but after 11.5 hours non-stop we felt we needed a break and anyway an early start the next morning would get us to Torksey at ‘set off’ time anyway, which it did. We sat at Gainsborough and watched the tide turn at 6am, gave it half an hour to get ahead of us, and then set off. By 4.30pm we were in Newark for our second night. Castleford to Newark in two days – must be a record!
From here on, we thought, we can relax a bit as we have gained a whole day already, but when we got near to Willington on the Trent and Mersey we found they were having an open weekend and there were boats galore queuing at locks, moored boats all over the place to slow down for etc. etc. But finally, the next day, we had the climb up into Birmingham through 24 locks – all against us. Louise’s back was still playing up (over-energetic keep-fit!) so Alex did them all! After a 7am start that morning, we got to Gas Street Basin at 6.30pm – Alex totally knackered. Will and Laura came for supper bringing an Indian takeaway with them and we drank a toast to their recent engagement.
In the morning we stopped just south of Birmingham on the Birmingham and Worcester where Will met us again and we had lunch, and then he took us to see his new house. As we travelled down the B and W canal we learned that the Droitwich arm had just been re-opened the previous weekend, after many years of dereliction, so we decided on a slight detour to Worcester via Droitwich, and the River Severn.
It’s always fun to travel on canals which have just been reopened because all the local inhabitants are so enthusiastic about boats travelling through again they come and chat about how it used to be and how nice it is now etc. Great!
So finally we got to Worcester and into the Diglis Basin where Alex had sweet-talked Jackie into letting us stay for a couple of days with electricity (vital for Louise’s hairdryer for the wedding reception picnic!).
After an afternoon and a following morning discovering Worcester – up the cathedral tower for an eagle’s eye view of the city – the taxi arrived and got us to Spetchley Park Gardens for what turned out to be an excellent post-wedding picnic in the park, followed by dancing and a hog roast – and it didn’t rain! (It threatened to all afternoon but didn’t actually do it). A taxi back to the boat at 11pm completed the first leg of our crazy journey.
Peter of Zee Otter very kindly gave us a lift to Aiguillon station and we caught train, airport navette and plane back to Leeds/Bradford airport. The plane was late leaving France so we missed the last airport bus to Harrogate and had to get a taxi. The driver dropped us off in the street where Matt (our car mechanic) had told us he had left our car, but we couldn’t find it! Then we realised we were in the wrong street, and as soon as we got to the right one, there was the car! So a late arrival back at Newton Aycliffe.
We realised that the trip by boat to our first wedding in Worcester was going to be a bit tight so we only spent two days at home, sorting everything out before we set off.
We made good time from our home mooring at Castleford to the start of the New Junction canal getting there about midday. Louise called the lockkeeper at Keadby to book passage for the following morning only to be told that it would be too early for British Waterway’s attendance - 5am – so there would only be an afternoon pen out at 5pm. We were due to arrive in Keadby by early evening anyway so we would have had to wait a whole 24 hours or so until the next evening’s pen out. Alex rang the lockkeeper back to ask what time today’s pen out was – 4 o’clock! Perhaps we could just make it by 5pm and still go. The lockkeeper said OK and booked us in. He had asked where we were and we said at the New Cut – but not at which end! I think he assumed ‘his’ end because he felt sure we could make it in time. But the New Cut alone takes 1.5 hours at the best of times. We opened the throttle wide and went for it.
It’s a commercial waterway, so the speed limit is higher than we can achieve but the first fisherman we passed at about 6 mph complained, ‘Is this a race or summat?’ Actually, yes – a race to catch the tide! We were lucky with the bridges and the lock was in our favour and we managed to shave 10 minutes off our best time for the New Cut! Then we were on the Stainforth and Keadby Canal. As we approached Thorne we came up behind a charity barge going very, very slowly, but they let us overtake – great! So we got first to the lock in Thorne as well. Another boater helped us through and warned that the swing footbridge just beyond was faulty but was about to be fixed open. It was. Excellent! As we arrive another boat was trying to set off through it but had a novice at the tiller, who completely cocked up and her partner waved us through. Phew! We watched for them at the next lift bridge but even after we had got through it and lowered it, they were not in sight so we motored on. The last thing we needed was to be boating with a novice through all the lift and swing bridges to Keadby. Finally we got to the sliding rail bridge just before Keadby and as we arrived it opened as if by magic. (We have waited three quarters of an hour for a long enough break in the trains to let us through at this bridge before now.)
Alex rang the lockkeeper and as we arrived he swung the road bridge and we motored straight in to the lock. 4.30pm!!
When the keeper gave the all clear we shot out onto the tidal Trent with about 4mph of incoming tide to help us and by 7pm we were at Gainsborough. We could have gone on to Torksey but after 11.5 hours non-stop we felt we needed a break and anyway an early start the next morning would get us to Torksey at ‘set off’ time anyway, which it did. We sat at Gainsborough and watched the tide turn at 6am, gave it half an hour to get ahead of us, and then set off. By 4.30pm we were in Newark for our second night. Castleford to Newark in two days – must be a record!
From here on, we thought, we can relax a bit as we have gained a whole day already, but when we got near to Willington on the Trent and Mersey we found they were having an open weekend and there were boats galore queuing at locks, moored boats all over the place to slow down for etc. etc. But finally, the next day, we had the climb up into Birmingham through 24 locks – all against us. Louise’s back was still playing up (over-energetic keep-fit!) so Alex did them all! After a 7am start that morning, we got to Gas Street Basin at 6.30pm – Alex totally knackered. Will and Laura came for supper bringing an Indian takeaway with them and we drank a toast to their recent engagement.
In the morning we stopped just south of Birmingham on the Birmingham and Worcester where Will met us again and we had lunch, and then he took us to see his new house. As we travelled down the B and W canal we learned that the Droitwich arm had just been re-opened the previous weekend, after many years of dereliction, so we decided on a slight detour to Worcester via Droitwich, and the River Severn.
It’s always fun to travel on canals which have just been reopened because all the local inhabitants are so enthusiastic about boats travelling through again they come and chat about how it used to be and how nice it is now etc. Great!
So finally we got to Worcester and into the Diglis Basin where Alex had sweet-talked Jackie into letting us stay for a couple of days with electricity (vital for Louise’s hairdryer for the wedding reception picnic!).
After an afternoon and a following morning discovering Worcester – up the cathedral tower for an eagle’s eye view of the city – the taxi arrived and got us to Spetchley Park Gardens for what turned out to be an excellent post-wedding picnic in the park, followed by dancing and a hog roast – and it didn’t rain! (It threatened to all afternoon but didn’t actually do it). A taxi back to the boat at 11pm completed the first leg of our crazy journey.
Friday 24 June 2011
Moissac to Castets-en-Dorthe and back to Buzet
Eventually, with much regret, we left Moissac and headed off further west again – our second time travelling west on this stretch of canal. We moored in Valance d’Agen on the quay which was vacant yet again. This time we had decided to explore the charming hilltop village of Auvillar which last time when we had been in the area had seemed a hill too far! So we offloaded the trusty bikes and set off. The hill up to the town was a bit of a push (far too steep to pedal – in fact much of it had slipped down the hillside some time during the winter and we had to creep past huge great machines working to stabilise the cliff!) but well worth the effort.
Ken and Rhonda had told us of a good restaurant 6kms further into the countryside and we thought that would be a good place for lunch. An hour later after riding up hill and down dale, we arrived sweaty and tired at the lovely little village of Bardigues. But it was worth it, as the restaurant lived up to every expectation and we even found a less hilly, if longer, road back to Auvillar.
Moving on towards Agen we passed POMME DE MER, who had stopped for lunch at a rather nice-looking canalside restaurant and Nick had a few words with us (between courses) and later that day arrived in Agen where much to Louise’s amazement, we were able to moor in the basin, on the opposite side from all the bustle of the traffic and the hire base. We expected POMME DE MER would join us later, but in the event they moored just before the bridge into the basin, on good bollards which we too had noticed on our way through.
That evening we were approached by a French lady who chatted with us for some time and told us that she was interested in our lifestyle. We invited her back for a longer chat and a drink the following evening.
In the meantime Alex took a trip to Aldi – far away over the aqueduct – chatting to Nick and Sally on the way back who were waiting for the locks. Then, in the afternoon, we both decided to take a trip to Lidl for other supplies (notably gin) and set off in the direction which we had looked up on Lidl’s internet site map.
We were welcomed with open arms by the manager in Lidl who was French, but had spent ten years working in Lidl in Glasgow, and was keen to show us how good his ‘English’ still was. So strange to hear English with a French/Scottish accent! Anyway, we had a good laugh with him, and then set off back to Riccall, hoping to find McDonalds for a wifi connection on the way. However, Louise got a puncture which would NOT stay reflated for more than a few minutes or yards. Alex hightailed it back to the boat for the puncture repair outfit which turned out to be in Louise’s saddle bag on her bike all along! Hey-Ho!
Eventually, after a quick repair, we got back to Riccall and had supper. ‘Elisabeth’ then appeared with her little French poodle ‘Mimi’ and her camera to ‘interview’ us, as it turned out, on our way of life. It appeared that she was running a sort of ‘get a life’ (Alex’s term) internet site where she was counselling people on how they could improve their lot.
She spent an hour or so with us chatting, and snapping and eventually sent us a link to her website where words like ‘relationship’, ‘romantic’ and ‘lifestyle’ were highlighted in the text of her description of us and our life on Riccall! We felt a bit non-plussed reading it!
The following day we pressed on and arrived back at Serignac, where we chatted with BODY AND SOUL’s owners Lucie and Malcolm who were already moored up. Nicky and Peter of AURIGNY had told us about Lucie and Malcolm, with whom they had spent much of the winter in their moorings at Meilhan and so we were pleased to meet them face to face at last. And of course they were great fun and we immediately clicked, as you do with some people you meet on the canals. Lucie is the most amazing cook and Malcolm plays a very competent piano (he has a keyboard installed on board their wide beam and plays regularly for private parties or for dinner and music cruises they hold from time to time).
After a couple of days, we regretfully moved on to Buzet where we were to spend a few days replenishing our stocks before the arrival of Richard and Robert.
However, on the day after we arrived ‘home’ Sara asked us to join everyone later for drinks at the restaurant. We later noticed a great deal of activity around the restaurant kitchen, involving Americans Walt and Gail and their visitors on LES VIEUX PAPILLONS. When we went to see what was going on we discovered that the evening ‘drinks’ to which Sara had invited us was actually going to be a full-blown Cajun feast which they were preparing as a surprise engagement/
early wedding party for Sara and Kevin, but that of course we were very welcome too. So we had a great evening together with all the other boaters plus several of Sara and Kevin’s friends from the locale and we got to try all sorts of unknown-to-us Cajun style dishes and somehow managed to come 2nd in the Louisiana-based quiz that Walt had devised. (I guess we knew as few of the answers as almost anyone else!)
Our journey to Meilhan was enlivened by two episodes of going hard aground while trying to moor up and it took 10-15 minutes in each case to extract ourselves. We also came across an established mooring where we had hoped to moor where the existing boats were so badly moored that the gap for us to get in was about 4m too small. This happens quite a lot on the canals and there is regularly much comment in our Dutch Barge Association magazine on ‘economy of mooring’. Either boat could have moved to let us in but neither captain was willing to trouble himself to do so. We hung about in Riccall for a good 5 minutes discussing the problem but to no avail and moved on towards Meilhan. We moored outside a canalside restaurant where we cycled into Marmande to book our rail tickets and finished off the evening with a nice meal.
Robert and Richard duly arrived at Meilhan in their hire car from Bordeaux airport and we set off for Castets-en-Dorthe. Rob steered for a while and then Richard but as we approached one of the bridges Alex took over to guide Riccall through, then as we got closer and closer doubts suddenly appeared in his mind. This one is lower than the rest! Full reverse and we pulled up with 6” to spare before the wheelhouse roof would have hit the bridge. Not another ROFF? Ah well – by the time we got to Castets an hour or so later, every single bridge on the Canal des Deux Mers (Midi and Garonne) had been noted as a ROFF (roof off) or a RON (roof on) so no more surprises we hope on the way back next year.
Castets-en-Dorthe is a rather grand name for a tired little village whose only claim to fame seems to be its position at the junction of the Canal Lateral a la Garonne and the river Garonne itself which at this point some 50kms inland is still tidal. The Garonne just now is very low after months of near drought as in the UK and all the farmers extracting water along its banks, but in the winter the level can come up dangerously high. In fact in the most famous flood of 1875 the waters came up as high as 11.75m - to the second floor of the lock house, and as recently as 1930 and 1950 over 10m was recorded! We had taken heed of the advice of several boaters to give the rather dull 5 hours down to Bordeaux on the river a miss (even though we are quite used to tidal work on the Trent and Ouse in the UK) and will visit Bordeaux by train or car later.
The hotel boat St Louis had preceded us to Castets and was already moored up on the first bit of available quay when we arrived so we had to go forward onto the next section. We knew that the pontoons were being replaced/extended as the port has been acquired by Veolia, a huge water and waterways enterprise in France, and we had seen a work boat operating as we arrived constructing further stretches of wooden quay. Another boater told us that though the work boat moored up on this bit of quay at the end of the day he thought we had left plenty of room for it to moor. The operator didn’t agree however, and made us move 20 metres right out of ‘his’ space. In fact he had us move so far and then only needed 3 extra metres. (The French, the French!!). The plus side though was that because the quays were still being worked on, mooring was ‘gratuit’ - one of the few words of French we have been glad to learn! (Normally €25 for one night, which is a bit steep by anyone’s standards).
We got back to Meilhan with Rob and Richard for their 6am start the next morning back to the airport. Sadly, the weather for the whole of their visit was very iffy, though it didn’t actually rain until the last day, and then, did it rain?!! We had managed to have a good barbeque in the sun the night we were in Castets though, so all was not lost.
The ST LOUIS moored the next day and Alex was able to commend Alistair on an excellent back-in moor-up – pretty difficult with a 30m boat, no bow thruster, and 6 guests all eating supper on deck! Alex had a chat with one of the crew members Lucinda, who runs wine tastings from her home base in Cahors and is one level below that of a ‘Grand Master of Wine’.
Unfortunately, we blotted our copybook that night when a group of us, including the two crew from the ST LOUIS congregated on BODY AND SOUL for after dinner drinks, and we had a hilarious evening until midnight when we all retired. On their return poor Lucinda and Cheryl got into terrible trouble for making too much noise! We felt a bit bad about that because we had all had a hand in it!!
On our way back to Buzet from Meilhan we stopped on the mooring at Mas d’Agenais and were helped to moor up by one of the boat captains already moored there. We thanked him and off he went, only to return shortly with an invitation to drinks a little later. We accepted gratefully and at the appointed hour wandered along. As we reached his boat we realised that this was one of the boats which hadn’t moved to make space for us several days previously. Oh dear! As we climbed on board the husband said to his wife, “Oh these are the people who were complaining about how we had moored without leaving enough space for them to get in”! Ah! So they had been within earshot, and had known that we wanted to moor and had done nothing about it! Some people are like that at the moorings. We just have to get used to it, take a deep breath and smile!
In fact, Bob of LA CHOUETTE was telling us that when he had tried recently to moor at Serignac and politely asked a cruiser if he could move along the quay a bit to allow him to get in the owner had been extremely rude, ‘f’ing and blinding about the size of LA CHOUETTE (30m). What he obviously failed to grasp is that the bigger the boat, the more we pay for our licence, therefore the more we contribute to VNF to keep the canals alive. But, fortunately, boaters as nasty as this are relatively rare.
We had an excellent meal for lunch on our final day back to Buzet at a new restaurant at Lock 42 – La Chope et Le Pichet (the tankard and the jug) – which we have passed a couple of times so far during its renovation. It had only just opened and mine hosts (Belgian) were very hospitable and the meal was excellent.
Back in Buzet after a few days it was Friday night, and Friday night is fish, chips and quiz night ‘a l’Anglais’ at the little restaurant in the port, run by the port capitaines Kevin and Sara. Twenty people in all and ten of us in our party – Ken and Rhonda from SOMEWHERE, Sam and Claire from NOORDSTER, Bob and Bobbie from LA CHOUETTE, Terry and Sandra from FELIX and ourselves. Well done to Kevin and Sara for a very nice meal, but we only managed third in the quiz this time!
Ken and Rhonda had told us of a good restaurant 6kms further into the countryside and we thought that would be a good place for lunch. An hour later after riding up hill and down dale, we arrived sweaty and tired at the lovely little village of Bardigues. But it was worth it, as the restaurant lived up to every expectation and we even found a less hilly, if longer, road back to Auvillar.
Moving on towards Agen we passed POMME DE MER, who had stopped for lunch at a rather nice-looking canalside restaurant and Nick had a few words with us (between courses) and later that day arrived in Agen where much to Louise’s amazement, we were able to moor in the basin, on the opposite side from all the bustle of the traffic and the hire base. We expected POMME DE MER would join us later, but in the event they moored just before the bridge into the basin, on good bollards which we too had noticed on our way through.
That evening we were approached by a French lady who chatted with us for some time and told us that she was interested in our lifestyle. We invited her back for a longer chat and a drink the following evening.
In the meantime Alex took a trip to Aldi – far away over the aqueduct – chatting to Nick and Sally on the way back who were waiting for the locks. Then, in the afternoon, we both decided to take a trip to Lidl for other supplies (notably gin) and set off in the direction which we had looked up on Lidl’s internet site map.
We were welcomed with open arms by the manager in Lidl who was French, but had spent ten years working in Lidl in Glasgow, and was keen to show us how good his ‘English’ still was. So strange to hear English with a French/Scottish accent! Anyway, we had a good laugh with him, and then set off back to Riccall, hoping to find McDonalds for a wifi connection on the way. However, Louise got a puncture which would NOT stay reflated for more than a few minutes or yards. Alex hightailed it back to the boat for the puncture repair outfit which turned out to be in Louise’s saddle bag on her bike all along! Hey-Ho!
Eventually, after a quick repair, we got back to Riccall and had supper. ‘Elisabeth’ then appeared with her little French poodle ‘Mimi’ and her camera to ‘interview’ us, as it turned out, on our way of life. It appeared that she was running a sort of ‘get a life’ (Alex’s term) internet site where she was counselling people on how they could improve their lot.
She spent an hour or so with us chatting, and snapping and eventually sent us a link to her website where words like ‘relationship’, ‘romantic’ and ‘lifestyle’ were highlighted in the text of her description of us and our life on Riccall! We felt a bit non-plussed reading it!
The following day we pressed on and arrived back at Serignac, where we chatted with BODY AND SOUL’s owners Lucie and Malcolm who were already moored up. Nicky and Peter of AURIGNY had told us about Lucie and Malcolm, with whom they had spent much of the winter in their moorings at Meilhan and so we were pleased to meet them face to face at last. And of course they were great fun and we immediately clicked, as you do with some people you meet on the canals. Lucie is the most amazing cook and Malcolm plays a very competent piano (he has a keyboard installed on board their wide beam and plays regularly for private parties or for dinner and music cruises they hold from time to time).
After a couple of days, we regretfully moved on to Buzet where we were to spend a few days replenishing our stocks before the arrival of Richard and Robert.
However, on the day after we arrived ‘home’ Sara asked us to join everyone later for drinks at the restaurant. We later noticed a great deal of activity around the restaurant kitchen, involving Americans Walt and Gail and their visitors on LES VIEUX PAPILLONS. When we went to see what was going on we discovered that the evening ‘drinks’ to which Sara had invited us was actually going to be a full-blown Cajun feast which they were preparing as a surprise engagement/
early wedding party for Sara and Kevin, but that of course we were very welcome too. So we had a great evening together with all the other boaters plus several of Sara and Kevin’s friends from the locale and we got to try all sorts of unknown-to-us Cajun style dishes and somehow managed to come 2nd in the Louisiana-based quiz that Walt had devised. (I guess we knew as few of the answers as almost anyone else!)
Our journey to Meilhan was enlivened by two episodes of going hard aground while trying to moor up and it took 10-15 minutes in each case to extract ourselves. We also came across an established mooring where we had hoped to moor where the existing boats were so badly moored that the gap for us to get in was about 4m too small. This happens quite a lot on the canals and there is regularly much comment in our Dutch Barge Association magazine on ‘economy of mooring’. Either boat could have moved to let us in but neither captain was willing to trouble himself to do so. We hung about in Riccall for a good 5 minutes discussing the problem but to no avail and moved on towards Meilhan. We moored outside a canalside restaurant where we cycled into Marmande to book our rail tickets and finished off the evening with a nice meal.
Robert and Richard duly arrived at Meilhan in their hire car from Bordeaux airport and we set off for Castets-en-Dorthe. Rob steered for a while and then Richard but as we approached one of the bridges Alex took over to guide Riccall through, then as we got closer and closer doubts suddenly appeared in his mind. This one is lower than the rest! Full reverse and we pulled up with 6” to spare before the wheelhouse roof would have hit the bridge. Not another ROFF? Ah well – by the time we got to Castets an hour or so later, every single bridge on the Canal des Deux Mers (Midi and Garonne) had been noted as a ROFF (roof off) or a RON (roof on) so no more surprises we hope on the way back next year.
Castets-en-Dorthe is a rather grand name for a tired little village whose only claim to fame seems to be its position at the junction of the Canal Lateral a la Garonne and the river Garonne itself which at this point some 50kms inland is still tidal. The Garonne just now is very low after months of near drought as in the UK and all the farmers extracting water along its banks, but in the winter the level can come up dangerously high. In fact in the most famous flood of 1875 the waters came up as high as 11.75m - to the second floor of the lock house, and as recently as 1930 and 1950 over 10m was recorded! We had taken heed of the advice of several boaters to give the rather dull 5 hours down to Bordeaux on the river a miss (even though we are quite used to tidal work on the Trent and Ouse in the UK) and will visit Bordeaux by train or car later.
The hotel boat St Louis had preceded us to Castets and was already moored up on the first bit of available quay when we arrived so we had to go forward onto the next section. We knew that the pontoons were being replaced/extended as the port has been acquired by Veolia, a huge water and waterways enterprise in France, and we had seen a work boat operating as we arrived constructing further stretches of wooden quay. Another boater told us that though the work boat moored up on this bit of quay at the end of the day he thought we had left plenty of room for it to moor. The operator didn’t agree however, and made us move 20 metres right out of ‘his’ space. In fact he had us move so far and then only needed 3 extra metres. (The French, the French!!). The plus side though was that because the quays were still being worked on, mooring was ‘gratuit’ - one of the few words of French we have been glad to learn! (Normally €25 for one night, which is a bit steep by anyone’s standards).
We got back to Meilhan with Rob and Richard for their 6am start the next morning back to the airport. Sadly, the weather for the whole of their visit was very iffy, though it didn’t actually rain until the last day, and then, did it rain?!! We had managed to have a good barbeque in the sun the night we were in Castets though, so all was not lost.
The ST LOUIS moored the next day and Alex was able to commend Alistair on an excellent back-in moor-up – pretty difficult with a 30m boat, no bow thruster, and 6 guests all eating supper on deck! Alex had a chat with one of the crew members Lucinda, who runs wine tastings from her home base in Cahors and is one level below that of a ‘Grand Master of Wine’.
Unfortunately, we blotted our copybook that night when a group of us, including the two crew from the ST LOUIS congregated on BODY AND SOUL for after dinner drinks, and we had a hilarious evening until midnight when we all retired. On their return poor Lucinda and Cheryl got into terrible trouble for making too much noise! We felt a bit bad about that because we had all had a hand in it!!
On our way back to Buzet from Meilhan we stopped on the mooring at Mas d’Agenais and were helped to moor up by one of the boat captains already moored there. We thanked him and off he went, only to return shortly with an invitation to drinks a little later. We accepted gratefully and at the appointed hour wandered along. As we reached his boat we realised that this was one of the boats which hadn’t moved to make space for us several days previously. Oh dear! As we climbed on board the husband said to his wife, “Oh these are the people who were complaining about how we had moored without leaving enough space for them to get in”! Ah! So they had been within earshot, and had known that we wanted to moor and had done nothing about it! Some people are like that at the moorings. We just have to get used to it, take a deep breath and smile!
In fact, Bob of LA CHOUETTE was telling us that when he had tried recently to moor at Serignac and politely asked a cruiser if he could move along the quay a bit to allow him to get in the owner had been extremely rude, ‘f’ing and blinding about the size of LA CHOUETTE (30m). What he obviously failed to grasp is that the bigger the boat, the more we pay for our licence, therefore the more we contribute to VNF to keep the canals alive. But, fortunately, boaters as nasty as this are relatively rare.
We had an excellent meal for lunch on our final day back to Buzet at a new restaurant at Lock 42 – La Chope et Le Pichet (the tankard and the jug) – which we have passed a couple of times so far during its renovation. It had only just opened and mine hosts (Belgian) were very hospitable and the meal was excellent.
Back in Buzet after a few days it was Friday night, and Friday night is fish, chips and quiz night ‘a l’Anglais’ at the little restaurant in the port, run by the port capitaines Kevin and Sara. Twenty people in all and ten of us in our party – Ken and Rhonda from SOMEWHERE, Sam and Claire from NOORDSTER, Bob and Bobbie from LA CHOUETTE, Terry and Sandra from FELIX and ourselves. Well done to Kevin and Sara for a very nice meal, but we only managed third in the quiz this time!
Wednesday 1 June 2011
Toulouse to Moissac
We left Toulouse heading north for Montech and the Montech canal to Montauban. We spent a night at the marvellously named ‘Grisolles’ high quay, where we have stayed a couple of times before, then turned into the Montech Canal. Shortly before the first lock we moored on a good wooden, if rather shallow quay at Lacourt St Pierre, in front of a boat called ‘Careless Love’. We did think it a strange name for a boat. Did it mean making love without taking precautions? or perhaps loving somebody or something without caring for them? We didn’t like to ask the boaters themselves when they came over for drinks with us!! We had morning coffee with them the next day while we waited to see if the locks were going to operate that day, as there were no lock lights visible. As it turned out, there was an electricity outage so the locks were not operational until after lunch, but never mind, we set off down the flight at 2 o’clock passing the Rick Stein barge Rosa on her way up, and arrived in Montauban shortly after 4pm. We knew Aurigny was already there and had arranged for them to come to us for supper, so we moored up on the grassy bank just behind them.
Nicki and Peter and their daughter Laura came for a jolly supper during which, at one point, it rained so hard that we could barely hear each other speak above the noise of rain on the wheelhouse roof. France is not always sunny!
Aurigny left the next day and we moved forward onto the (only) quay mooring which they had vacated. Brian and Gill, with their daughter Sophie and her boyfriend Sandy were due to come for a day’s cruise in two days, so we did a whistle-stop tour of Montauban old town, noting as we crossed the bridge over the Tarn the level which the infamous 1930 inundation had reached. It had completely devastated the part of the town on the west bank which had had to be totally re-built, along with flood levees to prevent another such devastation. The River Tarn is now accessible here via a double lock down from the mooring basin and you can cruise for 7 kilometres up the river. But the round ring down through the 4 locks to Moissac is far from possible. The locks were abandoned years ago and need massive expenditure to bring them back into use, although this is said to be on the cards. It would make a magnificent cruising ring if it were to happen.
When we got back to the boat, we prepared for a quiet lunch and afternoon sitting on the back deck, only to see two enormous flat back trailers arrive loaded up with all the makings of what were clearly floating pontoons. (We had been told that this was going to happen ‘some day’ but clearly today was the day!) In fact they were about to install these precisely where we had moored the previous night. Had AURIGNY not left when she did, we would have had to breast up alongside her in order to give the workmen space to work.
So although we didn’t have the quiet afternoon we had planned, we did have a grandstand view of the whole operation of off-loading the trailers with a telescopic Manitou, then the lowering of the pontoons themselves into the basin and then the putting together of the whole set-up over the next day or two. Also while we were there a total of 15 Sapeurs Pompiers (firemen) arrived to conduct an exercise in the mooring basin – extracting an accident or illness ‘victim’ from a boat, complete with stretcher!
Gill and Brian et al arrived on Thursday morning and we set off up the flight of locks, stopping halfway for lunch. There was a space for us again at Lacourt St Pierre which was great as this was where Brian had parked their second car, and where we could get a good TV signal for Louise (and Alex) to watch the royal wedding the next day! After the wedding, we rode to Montech to warn the lock-keeper that we would be going down the Montech flight on the Garonne Canal towards Moissac the next day.
While in Montech we saw SOMEWHERE arrive, so we helped them moor up. Ken and Rhonda insisted we go aboard to celebrate the royal wedding and catch up on any other gossip, and sometime later we wobbled away on our bikes back to Riccall.
The next day we left our mooring just as SOMEWHERE arrived to take our place, and later moored up at a lovely little spot - also surprisingly vacant - at St Porquier. ANNA had been moored there when we travelled this way last month. While sitting on the back deck quietly reading in the afternoon sun, we suddenly became aware of a man cycling slowly past making a ‘Krrrroook, Krrrroook’ sound in a faintly pigeon-like voice! Alex did his pigeon imitation in reply to which he got a smile, but the guy carried on krrrooooking. Then out of the trees flew a pigeon which landed right on this man’s head! As he cycled on the pigeon flew off, then, when he called, it flew back to his head again, balancing as he cycled along. Bizarre!!
So, eventually, we arrived in Moissac and went straight down the two locks onto the River Tarn mooring which we love. We had promised ourselves a few days on this lovely mooring but as it turned out we were there for two weeks! SOMEWHERE joined us after a few days and we had lots of chats, drinks and the usual coffees etc both with them and with Dean and Karine, a Canadian and an American respectively who were working on a Dutch boat called THETIS. THETIS, it transpired, is owned and used by an American who employs Dean and Karine to prepare the boat each season before he and his guests arrive, then to winterise the boat at the end of the season. This year they are also going to take the boat back up north for the owner, then spend the winter at their own boat, moored in Leiden, living in their campervan while they continue to work on her.
Eric and Polly of AMAROK also joined us down on the Tarn, but sadly they were in the process of selling their boat to an American syndicate, so were rather busy negotiating with the potential buyers and then later removing all their goods and chattels. The good side is that the sale of their boat was relatively quick and straightforward: the downside is that they have loved boating and we have lost a couple of good friends from the canal network.
However while in Moissac there was the usual excellent twice-weekly market, a brocante on the quayside (car-boot or second-hand sale), a huge boules competition right beside the boat, which ran from 8am to 11.45pm for two days and a car rally which was a two-day affair using the area beside the quay for its set off and finish.
The mooring on the Tarn is just lovely, as the pictures show. Each year, all the boats have to vacate the mooring at the end of October and are not allowed back on the river until some time in April when the threat of flooding is over. When the floodwaters subside of course, the concrete quayside is left covered in mud. The local council are supposed to come down to re-fit the electric points and bring a water truck and power washing equipment to clean off all the mud, preferably before the boats come down again. This year, however, they did the re-fit of the electricity points but were delayed by some weeks with the washing. The boats had been down on the moorings for some time with the owners paddling along through the mud and then later the dust. Several boaters had taken matters into their own hands and washed the quay down or in one case, hoovered it to minimise the wind-blown dust! Having suffered a couple of days of being sand-blasted, and the whole boat covered in dust inside and out, we too did the decent thing and washed down our stretch of quay. By the time the washing truck came along – a week after we had left – pretty much the whole quay was already clean!!
Nicki and Peter and their daughter Laura came for a jolly supper during which, at one point, it rained so hard that we could barely hear each other speak above the noise of rain on the wheelhouse roof. France is not always sunny!
Aurigny left the next day and we moved forward onto the (only) quay mooring which they had vacated. Brian and Gill, with their daughter Sophie and her boyfriend Sandy were due to come for a day’s cruise in two days, so we did a whistle-stop tour of Montauban old town, noting as we crossed the bridge over the Tarn the level which the infamous 1930 inundation had reached. It had completely devastated the part of the town on the west bank which had had to be totally re-built, along with flood levees to prevent another such devastation. The River Tarn is now accessible here via a double lock down from the mooring basin and you can cruise for 7 kilometres up the river. But the round ring down through the 4 locks to Moissac is far from possible. The locks were abandoned years ago and need massive expenditure to bring them back into use, although this is said to be on the cards. It would make a magnificent cruising ring if it were to happen.
When we got back to the boat, we prepared for a quiet lunch and afternoon sitting on the back deck, only to see two enormous flat back trailers arrive loaded up with all the makings of what were clearly floating pontoons. (We had been told that this was going to happen ‘some day’ but clearly today was the day!) In fact they were about to install these precisely where we had moored the previous night. Had AURIGNY not left when she did, we would have had to breast up alongside her in order to give the workmen space to work.
So although we didn’t have the quiet afternoon we had planned, we did have a grandstand view of the whole operation of off-loading the trailers with a telescopic Manitou, then the lowering of the pontoons themselves into the basin and then the putting together of the whole set-up over the next day or two. Also while we were there a total of 15 Sapeurs Pompiers (firemen) arrived to conduct an exercise in the mooring basin – extracting an accident or illness ‘victim’ from a boat, complete with stretcher!
Gill and Brian et al arrived on Thursday morning and we set off up the flight of locks, stopping halfway for lunch. There was a space for us again at Lacourt St Pierre which was great as this was where Brian had parked their second car, and where we could get a good TV signal for Louise (and Alex) to watch the royal wedding the next day! After the wedding, we rode to Montech to warn the lock-keeper that we would be going down the Montech flight on the Garonne Canal towards Moissac the next day.
While in Montech we saw SOMEWHERE arrive, so we helped them moor up. Ken and Rhonda insisted we go aboard to celebrate the royal wedding and catch up on any other gossip, and sometime later we wobbled away on our bikes back to Riccall.
The next day we left our mooring just as SOMEWHERE arrived to take our place, and later moored up at a lovely little spot - also surprisingly vacant - at St Porquier. ANNA had been moored there when we travelled this way last month. While sitting on the back deck quietly reading in the afternoon sun, we suddenly became aware of a man cycling slowly past making a ‘Krrrroook, Krrrroook’ sound in a faintly pigeon-like voice! Alex did his pigeon imitation in reply to which he got a smile, but the guy carried on krrrooooking. Then out of the trees flew a pigeon which landed right on this man’s head! As he cycled on the pigeon flew off, then, when he called, it flew back to his head again, balancing as he cycled along. Bizarre!!
So, eventually, we arrived in Moissac and went straight down the two locks onto the River Tarn mooring which we love. We had promised ourselves a few days on this lovely mooring but as it turned out we were there for two weeks! SOMEWHERE joined us after a few days and we had lots of chats, drinks and the usual coffees etc both with them and with Dean and Karine, a Canadian and an American respectively who were working on a Dutch boat called THETIS. THETIS, it transpired, is owned and used by an American who employs Dean and Karine to prepare the boat each season before he and his guests arrive, then to winterise the boat at the end of the season. This year they are also going to take the boat back up north for the owner, then spend the winter at their own boat, moored in Leiden, living in their campervan while they continue to work on her.
Eric and Polly of AMAROK also joined us down on the Tarn, but sadly they were in the process of selling their boat to an American syndicate, so were rather busy negotiating with the potential buyers and then later removing all their goods and chattels. The good side is that the sale of their boat was relatively quick and straightforward: the downside is that they have loved boating and we have lost a couple of good friends from the canal network.
However while in Moissac there was the usual excellent twice-weekly market, a brocante on the quayside (car-boot or second-hand sale), a huge boules competition right beside the boat, which ran from 8am to 11.45pm for two days and a car rally which was a two-day affair using the area beside the quay for its set off and finish.
The mooring on the Tarn is just lovely, as the pictures show. Each year, all the boats have to vacate the mooring at the end of October and are not allowed back on the river until some time in April when the threat of flooding is over. When the floodwaters subside of course, the concrete quayside is left covered in mud. The local council are supposed to come down to re-fit the electric points and bring a water truck and power washing equipment to clean off all the mud, preferably before the boats come down again. This year, however, they did the re-fit of the electricity points but were delayed by some weeks with the washing. The boats had been down on the moorings for some time with the owners paddling along through the mud and then later the dust. Several boaters had taken matters into their own hands and washed the quay down or in one case, hoovered it to minimise the wind-blown dust! Having suffered a couple of days of being sand-blasted, and the whole boat covered in dust inside and out, we too did the decent thing and washed down our stretch of quay. By the time the washing truck came along – a week after we had left – pretty much the whole quay was already clean!!
Sunday 8 May 2011
Spring Cruise: Buzet – Toulouse
Spring Cruise: Buzet – Toulouse
We are now back on Riccall at last for the new season. As usual we have changed our plans radically several times but the final version now appears to be fairly well set. We had been going to return across the Midi and back up the Rhone this year, leaving the boat at Avignon during July while we returned to the UK for friend and family weddings.
But, we have decided that while we have our ‘home’ here in the south of France, we should make use of it as a base from which to explore the region by car. So we will return to Riccall in the car after the weddings.
While we were in the UK we took up the present which Alex had given to Louise for her special birthday in October 2010 - two tickets for an early morning hot air balloon flight with Virgin Balloons. Louise has long held an ambition to go up in a balloon so this was a great excitement. Luckily for us, our very first booking went ahead: many of the other people were on their third or fourth booking, the previous ones having been cancelled because of poor weather conditions.
We left home in Newton Aycliffe at 5 am and flew at 7 from Ripley Castle, just north of Harrogate, in good weather, and the wind took us perfectly between Harrogate and Knaresborough, so we knew the local area well as we flew over it. The other 14 passengers had arrived from all round the country, Wigan, Hull, York etc and must have got a bit pissed off as we pointed out all the landmarks to each other as we flew over them!
We had a good landing, despite clipping the top of a dead tree as we came down near Wetherby, and were all treated to a glass of bubbly after we had helped pack away the balloon. Back in Harrogate by 9 am for coffee and croissants!! Well it was a (late) birthday day out, after all!
But now the cruising season has begun and we are about to leave for a trip to Toulouse where we hope to suss out the VNF (Voies Navigables de France - France’s equivalent of our British Waterways) dry dock and hopefully book a place for spring 2012. We hope that Ken and Rhonda of ‘SOMEWHERE’ are going to be still in the dry dock when we get there, which will mean we can have a close look at arrangements for docking though we have a niggling feeling that Riccall may be too deep for this dock, but everyone we ask has a different view!
In the meantime, we have had a short cruise with our friends Mike and Jean who are keen narrowboaters in the UK. They also very kindly brought some boxes of UK goods with them when they drove down here. We enjoyed two days and nights in beautiful weather and good company before they returned home.
We set off from Buzet a couple of days later and saw that AURIGNY was already at our first proposed mooring at Sérignac. We completed our mooring behind them before Nicci, who was reading or computing in the wheelhouse, realised we were there! Half an hour later, New Zealand friends of Peter and Nicci turned up in their shared cruiser PAPRIKA and we all had a jolly tea party on the quay.
A short time later a small French yacht turned up trying to find a mooring space. Alex took pity on them, assuming they had a deep keel and couldn’t just wild moor at the edge of the canal, and said they could moor on Riccall which they gratefully did. (It did transpire later however, that their depth was in fact only about one metre!) Just after our supper the French crew appeared with half a bottle of sweet white wine by way of thanks. They said they had drunk the other half at lunchtime and it had been very good. As the wine really needed a pudding to go with it, this inspired Louise to knock up her famous Eton Mess pudding and we took pudding and wine along to Aurigny to share with the others before the convivial evening’s drinking and chat.
A night’s mooring in both Agen and Moissac and then we stopped in Castelsarrasin and had coffee with Claude and Rose-Marie of GERMINAL whom we had last seen on the Petit Rhone in August. Then when we stopped for the night we saw ANNA up ahead and Mark and Annie came for drinks in the evening sun! It sometimes seems as if we have as many friends down here in the south of France as we have in England! And very nice it is too!
We eventually arrived on the outskirts of Toulouse and moored in the ‘Embouchure’ port. This wide port area some 4 kms out of the centre of the city, used to be a gathering area for barges waiting to go down onto, or just arrived from, the Garonne river, in the days when the river was the only way to travel between Toulouse and Bordeaux, i.e. before the Canal Lateral a la Garonne was constructed. Now it houses only a trip boat and a boat we had noticed last September when we passed through - a peniche called Sanctanox. Then, having clearly been a restaurant boat, it was undergoing lots of work, which as it turned out was to convert it into an advertising company’s offices.
One of the employees, Camilla, was clearly interested in us and came along to chat during one of her many ‘cigarette breaks’! We were painting our handrails at the time but she asked us if we would like to look around the peniche/office. We accepted readily but we said we would need to finish the painting first if that was OK. As it turned out, they all four left for an extended lunch break shortly after that and a little later, we took in a delivery of stationery for them while they were away. When they returned (at 3 o’clock!) we handed over the delivery and then went for a coffee and a look round the ‘office’, which was very typically modern: all black and silver and minimalistic – very impressive. Of course, we invited them back for a look round Riccall and they were pretty amazed at the accommodation we have and very complimentary, saying it is just like an English house.
The Embouchure port has, in fact three bridges out of it leading to three separate canals. The first is to/from the Canal du Midi which starts its 240 kilometres and 65 locks here in Toulouse. The second bridge is onto the Canal de Brienne which forms a short 1 km connection between the Garonne River and the Embouchure port. The third entrance/exit from the port is the Canal Lateral de la Garonne. Between the Midi and the Brienne is a world-famous bas relief in marble which depicts the Atlantic and Mediterranean seas. The two bridges which take the road over these two canals are known as the Ponts Jumeaux – the twin bridges. One early evening as we were sitting in the wheelhouse, a young couple arrived: she dressed in a long black coat and carrying a case of some kind. In the event they turned out to be a photographer and his ‘model’ come to the bas-relief to take some sort of publicity photos. She produced a violin and he a camera and they proceeded to spend the next hour or so taking pictures of her - with violin at rest, playing said violin, resting against the sculpture, with short skirt, with long skirt etc etc. Whether she actually WAS the violinist who knows? but Alex was certainly interested in the changes of costume!!
The next day and despite ferocious winds, we cycled to visit Ken and Rhonda in dry dock and spoke to Serge the boat engineer, who confirmed that we are indeed too deep-drafted for the VNF dry dock but he was able to offer an alternative where he could still do any work we needed, and booked us into the Ramonville dry dock for April 2012, also in Toulouse but a little further south. Serge comes with great recommendations from many people who have employed him to do work on their barges so we feel in safe hands – and he speaks good English: so important when trying to discuss technical matters.
The very next day Mike and Sally of ‘AILSA’ came for a coffee at 11 o’clock, having noticed us moored in the Embouchure as they travelled past in the navette from the airport. By the time we had finished we had had lunch and it was 5.30 in the evening! They invited us for dinner the following day and mentioned that there was a good bus service between our mooring and theirs in the central port St Saveur. So, as it was still very, very windy we caught the No 16 instead of cycling as we normally do, which got us to them in good time. But when we came to leave at 10.30 the last bus had already left at 9pm! The walk back took an hour and a half but, Hey! What the hell - it was a lovely warm and now windless evening.
Earlier in the day we had also been to see Ken and Rhonda again (to pick up the camera we had inadvertently left behind on our first visit) and we also took a trip on the trip boat from the Garonne River down through the lock onto the Brienne Canal to the Embouchure port and back again. This was the only way for us to do this short canal section as it is closed to private boats. The Garonne is said to be far too dangerous for ‘plaisanciers’. Wot! Worse than the Trent? I think not: we have travelled that many times.
Anyway, the staff of Sanctanox saw us get back from our day and as we had already told them of our intention to leave the next day, they popped across to say goodbye and give us a bottle of wine, as they were closing for the long Easter weekend. How nice!
We are now back on Riccall at last for the new season. As usual we have changed our plans radically several times but the final version now appears to be fairly well set. We had been going to return across the Midi and back up the Rhone this year, leaving the boat at Avignon during July while we returned to the UK for friend and family weddings.
But, we have decided that while we have our ‘home’ here in the south of France, we should make use of it as a base from which to explore the region by car. So we will return to Riccall in the car after the weddings.
While we were in the UK we took up the present which Alex had given to Louise for her special birthday in October 2010 - two tickets for an early morning hot air balloon flight with Virgin Balloons. Louise has long held an ambition to go up in a balloon so this was a great excitement. Luckily for us, our very first booking went ahead: many of the other people were on their third or fourth booking, the previous ones having been cancelled because of poor weather conditions.
We left home in Newton Aycliffe at 5 am and flew at 7 from Ripley Castle, just north of Harrogate, in good weather, and the wind took us perfectly between Harrogate and Knaresborough, so we knew the local area well as we flew over it. The other 14 passengers had arrived from all round the country, Wigan, Hull, York etc and must have got a bit pissed off as we pointed out all the landmarks to each other as we flew over them!
We had a good landing, despite clipping the top of a dead tree as we came down near Wetherby, and were all treated to a glass of bubbly after we had helped pack away the balloon. Back in Harrogate by 9 am for coffee and croissants!! Well it was a (late) birthday day out, after all!
But now the cruising season has begun and we are about to leave for a trip to Toulouse where we hope to suss out the VNF (Voies Navigables de France - France’s equivalent of our British Waterways) dry dock and hopefully book a place for spring 2012. We hope that Ken and Rhonda of ‘SOMEWHERE’ are going to be still in the dry dock when we get there, which will mean we can have a close look at arrangements for docking though we have a niggling feeling that Riccall may be too deep for this dock, but everyone we ask has a different view!
In the meantime, we have had a short cruise with our friends Mike and Jean who are keen narrowboaters in the UK. They also very kindly brought some boxes of UK goods with them when they drove down here. We enjoyed two days and nights in beautiful weather and good company before they returned home.
We set off from Buzet a couple of days later and saw that AURIGNY was already at our first proposed mooring at Sérignac. We completed our mooring behind them before Nicci, who was reading or computing in the wheelhouse, realised we were there! Half an hour later, New Zealand friends of Peter and Nicci turned up in their shared cruiser PAPRIKA and we all had a jolly tea party on the quay.
A short time later a small French yacht turned up trying to find a mooring space. Alex took pity on them, assuming they had a deep keel and couldn’t just wild moor at the edge of the canal, and said they could moor on Riccall which they gratefully did. (It did transpire later however, that their depth was in fact only about one metre!) Just after our supper the French crew appeared with half a bottle of sweet white wine by way of thanks. They said they had drunk the other half at lunchtime and it had been very good. As the wine really needed a pudding to go with it, this inspired Louise to knock up her famous Eton Mess pudding and we took pudding and wine along to Aurigny to share with the others before the convivial evening’s drinking and chat.
A night’s mooring in both Agen and Moissac and then we stopped in Castelsarrasin and had coffee with Claude and Rose-Marie of GERMINAL whom we had last seen on the Petit Rhone in August. Then when we stopped for the night we saw ANNA up ahead and Mark and Annie came for drinks in the evening sun! It sometimes seems as if we have as many friends down here in the south of France as we have in England! And very nice it is too!
We eventually arrived on the outskirts of Toulouse and moored in the ‘Embouchure’ port. This wide port area some 4 kms out of the centre of the city, used to be a gathering area for barges waiting to go down onto, or just arrived from, the Garonne river, in the days when the river was the only way to travel between Toulouse and Bordeaux, i.e. before the Canal Lateral a la Garonne was constructed. Now it houses only a trip boat and a boat we had noticed last September when we passed through - a peniche called Sanctanox. Then, having clearly been a restaurant boat, it was undergoing lots of work, which as it turned out was to convert it into an advertising company’s offices.
One of the employees, Camilla, was clearly interested in us and came along to chat during one of her many ‘cigarette breaks’! We were painting our handrails at the time but she asked us if we would like to look around the peniche/office. We accepted readily but we said we would need to finish the painting first if that was OK. As it turned out, they all four left for an extended lunch break shortly after that and a little later, we took in a delivery of stationery for them while they were away. When they returned (at 3 o’clock!) we handed over the delivery and then went for a coffee and a look round the ‘office’, which was very typically modern: all black and silver and minimalistic – very impressive. Of course, we invited them back for a look round Riccall and they were pretty amazed at the accommodation we have and very complimentary, saying it is just like an English house.
The Embouchure port has, in fact three bridges out of it leading to three separate canals. The first is to/from the Canal du Midi which starts its 240 kilometres and 65 locks here in Toulouse. The second bridge is onto the Canal de Brienne which forms a short 1 km connection between the Garonne River and the Embouchure port. The third entrance/exit from the port is the Canal Lateral de la Garonne. Between the Midi and the Brienne is a world-famous bas relief in marble which depicts the Atlantic and Mediterranean seas. The two bridges which take the road over these two canals are known as the Ponts Jumeaux – the twin bridges. One early evening as we were sitting in the wheelhouse, a young couple arrived: she dressed in a long black coat and carrying a case of some kind. In the event they turned out to be a photographer and his ‘model’ come to the bas-relief to take some sort of publicity photos. She produced a violin and he a camera and they proceeded to spend the next hour or so taking pictures of her - with violin at rest, playing said violin, resting against the sculpture, with short skirt, with long skirt etc etc. Whether she actually WAS the violinist who knows? but Alex was certainly interested in the changes of costume!!
The next day and despite ferocious winds, we cycled to visit Ken and Rhonda in dry dock and spoke to Serge the boat engineer, who confirmed that we are indeed too deep-drafted for the VNF dry dock but he was able to offer an alternative where he could still do any work we needed, and booked us into the Ramonville dry dock for April 2012, also in Toulouse but a little further south. Serge comes with great recommendations from many people who have employed him to do work on their barges so we feel in safe hands – and he speaks good English: so important when trying to discuss technical matters.
The very next day Mike and Sally of ‘AILSA’ came for a coffee at 11 o’clock, having noticed us moored in the Embouchure as they travelled past in the navette from the airport. By the time we had finished we had had lunch and it was 5.30 in the evening! They invited us for dinner the following day and mentioned that there was a good bus service between our mooring and theirs in the central port St Saveur. So, as it was still very, very windy we caught the No 16 instead of cycling as we normally do, which got us to them in good time. But when we came to leave at 10.30 the last bus had already left at 9pm! The walk back took an hour and a half but, Hey! What the hell - it was a lovely warm and now windless evening.
Earlier in the day we had also been to see Ken and Rhonda again (to pick up the camera we had inadvertently left behind on our first visit) and we also took a trip on the trip boat from the Garonne River down through the lock onto the Brienne Canal to the Embouchure port and back again. This was the only way for us to do this short canal section as it is closed to private boats. The Garonne is said to be far too dangerous for ‘plaisanciers’. Wot! Worse than the Trent? I think not: we have travelled that many times.
Anyway, the staff of Sanctanox saw us get back from our day and as we had already told them of our intention to leave the next day, they popped across to say goodbye and give us a bottle of wine, as they were closing for the long Easter weekend. How nice!
Thursday 10 February 2011
Winter update 2010-2011
Well, we’ve been doing our usual rushing about this winter: back and forth to Buzet by train, plane, bus and car, and bringing hundreds of kilos of batteries, spares for the genny and packets of crisps and all the other things you either can’t buy or can’t afford to buy in Fabulous France!
The old Xantia did sterling work bringing the first load of stuff down (12 x 25kg batteries and the rest) but we realised that as it was costing so much to run we scrapped it and bought a 2003 diesel Clio (£700 per year cheaper to run - 60mpg instead of 33! And only £20 pa tax) we now feel we can visit friends and family and generally tour around in both the UK and France, which is what we like doing. Not many pics I am afraid for this posting, but by popular request (at least one) we offer you a link to ‘The Finding and Refurbishment of Riccall’ – the first part of which has now been posted.
www.riccallrefurbishment.blogspot.com
We thought most people would go to sleep just thinking about the refurbishment bit so in order to keep our seven readers of the ‘rambling’ blog on line, as it were, we posted the new blog under a separate title.
We will of course keep the old blog going and intermittently posted when the season gets started, but just to give a flavour of our winter, after our first foray back to Riccall in December we did a trip down to Louise’s son Robert’s and girlfriend Kerry’s for Xmas (well done them – it was lovely), via Julia and Steve’s, then a night with Alice and Mark before going back to base in Co Durham. Then we spent a night on the narrowboat, had a lovely early birthday lunch with friend Angela, a night with friends Mike and Jean near Rochdale and a visit to friends near Appleby, on the way to a wonderful weekend with Alex’s cousin Mary and her husband Martin in Glen Prosen in Scotland! On the return journey we stopped for lunch with long-time friends Nigel and Janet, and tea with ex-neighbours and friends Stef and Barrie, both near Alnwick. Phew!
In all these wanderings we have managed to completely avoid any semblance of bad weather, which considering the winter there has been so far in both the UK and France is nothing short of a miracle. Scotland was wonderful – covered in snow, but no problem in driving. Visits to cousin Dorothy, and entertaining Maurice and Judy, Paul and Diane, Derran and Jamie have also been managed, in between.
Our trip back to Buzet involved a night with Julia and Steve (again – poor things!) a visit to Louise’s son Richard’s future mother-in-law Sue for morning coffee, and then two nights with Alex’s brother David and wife Bun in Somerset.
From there to Buzet involved an overnight stop in a not-brilliant B & B near Abbeville, followed by a ten-hour drive to Buzet!
So there it is, and if we have inadvertently missed anyone out – it was great to see you too!
The old Xantia did sterling work bringing the first load of stuff down (12 x 25kg batteries and the rest) but we realised that as it was costing so much to run we scrapped it and bought a 2003 diesel Clio (£700 per year cheaper to run - 60mpg instead of 33! And only £20 pa tax) we now feel we can visit friends and family and generally tour around in both the UK and France, which is what we like doing. Not many pics I am afraid for this posting, but by popular request (at least one) we offer you a link to ‘The Finding and Refurbishment of Riccall’ – the first part of which has now been posted.
www.riccallrefurbishment.blogspot.com
We thought most people would go to sleep just thinking about the refurbishment bit so in order to keep our seven readers of the ‘rambling’ blog on line, as it were, we posted the new blog under a separate title.
We will of course keep the old blog going and intermittently posted when the season gets started, but just to give a flavour of our winter, after our first foray back to Riccall in December we did a trip down to Louise’s son Robert’s and girlfriend Kerry’s for Xmas (well done them – it was lovely), via Julia and Steve’s, then a night with Alice and Mark before going back to base in Co Durham. Then we spent a night on the narrowboat, had a lovely early birthday lunch with friend Angela, a night with friends Mike and Jean near Rochdale and a visit to friends near Appleby, on the way to a wonderful weekend with Alex’s cousin Mary and her husband Martin in Glen Prosen in Scotland! On the return journey we stopped for lunch with long-time friends Nigel and Janet, and tea with ex-neighbours and friends Stef and Barrie, both near Alnwick. Phew!
In all these wanderings we have managed to completely avoid any semblance of bad weather, which considering the winter there has been so far in both the UK and France is nothing short of a miracle. Scotland was wonderful – covered in snow, but no problem in driving. Visits to cousin Dorothy, and entertaining Maurice and Judy, Paul and Diane, Derran and Jamie have also been managed, in between.
Our trip back to Buzet involved a night with Julia and Steve (again – poor things!) a visit to Louise’s son Richard’s future mother-in-law Sue for morning coffee, and then two nights with Alex’s brother David and wife Bun in Somerset.
From there to Buzet involved an overnight stop in a not-brilliant B & B near Abbeville, followed by a ten-hour drive to Buzet!
So there it is, and if we have inadvertently missed anyone out – it was great to see you too!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)