Well,
here we were again, all anxious to get started on this year's cruise, though it
may be a few weeks yet and may well be a long one! Louise has taken over writing the blog and as
her style is a lot less pithy than Alex's you may have to have a few more
minutes to read the following!!-
We
booked into Decize for July/August to enable a return to England for a
protracted summer stay. Last year we
decided, after sweating it out for weeks in France in mid-July, that it would
be rather nice to enjoy some of what England (and Scotland maybe) has to offer
in the lovely summer weather at home.
There's so much that we don't get to see and do, being in Europe for the
summer.
Our
return to RICCALL was timed to avoid the dreaded Brexit!! And so we returned on the 27th
with minimal fuss and no delay. Of
course, the first job was to stash all the stocks we had brought from home and
which are un-available in Europe. Then
we had to turn our attention to the state of the boat itself!
Inside,
everything looked dusty and rather down-at-heel, so a total spring clean was in
order. But more importantly, from a
pride perspective, was the exterior of RICCALL!
She was looking more than a little down in the mouth – dirty and
uncared-for. Last year, we did a good
job of painting the topsides of the saloon – taking the old paintwork down to
the metal and starting from scratch.
That paintwork has survived remarkably well over the winter, so we'll be
doing the same thing with the well deck this year. It's normally a bit of a storage area, and
can as a result become a bit scuffed.
Our new two pack paint will help but it will require a complete
back-to-the-metal approach again! Ah
well – we need something to keep us occupied.
While
we were in Seneffe doing these essential maintenance jobs, we took a couple of
days out to visit friends, Paul and Diane of BEATRICE, winter-moored near
Gorinchem (by car!) who live aboard their barge. The usual great socialising was the order of
the day, of course.
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| A visit to Holland isnt' complete without one of these! |
Lovely
to get back aboard and on the way – a little later than expected admittedly –
but we have heard that there are serious concerns about water levels in middle
France which may require a change of plan.
To The Midi or not? Who
knows? So on we go, with a few weeks to
go before we have to make a definite decision on our route. A hold-up at our second lock however caused
us to decide to stay topside overnight but then we safely crossed 'lovely'
Charleroi! Although still heavily
industrialised there are signs of improvement – the industrial site opposite
the steel works (chemicals?) is now being demolished, though it will be some
time before it will be completed. But
perhaps some time in the not-too-distant-future Charleroi may be rather less
daunting for the boater!
Well,
the traverse of Charleroi was done without incident and we moored up for a
night with fellow boaters Lynda and Steve on LYNEVE at Auvelais. The fair was in full swing as we arrived but
on the opposite bank, so perhaps we wouldn't be disturbed! And so it was. The conditions of use must have decreed a
close-down by 9.30pm as all was quiet.
The
countryside after Charleroi is always something of a revelation, even though
we've done this route several times. It
is quite lovely, especially in springtime – rural and seemingly very
remote.
After
this pleasant interlude came Namur – allegedly a rather interesting city –
where we met up with Julian, our narrow-boating friend (on SANTANNA) who had
found a free mooring in the city. (Julian is just marvellous at finding free
moorings!) He reckoned there was plenty
of room for us.
And
there was indeed plenty of room in the 'cheap seats'!! We had a great evening with Julian on
RICCALL, and were invited for a return match the following evening.
In
between, we did a short reccy of Namur and we both feel that we must have
missed something, because we were somewhat underwhelmed by the city. A little more research required next time we
think.
When
we did eventually set off the next morning, the weather had deteriorated
somewhat, so that we encountered cool temperatures, 'April' showers and at
times sleet and even snow in those showers!
But the River Meuse was mercifully devoid of any kind of traffic,
commercial or pleasure so we had the locks largely to ourselves. One of our favourite moorings was on the near
horizon, so we made for Anhée/Houx – a mooring which we'd used several years
ago, along with Nicci and Peter of AURIGNY, who were painting their hull. Part of this quay is at river level, meaning
you can paint the hull of your boat right down to the water-level. This is a rarity, as most moorings are much
higher than river level. Unfortunately,
although we would have liked to paint the sides of the hull, the weather was
just too cold. Another missed opportunity! But then we thought - hang on! We're going to
come out of the water this year anyway, so we'll do it then. Of course, this plan all depends on WHERE we
end up towards the end of the season!
The
Meuse was running moderately fast as we battled through squally showers of
sleet and snow at one point, but the next day was much quieter. The season hadn't started up yet so there were
very few boats around making lock use much easier.
But
of course, that was then! Next day we were 'inundated' by pleasure
boats, so much so that when we arrived at Vireux-Wallerand 10kms upstream from
Givet, there was no room at the proverbial inn!
We had to make do with a sloping side and rocky bottom for
overnight. Next morning we set off and
soon noticed one of the pleasure boats was coming up behind us, which turned
out to be a lucky break as our remote control to operate the locks failed to
work, as it had yesterday when a lock-keeper
helped out. Luckily ELISE noticed and
interpreted that we were sitting at a red light at Montigny Lock, so operated
their remote, which did indeed work.
Louise phoned VNF who met us at the next lock with a remote to
exchange. (So he DID understand my
message! - says Louise, somewhat amazed that her French got the point across.)
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| Glad the Meuse never got this high while we were on it!! |
And
then it rained, and rained, and rained: so much so that at 1pm we decided to
moor up and try for a 'menu du jour' at a recommended restaurant. It was very swish and elegant, but no they
didn't do a menu du jour except at weekends and on jours féries, but hey,
wasn't today, May 8th, the commemoration of the Liberation of France
from German military activity? After
all, we saw and heard the band playing the Marseillaise and the maire making
his speech as we moored up in Haybes!
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| Haybes Mairie |
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| Haybes Maire making his speech in the rain |
French holidays are a complete mystery to us; we've been doing this
cruising lark for over a decade now and still we can be surprised. But no restaurant lunch for us that day.
So
we moved on and the rain got worse and worse and heavier and heavier. We hadn't factored this into account until we
set off from our Charleville-Mezieres mooring,
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| Favourite mooring in Charleville-Mezieres |
re-entered the river from the
lock cut and suddenly we were making just 5kph, instead of our more normal 8! Of course this is the inevitable result of a
lot of rain but we just hadn't got our heads round it. We flogged upstream for about 6 kms but had
to admit that this was costing us a lot of money in extra fuel and sitting it
out seemed a good plan We knew of a
really good floating pontoon ahead at Lumes, amazingly virtually empty, so
moored up expecting to stay a day or so. Well, we were there for three days and still no sign of the river
returning to normal.
In between, we
socialised with HAVELOK's Helen and Mathew and PERIDOT's Chantelle and Claude
and did a day trip by train (lucky to have an adjacent station) down the
beautiful Meuse valley and back, dropping into C-M for late afternoon
drinks. Then the following day we went
on a long (very long) bike ride to find fresh milk. Regular readers will know
that this is how we manage to see so much of France – looking for bloody fresh
milk for Alex's cornflakes! (NB – we
failed to find any milk despite being in the region's biggest Cora
hypermarket!)
Still
stuck, still waiting for the flow to subside, we decided to make the most of
our enforced 'rest' and tackled the now rather forlorn-looking wheelhouse
roof. Just a temporary holding job this
time as we will have the job done later in the year when we come out for hull
blacking, but it looks just SO much better.
We don't see it of course, but all the gongoozlers standing by the sides
of locks as we enter from downstream do and we Brits can't let the side down,
can we? After all with the Brexit saga
still playing (or so we gather) we're already in the mire as far as other
nationalities are concerned.
So
eventually, once the flow had reduced to 2.5kph (Alex has his own method of
working this out) we felt it was time to move on and spent a long day still
plodding up the Meuse to a lovely spot in Mouzon. Amazingly the only mooring we can use in
Mouzon – at the Capitainerie end of the quay – was free and we shot in. We think it had been vacated by SIYABONGA
earlier in the day because we came bow to bow upon them in a narrows upstream
of Donchery lock No 39. That gave us all
a surprise and we were most impressed that SIYABONGA could stop on a sixpence,
letting us go through. However, Alex was
quick to point out that he was 'pleased' that even SIYABONGA with her amazing
stopping power still ended up across the canal because of her prop walk! Our own prop walk is much better than it used
to be following radical implant surgery on our rudder – see previous
instalments.
We
were at Mouzon then when we received a WhatsApp from our friends on ETTIE
Richard and Julia, asking us where we were.
We'd rather lost any hope of catching them now that we were at least 3
days behind schedule, but it now seemed possible that we just might catch them
at St Mihiel in a few days time. We were
both going to stop in Toul for home visits, so if all else fails, we can do our
socialising then. On RICCALL we were
both already getting excited at the prospect of a meal in our favourite French
restaurant of all time – in the former station building in the little village
of Lucey, north of Toul. It seems that
it is still operational, but so many French restaurants have closed especially
in small villages. They really are up
against the change in retail and eating habits.
Then
onto the 'manual' section of the Meuse where the locks have to be operated by a
roving éclusier. This makes the whole
experience more of a race against time than a quiet go-as-you-please cruise, as
you have to tell the éclusier where you intend to stop overnight and your
preferred set-off time for the following morning, which means you can't easily
stop at a place you happen upon and like, though you can, of course, telephone
to tell them your intention. Of course,
you don't do that, as it seems unfair to have an allocated éclusier for the day
and then stand him down! So it's two or
three days of this imposed timetable and we'll be happier when we can go back
to automatic lock operation. Why this
section has missed out on upgrading we don't know.
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| Lock cottage at Alma - our absolute favourite (for renovation) |
Consenvoye
was next in our sights and we set off to recce the little town and see if we
could perhaps find somewhere to eat, it being a Saturday evening, and we had
failed at Mouzon. We briefly spoke to
Paul and Jacky of EMMA who were moored up when we arrived. There was indeed a little restaurant, and
yes, it was open, but no, we couldn't eat there that night. Our limited French failed to quite grasp why
not, but it was very clear that there would be no cooking that night in the
auberge, or at least not for us: perhaps it was going to host a private party,
or they didn't have a chef? Who knows?
So
it was back to the boat for curry with all the trimmings! But when we approached the boat our faces
fell as we saw five young lads on off-road scrambler bikes, unloading their
paraphernalia for their overnight fishing experience! But we have to say, they conducted themselves
perfectly, even for two of them to come to us on our boat and apologise for the
noise they were making, of which there was none! It was so funny to watch them putting up
their tents: it was like a scene from It's a Knockout!
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| The lads camping and fishing overnight adventure |
But the night passed without a sound and they
were up early in the pouring rain, keeping their fire alight and making hot
drinks. When we left they gave us great
waves and 'bon voyages'. It was great.
We
set off at 9.30am - a time chosen by the éclusiers (and a bit early for Alex!)
for the day's travel to Verdun: an easy day with a pleasant lock-keeper who
earned himself two bottles of beer!
Considering the paucity of boats around we were somewhat amazed to find
Verdun rather occupied, though the quay which we wanted was empty, so all was
well.
For some reason we were both
exhausted by 8pm so it was an early night for Louise and a stupid sci-fi film
for Alex!
We
set off from Verdun for a 10am start at the first lock upstream, but although
the gates were open for us when we arrived, when the éclusier tried to close
the tail gates, there was something preventing one of the gates from seating
properly. Something was clearly on the
cill. He must have had a premonition of
what it might be as he immediately went for his long pole, then his grappling
hook! The pole failed but the hook
caught a very long piece of ancient rusty chain. Once that was on the side, we were off again.
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| Lock gate failed to close |
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| The offending chain! |
One
more day with an éclusier and then 'freedom'.
This time our éclusier was a rather dour chap, but he softened a lot
when he realised that Alex would do his share of closing and opening gates,
even to the extent of taking our ropes, quite unnecessarily in several locks.
A
lovely quiet night in Ambly mooring,
another sociable night in St Mihiel, two
overnights in Sampigny, where we sought out the lovely Musée Poincaré (Poincaré
was President of France after the war)
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| From the sublime . . . |
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| to the ridiculous!! |
and one stop for stocking up in Commercy.
We were very lucky to be able to moor on the
pontoon in Pagny with three other boats although mooring above and below locks
is easy enough on the Meuse at this point.
Then it was into Toul, but not the Port de France for us! We moored below the lock out of the Port de
France on a long, free, wooden staging and there RICCALL stayed for the whole
of Louise's trip to England. Luckily,
our friends Richard and Julia were returning home themselves for a christening
and wedding (separate events!) and were happy to give Louise a seat in their
car. Purpose of Louise's visit? - to
meet her new granddaughter Joni.
Back
at Toul, we moved RICCALL down the canal to the TSNI moorings (formerly
Lorraine Marine)
and spent three days while waiting for fuel painting the
hull sides – remember those hull sides which needed repainting way back when? The very same, but we got them done this time!
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| Alex hard at work |
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| Job's a good 'un! |
