Diksmuide to Charleroi

Well, here we are, some 4 weeks into this year's cruise.  Leaving Diksmuide behind us we set off east for Bruges and eventually more southerly lands.

We had a very easy traverse of Bruges 

Ready to pass under the 'Rack of Lamb' bridge

encountering only RACHEL (recently moored in the Coupure and travelling north) and no commercials.  That afternoon we stopped at Moerbrugge where we hoped to take on water but went off sightseeing first!

Tank sculpture at Moerbrugge

 As luck would have it, the water bourne was “dienst” and an additional notice, when translated, said “frost damage”.  So undaunted, Alex lifted the huge man hole cover and investigated.  Damage circumvented in a jury-rig fashion, we filled our tanks and had a quiet evening and night.

The Coupure having had to empty for dredging, many boats were likely to be on the move, and we joined CHOUETTE, PEABODY 

and another small barge heading east.  Two of these would peel off, PEABODY to go north to a boatyard in Zelzate, CHOUETTE to go straight down the Leie Diversion Canal to Deinze, our own destination, though by the old Leie River.  Alex had long wanted to cruise the natural course of the river Leie from Ghent to Deinze, so after a night on ducs d'Albe on the outskirts of Ghent, close to Evergem Lock, 

Dwarfed by Perseus At Evergem

we set off with a little apprehension on Louise's part.  We'd heard people say how twisting and narrow the river is, lined with expensive houses and small but equally expensive day boats.  

Just one of the many wonderful mansions on the Leie

But in the event RICCALL behaved impeccably and managed all manoeuvres without fault – not on her own of course – something to do with the captain!  Lunch was at Sint Marten Latem on the mooring reserved for the passenger boats – well, what else as the visitor mooring, all 15m of it, was occupied?

A very pretty spot and a quiet lunch on deck in the spring sunshine, and then . . . from the south appeared LEMMERBOOT IV a 22m Dutch barge renovated by its owner and captain, Wimm, who uses it occasionally as a 'trip' boat for special occasions, this a 50^th wedding anniversary party.  

A good chat ensued between us, while the hiring guests had their celebratory lunch, and we discovered that Wimm and a group of like-minded volunteers operate the bridge ahead of us at Astene, across the open lock, but on Sundays it is closed!  Wimm however, was interested in old RICCALL and said he was happy to open up specially for us once he got his passengers back to his mooring.

All went as planned, and we carried on to Deinze, to meet up with CHOUETTE and have supper on board RICCALL with Mike and Sally.

We expected Deinze to be just an overnight stop, but Alex decided it was a good place to fit the replacement steering ram.  

The new ram - still needed painting

Free mooring and electricity at €5 per day was the draw, and stocking up and a look round Deinze took up some of Louise's time.  By the time we'd been there 4 days, we had discovered Ooidonk Castle, only open on Sundays from 2-5pm and a jewel in the crown of not only the region but of Belgium as a whole.  Only another 3 days would take us to Sunday, and we arranged matters so that we set off from Deinze on Sunday at 12.30pm, to cycle the 3kms along to Astene Lock where the voluntary boating community operate a small museum and basic cafe (and have the role of bridge-keepers).  So we ate our paté and toast with guerkins, silverskin onions and mustard, drank wine and coffee and cycled the next 2 kms to Ooidonk. We happened to arrive just as a tour in English was about to start, and Ooidonk was fabulous!  

Well worth the 3 day wait.

Alex's tooth had been troubling him and we'd visited a dentist in Ghent for a root filling – this had taken all of one day and now we needed to attempt to make a claim for reimbursement of a %age of the cost.  We'd done this only once before and the system has since changed.  The claim is now done in the country where the cost has been incurred.  Some investigations brought us to a 'mutual' office where the process is set in motion.  We wait to see if this is successful!  But it was worth a try for a €350 dental process!!

This completed, all that remained was a last visit to the ‘kringwinkel’ – a wonderful name for a charity shop!  Here we found 2 excellent recliner garden chairs and cushions at knock down prices.

Friends and regular readers of this blog will know our penchant for a bargain!!

We were gradually becoming aware that the canal was strangely quiet.  Where we had expected laden barges by the dozen, there was very little traffic, and after the side canal to Roeselare, virtually none at all.

Our night's mooring on the main line at the start of the Bossuit Canal was super – quiet, calm waters and a pleasant outlook.  

Sightseeing on the old canal through Kortrijk

And then in the morning it was clear that spring had definitely sprung – green shoots everywhere and much higher temperatures.

Arranging passage through the 3 hand-op locks was easy, by phone, and in the course of the next 2 hours or so, we learned why our overnight stay had been so comfortable!  A lock on the outskirts of Lille was under repair for SIX weeks.  All the normal traffic via Kortrijk to Lille was having to take an alternative route.  Our next 15 kms would be quiet and calm, but then, once we joined the Escaut, all hell would break loose as we would join the 'motorway' barge traffic.

Perfect thatch!

As it turned out, although the canal was pretty busy, we were locked through on the first bassinée at both Herinnes and Kain locks.  We fitted in nicely with 85m boats where other big boys couldn't.  The passage through Tournai was easy too as we just followed an 85m commercial RO-MA.  Back to Antoing for overnight and then on to a well-trodden path, or should we say well-cruised waterway – Peronnes to Seneffe.  Of course an overnight at the delightful basin at the Pommeroeul-Conde Canal entrance was in the plan as was a night below the Strepy Lift and then it was on to Seneffe for the weekend.

We lunched upstream of Seneffe on a favourite quay of ours, and then made our way into the basin, which had been Okayed by harbourmaster Patrick.  What he had failed to tellus however was that this very weekend the Seneffe Club was hosting a Grand Boat Jumble, and various other activities on the water, including first a training day for the local 'dog life-savers' organisation.  There were 15 or so of these HUGE dogs (breed unknown!) with their handlers/owners, hankering to get on with saving the life of a drowning person!  Each dog was released from the quay to swim out and save a person who was splashing around, looking as if he or she were drowning.  That part was fine, but the other 14 dogs also wanted to have a go, so the sound of barking was deafening.  We slipped by, probably unnoticed by the gathered small crowd, who were entranced by the action.

It's a dog's life!

So, back to Seneffe, where regular readers may remember, we have spent two winters, but it has been 3 years since we were last there. We met up again with Arthur and Vivianne of MON PLAISIR which moors permanently in the port, and met for the first time Peter and Susie of LAVANA, who had wintered there.  So as you can imagine, a little bit of socialising went on as usual, and we decided to collect our car from Diksmuide.  Having  looked up train times etc, we discovered that although not terribly far, about 100 kms, it would take 4 trains and 3 hours to get there.  Arthur and Vivianne gave us a lift to the nearest station, and we set off.  Not one of our most difficult journeys, we nevertheless had a 40 minute wait in Brussels because a train had passed a red signal and the whole electricity system in the station had gone into underdrive!  But the rest of the journey was easy and we got back to Seneffe without hassle.

So then it was decision time!  Should we stay another day or get on with this cruise?!  Decision made we set off for an easy day down to the outskirts of Charleroi – 3 locks and 23 kms.  Charleroi is, as we have reported before, a dreadful place, for shoppers/pedestrians and boaters alike.  There's nowhere to moor, it is heavily industrialised and not a terribly pleasant passage, so we like to stop overnight before we get there and then dash like the blazes through and out of  the other side next day!!  As most people do!

Having had the most glorious weekend weather-wise, the temperatures have fallen off again and it is feeling somewhat chilly.  Spring has gone into hibernation!

DBA Rally to Diksmuide

On the way back north from the DBA rally in Auxerre, and realising we had plenty of time before winter mooring, we had been going to go up the Ardennes Canal, down the Meuse and on via Charleroi to Diksmuide.

However, we soon learned that Lock 56 on the Meuse was closed (supposedly until 4^th September) so instead we decided to explore the Canal de l’Oise a l’Aisne and the southern side of the closed Sambre a l’Oise, as far as we could up to the closed point.

Lovely lock cottage en route

While on the Oise a L'Aisne, and moored at Pinon, we decided to take the train into Laon, a town/city we had often seen from afar from the A26 motorway. Laon's picturesque old town is situated on the summit of a scarped hill, and stands high above the new town. The haul up the steep hill from the railway station was demanding but its little streets were lovely, the cathedral glorious, and we had a very nice lunch outside a tiny side-street bistro.

Moving on we were pleasantly surprised to find good moorings at Chauny and stocked up at an edge-of-town Lidl for the journey into the unknown! We even managed to buy some lock-side vegetables from an elderly couple selling from their own patch – almost unheard of now on the canals.

Chauny Hotel de VIlle

Excellent mooring at Chauny

Our next mooring was at La Fère – a lovely mooring. Would that we had known, there was a HUGE new Lidl only half a kilometre away and an enormous l‘Eclerc just 500m in the opposite direction!

And now we were into the Canal Sambre à l’Oise proper. But it was Sunday and we realised that we would only be able to get through a couple of locks as all the ones further upstream were closed on Sundays. Why so? Well it became clear later that afternoon as we passed two péniches moored abreast and waiting for Monday to take on gravel. They need the locks downstream to be available 7 days a week, but not the ones upstream of the gravel yard. (However, on our return journey, and to our surprise, we discovered a péniche above Lock 28 waiting for grain loading, so the canal is not completely unused.)

However, the closure was fine for us as we had earmarked our possible mooring from the DBA’s moorings guide, just downstream of the first closed lock (No 33 if you are following this in Fluviacarte!!) This did not prevent a long one-sided but cheerful ‘conversation’ from the VNF éclusier all about the fact that the locks were closed on Sunday and an almost unintelligible explanation of where we could moor for the night. On reflection, we think it was possibly where we did in fact moor, but his verbal description and strange hand signals had left us in some doubt! It was a lovely rural spot, a good long quay with small ring holders set into it that would once have held proper mooring rings but now only two full rings were left. The remaining ring holders were enough to get a shackle or rope through and as there was NO other traffic, all was well. We spent the rest of the afternoon cycling 20kms along the excellent towpath, just to see what was what.

The only downside of the mooring was a generator at the downstream end, pumping water into the nearby lake for some reason, which appeared to be set for 24 hour running. We moved as far along the quay as we could and had a fairly peaceful night – even a little sun filtered through the trees allowing for drinks on deck.

The next day we set off and the first lock worked fine, but we soon learned that there is a VERY long delay between pressing the button on the telecommand and anything actually happening at the lock!

The next lock simply would not respond. We tried VHF10 and no response. We rang the number we had taken note of on all previous locks – no response. So we managed to get near enough the bank for Louise to get off (no mooring bollards of course) with her phone to see if there was a different number on the lockside. There was, and the VNF eclusier said he would see to it “toute suite”. 10 minutes later Louise was back on board and the lock was operating.

The next lock also failed to operate on the telecommand signal but we had the right telephone number now and again 10 minutes later we were going through.

Finally we got to Origny-Sainte-Benoît, the head of navigation and there was a plethora of places to moor.

We chose the silo quay mooring as the bollards were well spaced for us and the quay at a good height. 

Another fantastic mooring - until 10pm that is!

There is a huge sugar beet refinery and a malting operation in Origny together with a chemical works and sewage farm, so it’s all a bit industrial but there are a couple of restaurants (one being refurbished) a bakery and a Carrefour Express, so not entirely remote from civilisation.

All was quiet until about 10pm at night when the cooling fan for the grain silo started up right outside the boat. Oh bother! But never mind; the weather was still pretty cool and inclement so close the portholes and block it all out.

The forecast for the following day was for cloud but no rain with a bit of sunshine later, so we packed a picnic and set off for the closed section, on our bikes. The overcast sky was a blessing as we had a very long day ahead up-hill-and-down-dale, although we hadn’t realised this when we set off: the ‘towpath’ only stretches for one more pound, after which it was unsuitable for bikes and it was necessary to use the local roads and ‘find’ the subsequent locks!

Actually the next three locks above Origny ARE operational and there was a VNF working boat above the first of them to prove it, but the VNF éclusier when asked, refused to let us go any further in the boat. How mean is that? He had nothing else to deal with! We haven’t seen a single other plaisance boat up here since we started.

So, bikes it was, and we inspected every lock up to Vadencourt and the two aqueducts which we understood are not usable because of instability. In fact, they have been entirely de-watered and the water from the pounds above is led through two large-bore pipes. We made notes and took copious pictures of all there was to see.  Here are a couple.

Sad sight - a dry canal bed

'The canal' !!!!

It has to be said, it is a lovely canal – a little straight perhaps on the southern side of the closure, but very rural and very tranquil. None of the villages en route are actually on the CANAL. They are all to one side or the other, mostly on the river Oise itself. Most have suffered the depopulation that so many villages in France suffer from but Vadencourt was quite nice, charming even, in a slightly dusty way!! It even had a small Proxi supermarket, post office and bar.

There was a bit of weed to contend here and there but we didn’t find it a major problem and it seemed to be confined to certain biefs.

So all in all, a worthwhile exercise we think and a surprise for some of the locals who have not seen a barge up as far as Origny for years!

So to our European boating readers, we’d say, why not try to include it in your cruising plans? The due date for re-opening is now said to be 2020, but that date has changed many times and we feel it would show real interest if more boats and barges made the short deviation – it could easily be done in only 2 days if you literally wanted to ‘tick the box’ but the canal does offer a very pleasant longer sojourn and is surprisingly deep and wide throughout.

After all, USE IT OR LOSE IT, as they say!

We had a long chat with a professional bargee when we got back to La Fère, all in rapid French (his, not ours!) about the state of the Nation and the number of unemployed who just took state benefits and spent their days fishing!! etc. etc. (Great fun, if a little mind-boggling trying to keep up.)

Then we headed off to revisit St Quentin, last seen 8 years ago.

Lovely St Quentin - Grand Place

It seems so  much better now, with good moorings adjacent to the VNF depot – a kilometre upstream from the 'port' which has poor ratings. We stopped at the island mooring at the junction with the now-

closed Somme short-cut both on the way to St Quentin and on the way back. 

Idylllic island mooring

But in the night Louise was woken by the sound of tiny feet on the deck and after having investigated from the wheelhouse and seen nothing, she went to the loo, only to find a large rat on the shore staring in through the porthole! Thank goodness there is no way into our actual living quarters, so long as they keep their distance, good luck to them – or so says Alex. Louise thinks differently!

We wended our way south and west eventually back onto the Canal du Nord for our route back to Diksmuid for our winter mooring. (We have done the Riqueval Tunnel north of St Quentin once before and as far as we are concerned, never again, thank you! Hence the long way round.)

The sapeurs-pompiers on a training day!  In the lock!

A few days later we were heading up the Canal du Nord lock flight toward the summit when we noticed PASSE LAGOM was showing up on the AIS few locks ahead of us. We couldn't contact Nils and Torild on Channel 10 on the radio so had to call mutual friends by phone to alert them to our presence behind. We ended up both moored at one of our favourite moorings at what we call the Bois be Vaux before the tunnel itself. A jolly evening ensued but while they decided to stay on the next day, our itchy feet persuaded us to motor on.

Passe Lagom's Nils and Torild wave us off

We had time to spare though and had decided to take a couple of diversions; the first up the Scarpe Superiore to have a look at the town of Arras.

The first lock presented a problem as we didn't have the requisite remote, so we turned RICCALL and headed back to the lock on the main line where you are supposed to pick it up! (We didn't see any info to alert us to that.) They saw us coming and had it ready as Louise mounted the steps, but not before the éclusier had given her a quick tour of the control tower with all its monitors and bird's eye views.

We only had to call the engineers a couple of times over the next few days to get the locks going as we travelled up to Arras. We moored at the last possible place for us (and for everyone else as the canal is closed to all traffic upstream) opposite the kayak centre and cycled the rest of the way into Arras town and what a treat!  We think the two main squares (one in particular) are some of the very best we have ever seen in France.   See what you think.

Lovely Arras Grand Place

Alex went up the tower for magnificent views over the town while Louse enjoyed a coffee in the sunshine and watched the wedding parties emerging from the town hall. Great fun!

Wedding balloons

The port you can't get to in Arras - what a shame!

The next day as we prepared to turn round to re-trace our steps a dog-walker warned us that there was a shopping trolley under the water just where we wanted to make our turn. Good info: we fished it out with the boathook so it didn't get caught up in our propeller.

Our next detour was to Lens. The first mooring on this dead-end canal is one that we have used once before to get off the Canal du Nord highway. It's not so very peaceful though, as the wash from the big boys going past the end makes the mooring staging surge, and of course the boat too. This time we stopped about half way to Lens on a good quiet mooring beside a pleasant park. We knew that the end of the canal was a no-go area so we cycled the rest of the way into Lens and found it decidedly forgettable! To cap it all ,when we finally sussed out the true 'head of navigation' it was within the purlieus of a chemical works and Alex had to talk the gate guard into letting him in for just a second to take one photo of the head of navigation!

The end of the line in Lens

When we got back to the boat, and needing only half an hour for a leisurely lunch in the all-too-rare sunshine, we discovered that the strimming squad were out in full force attacking the grass right next to the boat! 

The strimmers at work - no peace for our lunch!

Louise's entreaties fell on deaf ears, and now that it was no longer peaceful we beat a hasty retreat back to the Canal du Nord main line. We spend the night in another favourite mooring - the Gare d'Eau near the junction with the Dunkirk-Escaut Waterway.

Then we headed north to Dunkirk, took a detour through the first lock onto the Lys for a quiet night's mooring then back onto the main drag for a rather long slog into Dunkirk.

The following days we had trouble with locks and bridges that needed engineering help to operate but finally got to Veurne, where we arranged to leave the barge for a week while we returned to England.

One night on this lovely free mooring then into the port.

Lovely Veurne - a good city to spend tine in

This gave Diksmuid time to ready itself to actually receive its winter-moorers! The problem was, it turned out, that the refurbishment/replacement of the floating pontoons had taken longer than anticipated and there really had been NOWHERE to put RICCALL!

When we returned from England we had another lovely night at Finetelle before finally mooring up on the new pontoon in Diksmuid.

So, with apologies, this blog has been very delayed in its production, mainly due to our efforts on the house in Kent, but here it finally is!!!

Our stats for this year are:

2024.4 kms      292 locks    39 bridges    7 tunnels

Summer DBA Rally and other bits!

We finally got back to Cambrai on Whit Saturday. The Channel Tunnel 'waiting to board' car park had been absolutely packed, but we found a nice grassy area signed 'Picnic' where we parked and did indeed have a picnic lunch in warm sunshine along with a million other cars.

We left Cambrai on the Sunday and were surprised how few commercial boats were showing up on our computer AIS screen, and really began to think maybe the locks were closed yet again! Then Alex noticed that the radio aerial was not pointing up into the sky as it should be and suddenly, all the commercials appeared on the screen, but even then not so very many on the go.

This meant that when we reached the start of the Canal du Nord we were the only boat around.

The first lock at Arleux was ready and waiting and so were all the rest to the very top of the flight. We did the whole flight in 3¼ hours but the best bit was from Marquion to the top, which took only 2 hours 5 minutes! That must be a record! Every lock was open and waiting but we had a moment of 'worry' when we could see on the AIS a commercial coming down towards us. Would they hold the lock for us or turn it round for the commercial? A close run thing – but they kept it in our favour, so the poor commercial had a 10 minute wait.

And so our first night was at one of our favourite moorings above Ecluse Graincourt No 7, on top of the world in peace and seclusion, with sunshine thrown in.

We were on a bit of a mission of course, as the trip to the UK had rather taken longer than expected and we were heading for the DBA Rally in Auxerre, but still, when we met a lovely Dutch couple, Anita and Peter on their barge BARRACUDA at St-Christ-Briost, we exchanged drinks, viewings and gossip, then again the next night at Noyon. 

BARRACUDA at St Christ-Briost

Their barge, newly built, with every gizmo you could think of was SO different from RICCALL that we viewed each other's barge with amazement! The steering position on BARRACUDA was like something out of the Starship Enterprise, complete with captain's chair on runners to move it towards the myriad of controls (360º bow thruster, autopilot, front and rear remote viewing cameras with 22” VDU screen, trolling valve, front and rear spud poles, multiple navigation aids, lever controlled hydraulic steering etc, etc). And they had managed to get 3 double bedrooms into their 22m of barge as well as lounge, kitchen-diner and an outside seating and dining area which could be raised or lowered (to cover it) at the touch of a button!

However, Peter did say that he was amazed how roomy RICCALL was when you looked at her size from the outside, and was generally very complimentary, which was nice as he has spent the last 15 years running a boatyard, building and repairing barges, including his own.

We spent a long day, for us - 68kms and 4 locks - and finally got to Pontoise, where we spent another pleasant night on the town quay – another of our favourite moorings.

Further on, and up the Seine at Bougival, we came across ANTHONIA and our friends, Jeremy and Carol, also on their way to the rally. An impromptu drinks and supper ensued and all agreed to make an early start to cross Paris the following morning. All went well, with each of us taking hundreds of pics  -

Approaching the La Defense business district of Paris

ANTHONIA in the distance, dwarfed by the Eiffel Tower!

and thankfully 'our' mooring at the Seine-Marne junction was available as usual, for us to breast up. Carol suggested a meal out in a local French brasserie which was just great.

Our favourite Parisian mooring, opposite the Chinese exuberance!

Watching the river cruise ships turn - great spectator sport

ANTHONIA left the next morning while we stayed to do more painting as the quay was at an ideal height.

Removing the masking tape is a tricky job when the paint is still tacky

We caught up with ANTHONIA and ESME when we reached Melun where they were both already moored and we stopped early for the day as the wind was becoming unbearable. The wind kept us moored for the whole of the next day as well - we just don't do windy cruising.

We all met up again at Sens - ESME, ANTHONIA, AURIGNY and several other barges which we got to know once arrived in Auxerre. But we had a laugh as we approached the mooring because Peter on Aurigny had told us there was plenty of room to moor but the barge Sabrina of London obviously did not know this. We had overtaken them in the lock (they were kept waiting and had moored at the back so we had to moor ahead of them) and when we were released we did our normal speed 8kph and they came rushing past at about 12kph to take what might be the last mooring spot. John apologised later saying they wanted to catch the market, but that evening over drinks one of their guests admitted they had actually been more worried about the moorings!

Rich man's country cottage on the upper Seine . . .

. . . but there's still commercial activity to contend with

Verrry tight fit

ANTONIA  and AURIGNY had an earlier arrival time at Auxerre, as did the other barges so they left before us and ESME and RICCALL brought up the rear sharing the locks and moorings up to Auxerre.

We arrived at the last lock just up river from Auxerre at the appointed time to be greeted by the rally organiser, John Best, who showed us to the mooring position allocated to us. This was the first in line after the lock but we had to moor well out from the quay with our biggest tyres under the boat as it was very shallow. However, the advantages were that we had no boat moored outside us, we weren't right in the thick of the action (some might think that a downside, but not us!), we were closer to the town and well away from the children's playground and public outdoor swimming pool.

The rally itself was a great success with a trip to a 'cave' (wine cellar), wine tasting and buffet lunch on the first day, boules competition, champagne reception and dinner on the second day, boat race and evening BBQ in the Auxerre Port de Plaisance on the third day. It was all very sociable and we got to look round several other barges and several sets of people looked round RICCALL- some of them prospective barge purchasers who were gathering information and asking questions.

Thirty barges and 120 attendees - quite a rally!

Jeremy of ANTHONIA winning the boat race

Here's a link to the official rally video if you're interested:

https://vimeo.com/223883595

 

But on the way to this event we had had two failures: the LED UV steriliser unit started showing a RED light instead of a GREEN one, and the PV panel controller went phut! and stopped working. Pearl Aqua were very concerned that the Aquisense unit had failed so soon and agreed to send a replacement asap to Auxerre to wait for our arrival. And the suppliers of the PV controller said they would do the same. Both parcels arrived as promised and were waiting at the Port de Plaisance when we arrived, so that was a great relief. Alex installed both units in double quick time but while the steriliser was fine, the new PV controller failed after about an hour! We asked the supplier to send another one express delivery and we would wait where we were until it got to us.

After the rally our next destination was Reims, where we had arranged to leave the barge for a couple of weeks while we returned to the UK for Louise's son Robert's wedding to Amy. (Note to children – why organise these things during the cruising season? So thoughtless!!) So we were to retrace our steps to Paris, then up the Marne to Conde and turn left for Reims.

On our way to Paris we were joined by our old friend Derran, who was to spend a few days with us. After some confusion as to exactly WHERE we were waiting for him (Derran doesn't have a sat-nav in his car which would have helped with our position coordinates) we finally got him on board.

Onward and our favourite mooring in Paris was again available and we had supper in the same bistro as 3 weeks previously – again perfect.

Louise and Derran at the Isles des Meldeuses 

Well I never - a glass of wine (or more) to end the day!

Lovely Meaux mooring again

At Lagny Derran caught the train back to collect his car but at Meaux and Isle les Meldeuses he cycled back, which apparently made for some interesting route-finding, despite taking our reserve sat-nav with him!!

When it came time for him to leave, he gave us a lift up to Cambrai where our own car had been left, because we had worked out that the journey to collect it from Reims would be extremely tricky, (4 to 6 hours with 3 changes of train), whereas collecting it from anywhere on the Marne, from Reims, was much easier.

By the time he left, Derran was becoming quite a useful extra crew-member – steering, throwing ropes and helping to moor and un-moor. It was lovely to have him with us, but we also appreciate being just 'a deux', which we then would be for the rest of the summer.

A few days later, we arrived at Vandieres, our 9½ out of 10 mooring, where we planned to spend a couple of nights. It's a beautiful, peaceful spot with a panoramic view of the champagne vineyards covering the valley hillside.

When we arrived we were delighted to see a couple of peacocks on the staging by the mooring, 

"Hey, this looks interesting!"

but you can have too much of a good thing, and by the time they had come on board several times and tried to eat Louise's flowers we decided enough was enough, 

"We were hoping for a ride . . ."

"This is a good perch"

so discouraged them by zealous use of the deck-wash hose and eventually they got the message.

We were now within a couple of days of Reims and our next UK return.