Tuesday 26 to Thursday 28 May
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| Bergues to Bourbourg - 25kms |
On a gorgeous day, one of the warmest we had had so far,
we set sail along the route less travelled: Canal De Bergues back to Dunkerque
and then on to the Canal De Bourbourge, firstly the busy, commercial part and
then on to the dead quiet but very pretty section,
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| Approaching Coppenaxfort |
through the manual lock,
to the town of Bourbourg. Apart from a
pontoon, a push button tap and a bin, there are no other boating facilities at
Bourbourg – and it is just on 1.1m deep (if not less as we kicked up quite a
bit of mud).
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| Mooring, Bourbourg |
A higgledy piggeldy town, a little on the dreary side but with a
certain undeniable charm of its own – and a huge InterMarche, bigger than any
other supermarket we had yet seen on this particular trip.
The restored choir in the Chapel of Light in the 12th
century Saint Jean-Baptiste Church has a permanent contemporary display of
religious themes around water and the Creation by the British sculptor Sir Anthony Caro which we appreciated
despite its vague wackiness – somehow it worked and the handout in English was
most helpful to our understanding.
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| Galapagos |
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| Beside the river |
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| Paradise garden |
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| The baptismal font |
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| The Tower of Morning taken from The Tower of Evening |
Apart from a ride to Graveline which is a real tourist
seaside town with its main redeeming feature being the lovely garden within the
huge walls of the old city ramparts,
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| Sculpture in the garden |
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| Girls chatting |
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| Rampart passageway |
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| Part of the gardens |
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| Gravelines pier... |
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| ...and beach... |
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| ...and nuclear power station, 6th largest in the world and 2nd largest in EU. |
Back at Bourbourg we had booked lunch the next day at the restaurant. A fairly good meal but to my mind, overpriced.
I’m not quite sure why we spent three days
in Bourbourg. Maybe, despite our internet connection being non-existent, it was
the feel-good berth or the sunny weather or just the time to sand and paint and
tidy without interference. But we just did.
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| Steps to swim platform being refurbished. |
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| Home from home. |
Lynn was it to cold to join in with the girls chatting.
ReplyDeleteI see that Gravelines small boat (sorry cruisers) harbour is open to the sea is there not much tidal moment. Lost of mooring positions obviously quite a few sea going vessels in there.
ReplyDeleteThose are mainly sport fishing boats and the canal seems to work quite well but obviously not all the time as the lock is only open for three hours on either side of high tide. Apparently a lot of yachties from the UK like using it as their entry port as it it not the busy type of port like Calais, Dunkerque, Nieuwpoort or Ostend are.
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