Canal du Nivernais: Mailly-le-Ville to Auxerre via Vincelles.

28 kilometers, 16 locks.

Wednesday 13 September 2017. Mailly-le-Ville to Vincelles – 14 kilometers, 8 locks, 4 hours 40 minutes (95 minutes of delays).

Morning dawned with Elle rocking on the mooring and clouds scudding by but as the wind was forecast to be coming from behind we decided to move on, moi just hoping that we would not be blown into any lock gates. The lady lockie at the first lock arrived twenty five minutes late, still rubbing the sleep from her eyes but from then on the trip was singularly uneventful with the wind not being an issue at all!

At the last lock we realised that we were entering serious wine tourist territory as there was a sign offering to have one collected from one’s boat and taken for a half-day tour of the Chablis vineyards at the snip of a price of €65 per person…

The long wall outside the crêperie (pancake restaurant) at Vincelles had an opening for us and in no time we were safely tied up;

Vincelles mooring.

after a light lunch, it was off to the nearby Atac supermarket to provision up. That evening we had supper at the much rated crêperie and while my goats cheese salad was good, Lynn’s escargot crêpe and chocolate and cream pancake desert were rated “okay, but not that great” – the escargot dish was a real disappointment and was simply snails in garlic and parsley butter tossed onto a pancake, a combination which did not really work. A cream sauce creation would have complimented the crêpe far more.

The next day, after doing a load of washing at the Atac

and taking a short tour around the small town we set off over the river, through the pretty riverside town of Vincelottes and down to the caves at Bailly some three kilometres from our mooring. For €6 per person the tour of the underground chalk cellars capable of housing some seven million bottles of Crémant de Bourgogne sparkling wine is a must and two glasses of bubbles, and the souvenir flutes, are included in the price. Bargain!

Reception

Murals in the cellar.

Anyone for bubbles?

Friday 15 September 2017. Vincelles to Auxerre – 14 kilometers, 8 locks, 4 hours 40 minutes (50 minute lunch stop).

The luxury charter barge Randle had moored behind us at Vincelles and they were also leaving for Auxerre so we locked through with them all the way – with their twenty three meters and our thirteen, the locks were pretty full of boat.

Randle

Auxerre lock decor

Tree pruning crew.

Coming into Auxerre - stunning!

The Aquarelle hire boat base at Auxerre was packed with, in some cases, boats three abreast, many of which were closed up for winter. Fortunately, the wall on the old city side of the river (we’re on part Nivernais canal and part Yonne River) had a space right at the downstream end which was ideal. Mike, the friendly captain collected our money for a three night stay and one electricity jeton and then it was braai and chill time. We were joined by a huge Le Boat who squeezed in behind us and whose luncheon had obviously been good judging by their sundowner loquaciousness.

Saturday morning it was off to the automotive spares outlet to find a gas strut to replace the one which holds up our doorway hatch (no luck!) and to the eLeclerc supermarket for food and wine.

Part of the fish counter.

We do seem to spend an inordinate amount of time in supermarkets but with only a small 140 liter food refrigerator/freezer we can only store a limited amount of meat, veggies and salads. And then we wandered through the old city which is really lovely albeit quite crowded with tourists – to be expected this being Heritage Weekend when many of the museums and galleries are open to the public free of charge. But Sunday was to be our ‘tourist’ day…

The Aussies behind us (Pete, Barry and ? and wives) were in fine fettle once again and after lending them a water connection gin swilling Pete came aboard with a bottle of wine which he emptied before they all set off for dinner. We heard them arriving home after midnight amid much laughter so obviously a good time was had by all.

Auxerre mooring.

And so Sunday arrived with the first task being to make five trips to the nearby Atac fuel station and to load up two hundred litres of diesel, the same process to be repeated the following day. With a jerry can apiece we set off down the cycle path, filled the jerries, bungy corded them on to the carriers and mine promptly fell off! Back in place, Lynn gingerly moved off but crash – jerry can meets concrete. It was corded back on again but not before both jerry can and bike had taken a tumble. And I did a good job of repeating the comedy of errors. The plastic of the cans was not bonding with the steel of the carriers at all so leaving me on guard Lynn went back to Elle, collected some straps and eventually we made it back, emptying twenty litres into the tank and saving the other for a top up when we close up for winter. We will not be repeating the process, choosing rather to pay the exorbitant surcharge and fill up the remaining three hundred and fifty or so litres at the Aquarelle waterside diesel pump.

On the way back with our fuel we happened to bump into Aussie Barry off the Le Boat boat who said that that the other two guys had sat drinking bottles of red wine until 5am – they all left at eleven thirty for Migenne for ‘hand back’ and the hangovers must have been monumental.

And then the heavens opened and the wind blew and so it continued the whole day, dashing our sightseeing plans and, being Heritage Weekend, it was a double whammy.

Braaing in the rain - enormous cuisses.

The next day the weather improved somewhat and our first stop was the Post Office where a parcel for Lynn’s brother Ian was despatched to Diksmuide and then we made a fainthearted attempt to ‘reverse follow’ the tour of the old city. We missed quite a lot but I found the place delightful although Lynn thought that it lacked the buzz of some similar sized French towns.

Cadet Roussel

St Eusebe Church founded in the 7thC.

That evening we had sundowners at the café across the road where we bumped into the recently retired Professor of Hydrology at Pretoria university Fanie van Vuuren and his wife Leone.

Fanie bemoaning the Springboks record 57 - 0 drubbing by the All Blacks!