24 August to 28 August 2018. 36 kilometers, 30 locks.
Friday
24 August – Santenay to St Léger-sur-Dheune. 9 kilometers, 4 locks, 1 hours 45
minutes.
Leaving the beautifully restored, Swiss registered barge Vrijheid behind at the Santenay mooring
we set off upstream towards St Léger – disappointingly, the restaurant where we
had so enjoyed a meal last year, had changed hands and the subsequent reviews
were not complimentary at all. We had to find a new shower pump however and
were hoping that one could be sourced at the Locaboat base in the town so we
decided on an overnight stop there anyway.
More pretty canal-way finally ended
as we arrived and
moored up behind Nounou who were
topping up with water before taking their leave; unfortunately, what we remembered as being free, un-serviced mooring from last year has had facilities installed and is now a
pay-mooring so we moved back to the quayside proper, right next to the
capitainerie but a safe distance from the demarcated hotel boat turning circle.
The base did not have a pump (nor do they sell diesel)
and neither did the camping store which we rode to so, in consultation with
Ian-in-the-Azores, we cobbled together a set of adapters and fitted a bilge pump
into the shower drain and we can shower again without having wires and pieces
of hosepipe all over the galley. And we also managed to get another old
shower-pump, which had been lying in the bilges since we bought Elle, working.
Saturday
25 August – St Léger-sur-Dheune to St Julian-sur-Dheune. 11 kilometers, 10
locks, 2 hours 55 minutes.
Last year we had marked the mooring at St Julien as being
“Lovely” and most pleasant it was albeit with no services.
On a much cooler day
and, after chugging through rural landscapes and a couple of quite boisterous
locks, we arrived to find there is not much to the small town of St Julian but
the little restaurant seemed to be doing a bustling trade; not surprising as
the hotel, auberge and bistro in nearby Ecuisses were all ‘en conge annuel’
(how do you close an auberge and a hotel during the holiday season?) – a pity
as we had promised ourselves a meal at the bistro on our return to Ecuisses.
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| Apples but stung to bits. |
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| The road to Ecuisses. |
A late lunch and an early bedtime were in order.
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| Finesse is very photogenic.. |
Sunday
26 August - St Julian-sur-Dheune to Montchanin. 4.5 kilometers, 8 locks, 2
hours 25 minutes.
With a firstlight temperature of 7C and with lots of mist
around,
we decided that we would not spend another night in St Julian but
rather get over the last of the ‘uphill’ locks. Lynn managed to stop the roving
lockkeeper in his car while trying to get through to ‘lock control’ on the
phone (Tip: Get the roving lockies’ contact numbers wherever possible in case
you need to make a change of plan) and he agreed that we could be on our way as
soon as we were ready.
In last year’s blog comment was made of how tiring this
stretch of locks is but this year they seemed worse than we remembered and we summited
with much relief,
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| Summitting at last! |
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| The Canal du Centre was built to connect the Saone and the Loire. |
mooring outside the VNF offices – not very attractive but
very functional - no water or electricity though.
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| Our across-canal campers. |
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| A hard life indeed. |
The day had morphed into a
thing of beauty so Lynn decided to paint part of our front coachroof which had
been prepped weeks ago but which she had been unable to finish due to the high
daytime temperatures.
Montchanin was established in the mid eighteen eighties
as a coal mining town and from Google earth looks a bit industrial so we opted
out of taking the busy road into town and instead whiled away the afternoon
reading.
Monday
27 August – Montchanin to Blanzy. 9 kilometers, 7 locks, 2 hours 25 minutes.
Once again we had arranged for a nine o’clock lock
through but on arrival at the lock the doors were closed, the lock was empty,
there were no lights showing, and there was no lockkeeper. So we turned around
intending to ask about the situation at the VNF offices; as we arrived at our
recently vacated mooring a VNF car pulled up and the girl asked if we wanted to
use the lock in the opposite direction. “Oui, madame, Merci”, so we turned
around again and from then on everything went smoothly – bliss to be going ‘downhill’
again!
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| The 'port' at Montchanin. |
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| A memorial to French Resistance fighters killed in 1944. |
The quay at Blanzy was deserted apart from two very dilapidated
long-stayers, one deserted and one, a filthy wreck, with a person living on
board.
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| Can afford to drink beer but... |
Bikes off and down to the quayside E Leclerq we trundled to buy engine
and gearbox oil and some wine, returning to Elle
for a braai.
Tuesday is market day in nearby Montceau-les-Mines where
we had decided not to moor up but instead to cycle to from Blanzy. The market
was not as busy as we remembered but a couple of cheap golf shirts were again
purchased (same seller, same make and same price as last year) as were some
fresh vegetables.
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| The unusual St Georges cross ensign. |
After morning coffee at a café-on-the-square
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| Ten o'clock - coffee time. She on left, he on right. |
we strolled
through the single shopping street,
buying some interesting and very cheap goodies
at the ‘Chinese shop’ before cycling back to a lovely pan fried fillet with
mushroom sauce and vegetables late lunch.
I had picked up a bit of a twenty-four hour bug
so we decided to chill aboard in the beautiful but once again, very warm,
weather.
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| So cool - cyclists chatting outside our window. No hassle! |
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| Water replenishment time. |
