"Elle" - Exploring the European Inland Waterways: September 2019

8 September to 23 September 2019.110 kilometers, 36 locks, 3 tunnels.

Sunday 8 September. Baume-les-Dames to Deluz. 17 kilometers, 6 locks. 3 hours, 15 minutes.

It has been a long break between blogs due in part to foreigners being on board and a couple of mechanical issues from which I try always to retreat. The first ‘foreigners’ were the mechanics from Chantier Naval in Deluz, and the second lot were our very good friends from Durban, James and Laurien, who insisted on treating us to as much as we could imbibe and partake of in as short a time as possible – situation normal for these two!

So let us recap.

Leaving Baume-les-Dames in cool, foggy conditions, we wander south-west-ish and, despite the best efforts of the @#%$**&!! weed,

More weed!

Another boat!

we arrive at the same little quay in Deluz which we had visited previously, tie up, and watch the rain pass. Lynn does some foraging whilst I wonder whether the new solar panels, house pump and lift pump had arrived, having been notified by Cluaue ‘le chef’ that, because I had addressed the latter to myself care of himself, the courier company would not release the goods which I would have to collect from the ‘Coli’.

Apples.

Pears.

Lynn's bounty.

Tuesday 10 September. Deluz to Besançon (Port Tarragnoz). 19 kilometers, 5 locks. 3 hours, 0 minutes.

Morning breaks, a huge mobile crane arrives across the canal, does a u-turn and leaves again, Chantier Naval’s opening time of eight o’clock arrives as do their staff, and then everyone traipses off down to the port leaving us in suspense. Surely they have not forgotten about us? By now the crane has set itself up at the port and, eventually, Claude & Co are spotted organizing the liftout of a small yacht and its loading onto a transporter – their keel has obviously prevented them from having the necessary draft to get back to Germany so they have to truck it back.

That all goes well, and we wait…

At about eleven Lynn sensibly suggests that we trot across to the boatyard, engage with Claude who is positive that his team are already on Elle and then it all starts happening; Claude #2 and ‘Rip van Winkle’ are into the engine bay,

decide that they need a fitting, dash off to whom knows where, we go out to the now-open little restaurant for a delicious meal,

Salad entree

Veal with mushrooms.

Caramelized apples on a bed of strawberry and chocolate.

they come back, and, three hours later, our pressure pump has been replaced and is working a treat, the two additional solar panels have been connected and the shower lift pump has been stored in anticipation of the next emergency – and Claude #1 only charges us for three hours labour, parts included! Bliss. The weather is stunning so we decide to move on downstream, arriving at Besançon (Tarragnoz) to a deserted pontoon and a moonlit evening, enhanced by the floodlit walls of the fortifications looming above us.

Thursday 12 September. Besançon (Port Tarragnoz) to Besançon (Cites des Arts). 1 kilometer, 1 lock, 1 tunnel. 25 minutes.

Interesting bimini addition.

Wednesday was spent doing some sightseeing, as was Thursday morning,

Riding through the Tarragnoz tunnel.

Old city gates

Besancon.

An odd reconstruction.

Besancon around the bend.

after which we moved Elle to the port outside of the Cites des Artes to await the La Grange’s arrival, expected early evening but delayed by their taxi being engaged with the traffic.

Jeanine - more about her later.

Once aboard, much hugs and a glass or two of M. Pannier’s best, a dash back through the lock and the tunnel to Tarragnoz to avoid charter boat Jeanine’s 08h00 departure, and, for the exhausted La Granges (and a very unwell James), sleep.

The Besancon battlements as seen from Melbourne, Oz.

Friday 13 September. Besançon (Cite des Arts) to Saint Vit. 29 kilometers, 9 locks, 2 tunnels. 11 hours, 15 minutes (including a 5 hour stop at PK57).

Seven-thirty on the dot it's lines up and we’re on our way, grateful that we have avoided the misery of being stuck behind the labouriously slow Jeanine whilst on our way to our planned overnight stop at PK57 – the charter boat was heading for their overnight stop at Ranchot, well beyond PK57.

Bye, bye Besancon - until next year.

James at the wheel.

Thoraise tunnel entrance once again.

Laurien at PK57.

After lunch and a snooze, we somehow all agreed to head on to Ranchot, jump in front of Jeanine before they departed at seven o’clock the next morning, and head on to Dole for an early arrival but such are the plans of mice and men.

The weather was good, the weed was thinning out to an extent, our impellers were still playing up and need changing urgently, and at a quarter to seven, just before lock-closing time, we arrived in Saint Vit to find Jeanine firmly ensconced in the lock for the night. I suppose that we could have insisted that they either go through or back out so that we could lock through and be ahead of them in the morning but decided instead to let sleeping barges lie, leave late the next morning to let them get ahead, stop at Ranchot for baguettes and croissants to let them get even further ahead and, if all went according to plan, arrive in Dole just behind them.

Jeanine locked in.

Elle locked out.

Saturday 14 September. Saint Vit to Dole. 27 kilometers, 9 locks. 8 hours, 30 minutes (including a 1 hour stop at Ranchot and another at Rochefort-sur-Nenon).

07h15 and she's on her way again.

Steaming jacuzzi.

Hah!

Despite leaving well after an hour after Jeanine and stopping in Ranchot for an hour,

Ranchot

traveling at three kilometers an hour in the shallow canal derivations (and even more slowly around corners), we caught Jeanine soon after mid-day and spent the next excruciating three hours trundling in their mud-stream, not helped by an upcoming hire-boat which had no clue about the locks and delayed us both for half an hour whilst they tried to sort themselves out on the up, until we threw in our hand and stopped at Rochefort for an hour to let luxury-plodder get ahead.

Sigh...

Lunch on the trot

Approaching Rochefort.

The long cut into Dole.

J&L waiting for J to lock through into Dole.

We eventually arrived in Dole at five o’clock, rather than the usual two o’clock landing for this distance, James and I went for a short walkabout and then it was boat and bed.

En route we had one of these mishaps!

Re-splicing the loop.

Dole port.

Our neighbour had also had a tough trip from wherever.

On Sunday, the team, minus moi who was on impeller replacement duty,

Supposed to last 500 hours - this is after 200.

set off for a tour of this most delightful city; fiddly bits done, we all met at the cathedral, meandered through the quaint streets to the Place de la Republique where coffee and beers were consumed and then it was back to the tanneries area of the city for a really good lunch at la Petite Venise.

James being creative.

Can anyone say what style of architecture this roof represents?

A walk in the park.

Monday 16 September. Dole to St Jean de Losne. 23 kilometers, 9 locks. 4 hours, 25 minutes (including a 25 minute lock delay).

Anxious to be off the canalized sections of the Doubs and to be back on the lazy, weed-free Sâone, all agreed that another early start would be in order so, in crystal weather we set off on our last day on the River Doubs/Canal Rhone-au-Rhin, heading towards SJDL and the lovely Sâone, being frustrated temporarily at Ecluse 71, the battery charger of which (which receives the telecommand signal) was broken, we finally reached Ecluse 75, handed back our telecommand, wandered down the river

The coke supplies for the chemical factory.

The naughty lock.

Flower carer.

Bateaux coming and going through the lock.

J&L's first lock share.

"Is that Laurien down there?"

Autumn is approaching rapidly.

only to find nary a space and nary an offer of rafting up from any of the four barges and one cruiser lined up on the steps; a ‘lady’ from the one barge, which we heard on good authority had already been there one day over the allowed three days, had the temerity to tell us to moor on the other side of the river – no services and the scruffiness of Losne. Eventually, while preparing to tie up to the booze boat and wait for a gap, the owner of barge Svanen allowed us to moor up beside them for lunch and, as nobody moved all afternoon, for the night – a nice gesture but, by their own admittance, they had already overstayed their allowed three day stay. And we heard from a hire-boat here in Tournus that the one barge is still moored up there.

The lunch of frog’s legs and white-bait was excellent – thank you again J&L!

Tuesday 17 September. St Jean de Losne to Verdun-sur-le-Doubs. 38 kilometers, 2 locks. 4 hours, 50 minutes.

In almost perfect cruising conditions, we set off down the Sâone,

Passing Seurre.

passed through the two big locks,

James taking us in.

Lovely deckhand!

The dash out of the lock.

We have never seen this before - three peniches tied abreast and traveling upstream.

and by lunchtime, we were ensconced in the rather drab little town of Verdun-sur-Doubs, a short walk around which revealed not much.

There was a cave however.

James again.

Girls just wanna have fun!

Wednesday 18 September. Verdun-sur-le-Doubs to Chalon-sur-Sâone. 25 kilometers, 0 locks. 2 hours, 40 minutes.

Another very early start in order to be in Chalon as the first departures from the usually full port were on their way, saw us passing the riverside restaurant at Gergy at eight o’clock,

Gergy

Little 'uns...

And big 'uns.

and finally arriving in Chalon-sur-Sâone before ten to find plenty of space available, a situation which did not last for very long.

The branch to the now-closed Canal du Centre.

Hello Chalon!

The island complex.

Chalon is a lovely city and, with the huge Carrefour two hundred meters from the port, most convenient for boaters. We visited the fresh produce market being held in the square where the Hotel de Ville is, wandered the many pedestrian lanes and eventually headed back to Elle for champers and confit de canard – very decadent.

Confit de canard

The baker.

I was scolded in here by a priest for taking photographs
while people (two of them) were praying. Never been an issue before.

Lynn's even better confit de canard.

Sante!

Thursday was spent in a similar fashion, the difference being that J&L once again treated us to a very good meal at Les Canailles, a restaurant on the island.

Yes, we bought...

...and even more.

Friday 20 September. Chalon-sur-Sâone to Gigny-sur-Sâone. 20 kilometers, 0 locks. 2 hours, 5 minutes.

Friday was a shopping morning for Lynn and I, whilst James and Laurien got on with the awful job of packing suitcases in anticipation of their taxi pick-up at midday. And then in a flurry of hugs, kisses and handshakes, our guests over the past nine days were gone and we wandered back to a very quiet Elle. Thank you for all your generosity Guys – we hope you enjoyed yourselves and we’ll see you next month in Durbs.

A spur-of-the-moment decision saw us up-lines, wave goodbye to beautiful Chalon, and set off downstream to the very uninspiring port of Gigny-sur-Sâone, which is the ideal launchpad to reach the very busy pontoon at Tournus, at the appropriate time.

This boat was having its foredeck plastered in cement!

Saturday 21 September. Gigny-sur-Saone to Tournus. 11 kilometers, 1 lock. 1 hour, 45 minutes.

Despite arriving in Tournus at a quarter to ten, the pontoon was choc-a-block but one hireboat said they were leaving within the hour, and another, flying a South African flag, by eleven-thirty, so we rafted up to the South Africans and shortly afterward slipped into the space vacated by the other hirer – by that evening, and the next, boats were rafted up all over the place!

After Googling in vain for a pub which would be showing the SA versus NZ rugby game, we wandered through stalls of the very busy Saturday morning market and chanced upon a small bar; Lynn asked the lady proprietress if they had a TV set and if so, could she put on the rugby.

A most interesting ceiling.

Go Bokke!

Haka of HKGK?

Affirmative answers to both questions saw us plonk ourselves at a table among a group of very scruffy locals (including one very drunk one, something not often seen in smaller towns) and, before we knew it, there were quite a few Frenchmen taking an interest in the game – one guy even bought us a beer! But we lost the game so it was a bit of a dejected walk back to the boat.

Most of our time here has been spent spring cleaning and catching up on the blog but we did take time today to walk around a deserted Monday-morning Tournus, and to enjoy a fine pasta luncheon at the Lazzarella restaurant on the quay before retiring back to Elle to do some final ‘this leg’ blogging, and boat watching.