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| Crossing the bridge |
What the Water Rat said to the Mole: “Believe me, my young friend, there is nothing–absolutely nothing–half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats.”
I’d taken the boat out on the first day and successfully avoided a “Galaxy Quest” moment (you know – when they scrape the nose of the Enterprise all the way down the inside of the space port). Today was Stewart’s turn and of course it went well, though he mentioned that at the first lock entrance there was a certain degree of sphincter puckering.
Another beautiful day, overcast but warm, when the sun chose to show its face, with a cool breeze from the West. One side of the canal today was mainly woods, large trees and lower shrubs and brambles all hanging out over the river. The other bank was the old horse road for pulling the barges – gravel with neatly slashed green grass shoulders. Beyond the road the landscape changes from forest to fields of wheat – still green, and vivid yellow canola in the middle distance. Now we’re in the narrower canal, when it’s forest on both sides, we’re travelling inside a corridor of green.
We travel slowly, perhaps 10km per hour and it’s wonderful to watch the vistas reveal themselves as we creep around each corner. Coming into the town of Florentin we are greeted with the silhouette of St Florentin cathedral at the top of a hill at the end of a tree-lined, gun barrel straight, km long section of canal .
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| Fun on the locks |
Our boat is large, about 15m, with a draft of perhaps a metre, and it catches the breeze like a foam esky in a swimming pool. Fortunately it has bow thrusters which makes manoeuvring a breeze. You can turn the thing on its own length. The fun bits are going through the locks where, typically, you pull over and wait your turn then, after the folks going down stream have passed, steer into the narrow lock, make fast the vessel, then (in our case going up stream), ride up with the water as it flows into the lock – sometimes four or five metres high.
It’s great fun handling the boat and the ropes, and we all have a go. The locks in the Bourgogne canal are all operated by lockmen. Each lockman covers a region, each with a number of locks, and communicates constantly by phone with the other lockmen (and lockwomen). They whip up and down the canal between their locks, in wheenie cars or on mopeds. Alex, a young Frenchman, has been to Australia and toured Adelaide to Darwin via the East coast in a Ford Falcon Station wagon!
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| Our boat “Saint Aigna” waiting for the lock to fill |
At lunch, all the lockman pull up for an hour. We tie up on the bank of the canal in a beautiful leafy glade. A stark contrast to the night before, all that could be heard was bird call and the gentle lapping of water against the hull. We made a lunch of cheese, ham, baguette and a nice pinot gris from our journeying in Turkheim.
We stopped at the town of St Florentin and climbed up the hill to where the cathedral enjoys a commanding view of the surrounding fields. This town is marked by change – all in keeping with it’s history; roads are being recobbled, timber and stone houses being rebuilt and rooves being repaired. In the modest town square, a solitary woman and two conversing old gentlemen enjoy quiet drinks. The view down over the mossy tiled rooves to the canal below was beautiful.
Leading up to Florentin there were little hobby farms; cottages on steep terraced hillsides with orchards and vegetables, surrounded by dense forest and shrubs. After the final lock there is a stone bridge, a viaduct if you will, that allows the barges to traverse the river through Florentin – it was pretty cool. A Parisian man on vacation, a photographer, takes lots of photos of us crossing and wants to send them to us. He’s a lovely fellow and his desire to communicate and share his enthusiasm in the area are heart warming.
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| View point above St Florentin |
Our plan was to eat out tonight but the only eatery in the small town is closed for the weekend (on vacation apparently), so Judy cooks up a raclette for dinner. Soon it will be our turn to cook – hope they like salad. It’s just starting to rain lightly and it’s cosy in the cabin of our boat. I can hear gentle rain fall and night birds and some frogs.
Tomorrow we see a chateau and hopefully find a restaurant that’s actually open!