Thursday 27 May
We are now in a marina (Port de Plaisance) in Valence. A long time since I last blogged - we left St Jean de Losne last Saturday having had a really good three days. The weather had improved dramatically - it needed to, although we seemed to go from winter to hot summer with nothing in between - and we had a good trip down to Chalon-sur-Saone, where we spent the next two nights along with Stella and Mike on Lady Stella who are also heading south. On Monday - another bank holiday - we left Chalon, and Stella and Mike, and headed for Macon. Unfortunately the PdP at Macon was full and we decided against the town quay and spent the night on a fairly small pontoon at Belville with three other boats. On Tuesday we set off for Lyon - another beautiful day - but Lyon was uninviting and again only the town quay to moor against and we have been warned endlessly about the safety of leaving the boat for any length of time. Lyon is obviously full of vagabonds. We may return in the car on our way back to the boat later on in the year.
And then we left the relative safety and calm of the Saone and joined the mighty Rhone - and into our first massively deep lock - well, actually only 12 metres, we have yet to come across the Bollene which is 23! The wind picked up from the south and we had waves going over the front of the boat. The wind apparently only blows in two ways on the Rhone - north or south, the north wind being the mistral - dont know the same for the southerly wind. Sailed on for a while trying to find suitable berth for the night and finally arrived in a PdeP with a pontoon right on the river with massive cruise boats sailing past well into the night. Apart from these cruisers we have seen very little heavy goods traffic although we did share a lock with one very large barge.
Headed off again Wednesday with Gwen and Peter on Triton believing there to be a better chance in the locks with two bateaux de plaisance arriving together. First lock went very well and then we waited at least 45 minutes for the next two and went into the third with one of the cruisers - you would not think there could possibly be enough room for one of those and the two of us, but the lock swallowed us up.
Having had three fairly long days on the water, we are having a day off, catching up with washing, shopping, cleaning the boat yet again and tomorrow we will set off for Viviers and then on to Avignon some time over the weekend. We have been disappointed not to have stopped in Macon and Lyon so determined to stop in Avignon - having said that we will probably be in Port St Louis before we know it!
You do seem to be getting on well at last but disappointing not to be able to stop where you want to. However you need to leave some places to visit! We also seem to go from winter to summer in one hit but then we went back to winter again! We actually needed the rain and it saves watering the pots, only half of which i have done so far. Another job for this weekend.
ReplyDeleteTake care and enjoy. Sue x
Wow! your trip sounds fantastic. All those places we know and love so well! Yes MOS did get the rain overnight and into the morning and then roasting hot sun to undo all the good! Green Thumb have visited us and you will be pleased to hear that the rain came on the following night so that the fertiliser did get washed in. We have both got a lot of brown patches which were diagnosed as leather jacket damage!!! We are off next Tues for 2 weeks in France - to the Alps near Annecy for our walking holiday. Spending 3 days driving down in Andy's camper van and same coming back.You are obviously going far too quickly for us to catch up. Enjoy Provence and bon voyage for the rest of the trip. Love Penny and Ian
ReplyDeleteBonjour! We are sad not to be with you but seems that you are coping very well without us following our mutiny last year in epernay! It all sounds very familiar - squeezing into locks with nasty barges and struggling to find places to stay. Glad the wev has improved, we are looking forward to a wet BH Saturday!
ReplyDeleteInvites are all out now, although we have only had 5 responses. Ross was first to respond. Apparently he has one dietary requirement - plenty of beer! Who would have guessed?
Enjoy the rest of the trip, hope the sirens are less frequent in the south of France x
Wow lots going on since your last blog thought you had disappeared! You are now seeing the places you should have last year. Don't think I would have liked the waves over the front of the boat or being in locks with commercial barges bad enough on the Thames in a fibre glass boat. Surrey has not had much rain though forecast for BH Saturday as we are off to a 70th birthday celebration organised for outside! It will be interesting to see all the places you have passed later in the year by car a total different perspective. What date do you return? Enjoy the rest of the holiday. Love K & V x
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