Monday 23rd June 2008 Fenouillet to Toulouse

Hot and sunny, clear blue skies, nice cooling breeze. Thunderstorms promised later. It was 9.00 a.m. as I turned the pole then hopped off at the wooden landing below Lacourtensort lock 2 and walked up to the lock to press the green button. There was a beautiful garden in front of the lock house with rockery and roses in a gravel bed. The man from the house was out working already watering his plants and trees. At Lalande, lock 1, I went up the ladder. A large cruiser (ex-Connoisseur hire boat called Idefix) passed us just before the bridge inhabited by winos living in boxes. We passed the row of houseboats at the end of the Canal de Garonne and turned left in the basin on to the canal du Midi at 10.35 a.m. There were more dropouts living in tents under the trees along the top of the canal bank all the way into the city. The lady keeper came out to see that we’d moored OK in lock 1 Bearnais. Mike put a stern rope on the large bollard by the bottom end gates and Bill dropped a rope on our stern. She asked if we were OK like that. Yup! And up we went to the sound of hooters going off for each manoeuvre. (Health and safety is starting to go mad here too!) A short pound to lock 2, Minimes. We had a hold up while the VNF were doing something by the top end gates; there were three men, one van and a scooter. Then we rose sedately under CCTV camera surveillance (operated by Madame at lock 1, we wondered?) Two cruisers were coming down as we left, but they closed the lock gates behind us and made the cruisers wait while the men did some more work. One of them was flying a Swiss flag, but had Veghel in the Netherlands as its home port? On up to Bayard lock 3, the deep one. The camera below the lock swivelled round to watch us as we entered the empty chamber. They had added a much needed mooring pole halfway along the lock chamber. I put a fore end rope around a very rusty metal tube and Mike tied to a floater at the stern, we collected Rosy alongside and then the gates closed and the lock filled very gently. I rang the VNF offices in Toulouse and asked if they could open the bridge into the basin for us, the guy asked when and I said 15 minutes? He said “No, it would have to be after lunch at 1.30 p.m.” OK. We stooged on past the moored boats in the port (no sign of Paul’s Liberty) and moored across the entrance to the basin, much to the annoyance of the fishermen who kept looking at the no mooring signs. At 1.30 p.m. the VNF chef came to move the bridge (the same guy who had told Mike earlier, when he arrived with our car, that he couldn’t leave it in the VNF compound – which is like a small isolated village, an oasis in the city). There were no barriers so the chap who had come with him had to flag down a group of cyclists. I said no, no let them carry on let’s see them swim the gap! Must have just amused him ‘cos our VNF chef kept tittering after that! We entered the basin and moored close by the dock. Took a few photos – it was quite the biggest dock we’d ever been on. Fanny ran up and down the forty five degree sloping stone walls with ease. Bill said it was great he could throw her ball and she’d get tired out running up and down the walls. We went to the office and signed their papers for a key to the side gate. The chef said we couldn’t leave the car inside the VNF compound overnight we would have to park it in the street, it was the rule. Mike baulked at that, he’d never had to leave our vehicle outside like that in all the boatyards, docks, clubs, etc, that we’d stayed at before. We went to get the karcher (pressure washer) he’d arranged to hire from Kiloutou (nice name - qui loue tout - who hires everything!) by jnc 15 Roseraies on the A61. We were going to do some shopping too but Mike decided to take the karcher back to the boat first. We put the machine on the boat and went off to Carrefour at Labège 2, bought the groceries and headed back. I piled all the junk that normally lives in the car into several bags and unloaded them and the shopping by the gate. Mike parked the car next to the gates in an awkwardly placed parking bay. Bill gave me a hand carrying the shopping across the wide cobbled yard. I was glad to see Mike had the same trouble as I did with the key in the side gate, he couldn’t remove the key – I said “turn the key to the vertical position” to him and he pulled the key out – it had taken me five minutes of fiddling to discover that! I put the groceries away and made a sandwich as it was too hot and too late to cook a hot meal. Later we chatted with Bill. He said he’d been making phone calls to the guy who transports narrow boats who had told him he hadn’t got any boats booked to come to the Midi. Bill said he’d told him that Agde was the place to be craned out otherwise crane hire would cost him about 1,000€. He said he’d ask on his website if any boats wanted to come to the Midi and do a deal with him for half rates.

Sunday 22nd June 2008 St Jory lk to abv Fenouillet

Hot and sunny again. We set off for the lock at 8.45 a.m. As we passed them the crew of yacht Albert was also casting off. They said they didn’t like being at the front of the lock and Mike told them we couldn’t go up the front either as our boat weighed 18 tonnes and would be bashed about by the water coming in. They said they would come up after us. I stepped off while St Jory lock 6 was emptying to get some bread from the boulangerie in St Jory village. There was evidence of the party that went on the night before with crash barriers piled up and rubbish on the streets, empty coke cups and food wrappers. I bought a flute and went back to the boat. The yacht was up front in the chamber (they’d screwed past Mike to get in front as he was being pushed sideways by the weir right below the lock) and the gates were only just closing behind Rosy and Temujin as I got back. The next lock was 1.9 kms distant and the yacht went first at a great rate of knots. We followed, but they went in the lock and closed the gates behind them when we were only about 50m from the lock. Well, we somehow expected it, but they could have said they were going to do that - Mike was quite upset by their rudeness. If they were in such a hurry they should have said so and we'd have let them past. I stepped off to press the button on the lock side at lock 5, Bordeneuve. The yacht was at the next lock before our top end gates were open. At 9.55 a.m. we were on our way to lock 4 Lepinasse, another 1.9 kms distant. Mike climbed the muddy ladder to press the button when we got in the chamber. There were crowds of walkers and cyclists on the towpath and they gathered to watch us lock through. 3.8 kms to the last lock, N° 3 Fenouillet. Mike went up the ladder again. We moored just above the lock on the towpath side at 11.20 a.m. about three feet out from the bank - on the bottom again. I put the window shields in and set the canvases to give shade but allow the breeze in as the sun was shining directly from the front. Lunch then Mike set the gennie up for the first time this year to run the TV, etc, while he watched the Grand Prix from Magny Court (the last one to be held there, after a run of sixteen years).

Saturday 21st June 2008 Lacourt-St-Pierre to below St Jory lk

Hot and sunny. Bill set off early to get some shopping from the Intermarché in Montech. Mike also got up early, around 8.00 a.m. but had some trouble with getting ready so we were half an hour later than we had intended to be. A large hire boat coming past heading for the Montauban locks just as we were about to untie didn’t help matters much. Bill called on the radio and we turned on to the main line at 10.15 a.m. as Bill backed Rosy out of the moorings. A yacht had been about to come up Montech lock as we went past it, it soon caught up so we called him past into Lavache lock N° 10 in front of us. It was an automatic lock so the French guy off the yacht (called Albert) went up the only ladder and pressed the button. It was 11.00 a.m. when we left the top, setting off on the 18.5 kms long pound to the next lock. The yacht was soon out of sight. We saw only one other boat, a little British Otter around 11.40 a.m. heading downhill. The yacht Albert was moored at Grisolles – crew in the restaurant no doubt. It was 1.25 p.m. and as we passed they were setting off and caught up with us again as we arrived at lock 9, Emballens. The resident lock keeper, a young man with long curly hair in a knot on top of his head, hippie-style, came out to operate the lock and pressed buttons on a console. The converted shortened péniche Exodus was moored above his lock with a for sale notice on it (It was for sale when we came down in September 2007). We followed Albert to the next lock, he was in the lock before we were halfway along the 3.5 kms pound. Surprisingly  the young female keeper waited for us and we all three went up Catselnau lock 8, shortly followed by l’Hers lock 7, the latter worked for us by a young man. Mike told him we were stopping below the next lock and he also told the crew on Albert. It was 3.30 p.m. The yacht set off first but didn’t get very far before they stopped five feet out from the bank. As we passed them the skipper said they had an overheated engine and would have to sort it out. 

We carried on along the rest of the 3.3 kms pound leading to St Jory, lock 6. The trees along the right bank were casting a very inviting shade. We called Bill, who was following us, and got no reply so we stopped and almost got close to the bank. Bill had been trying to call us to say let’s moor under the trees! The VHF marine radio had changed its channel from 9 to 8! Just after we tied up the yacht came past and moored close to a cruiser tied at the end of the length of piling below the lock (they said they were going into the port in Toulouse). It was still steaming hot even in the shade under the trees. In the distance we could hear muffled music – today was France’s day of music. It was very noisy as we were moored right opposite the railway which now follows the course of the canal all the way into the city of Toulouse. It was very hot and sticky so we left the doors open as late as possible to try and reduce the heat in the cabin.

Friday 20th June 2008 Lacourt-St-Pierre

Hot and sunny again. Mike was up bright and early to take the car to the VNF yard and come back on the moped. Bill and I went to see the people in the Mairie - no one in, they only open afternoons, 2 p.m. until 6 p.m. - 5 p.m. on Fridays. We went back to the boat and I put the aluminium reflectors in the starboard side windows to try to reduce the heat in the cabin as it had been stiflingly hot the day before. A gang of heavy weight kids were playing rugby (sort of, more like all-in wrestling) on the grass by the car park, so I told Mike I was going to the Mairie at 2.00 p.m. and to keep an eye on the moped which was stood outside, unlocked, by the boat waiting to be hoisted up on to the roof. Bill and I went to the Mairie. Two young women beamed smiles but said they didn’t collect the money, someone would call for it. Then I mentioned that the electricity was off. Ah! The older one despatched the younger one to find Mr whatshisname to go and fix it. She said it was probably due to the fairground people who were putting up rides, etc, ready for the weekend - they’d probably cut it off somehow. OK, thanks. Later an elderly man came to search for the source of the problem while we were stowing the moped on the roof in the blazing afternoon sun. Mike was having trouble remembering how we covered the moped and tied it down, well it had been nearly nine months since we last did it! Half an hour later the old feller came and asked if the power was back on (he’d been back to the Mairie to trace the power line for the port), yes, it had just come on. The breaker in the school had dropped out! We thanked him and wished him a “bon weekend”! Bill found a dead snake, run over by the look of it – some sort of grass snake. I didn’t dare try to set the washer going again (it was full and ready to wash!) 

Thursday 19th June 2008 Abv Prades lock no 19 to Lacourt-St-Pierre. Montech branch

Sunny and hot again. We were ready to go just after nine, but Bill thought we were staying so that Mike could retrieve the car, nope that’s Friday. We left as a British cruiser went past heading downhill at 9.30 a.m. A fisherman who had stationed himself right behind Rosy’s stern (he had the whole pound – 3.4 kms long – to fish in, so why right behind the boats?) caught a large fish as we were getting untied. Rosy winded with the aid of the current (there’s a permanent flow of water down the canal from the feed off the Garonne in Toulouse) and we headed uphill to lock 17, St Martin. Bill turned the pole and I went up the muddy ladder in the lock chamber to press the green button (rant: why couldn’t they have nice easy to work rods in the chamber wall like everyone else – or even a zapper? The commercial boat crews used to use a mop to knock them down when they were simple levers, not buttons, but that’s not so easy nowadays as there are no commercials left in the Midi); there was nowhere to alight below the lock and I couldn’t jump off on the access platform below the lock as we had to go in through the centre of the arch carrying the road over the tail of the lock due to the height of our mast. A very young man in a van arrived just after I’d pressed the button (was he supposed to do it?) and asked where we were going. Mike threw a rope up on the lock side but there was no bollard, so I stood on it, then went to stand in the shade under a young walnut tree while the lock filled. Crowds of kids aged about eight or nine with minders came cycling down the cycle piste/towpath in bunches of ten at a time. I made some tea as we went up the long 4.5 kms pound to lock 16, Escatalens. Mike dropped me off at a very high landing point covered with rocks and I walked up to the lock and pressed the green button. Two large Dutch cruisers were waiting above to come down (The first one sounded distinctly English although Amsterdam as his home port was on the back of his boat) It was 11.20 a.m. as we set off along the 1.7 kms pound to the bottom of the flight of five manually-operated locks up to Montech alongside the Pent d’Eau (water slope). Twenty minutes later we arrived at lock 15, Pommies, which was empty with the gates open ready for us. A young lad with a moped worked the lock from a console on the lock side. We’d changed sides as there was a bollard almost in the right place (still too far up the chamber) but my rope wouldn’t fly right and kept missing it - four attempts before I got it. Mike roped Rosy alongside. The lad locked the office by the bottom lock, followed on up to lock 14, Escudiés and worked that for us then went back down to the bottom lock. We scooted on up to 13, Pellaborie, as it was getting closer to the lunchtime closing hour. A young lady pressed the buttons and we rose ropeless. She locked up and rode up the towpath on her bike. The young man worked 12, Peyrets; this time he only lifted one paddle which caused a swirling in the lock. We rose ropeless again. The final pound up to 11, Montech and it was 12.30 p.m. and we thought we would have to wait for an hour while they had lunch but the lad opened the gates and worked the lock for us. When the lock was full Mike told him we were off to Lacourt-St-Pierre and gave him two bottles of beer for working overtime. I asked what the derelict factory alongside the lock used to make, but he didn’t know as he didn’t live in Montech. (I must find out.) We went across the “new” canal access to the water slope and turned left into the Montech arm which leads to Montauban. It was quiet and there were loads of grass cuttings floating in the canal. A grey heron kept flying off in front and landing just a few hundred yards in front, then it started to let us go past it before it flew off again as Rosy got closer. Eventually it flew up and wheeled round to pass us, flying just above tree level, and went back to its patch of towpath fishing rights. A little further on a little egret posed very elegantly on the stub of a dead tree trunk as we went by. 

At 1.30 p.m. we moored at the empty quay at Lacourt. We were just on the bottom about six inches from the side. A sign said 3€ per day. At today’s fuel prices that’s cheaper than generating our own electric. We plugged in and dozed in the heat. It was hot and noisy as a grass cutter mowed the already razored bank opposite the boat. Mike went to get the car. He’d left the two relevant IGN road maps and his fleece in the car when he and Bill went to Toulouse on Tuesday. Tut! Somehow I got the blame for that! A large Dutch klipper called St Louis went past, nice and slowly, with a few guests on board heading down into Montauban. Its skipper had a mobile ‘phone glued to his ear, steering with one hand but managed a wave as he went by. I had soaked Mike’s filthy jeans (from working on Paul’s boat) in the sink all day so I put them in the washer, then put the laptop on to catch up with the log as I hadn’t done any updates since Monday. Just after the washer finished the power went off. I couldn’t find out what had tripped - the post on the bank didn’t seem to be working. Back to 12v! Mike was not amused when he returned. He couldn’t find where the problem was. There was no incoming mains power at the two posts by the boats and he couldn’t find another box. No one came to collect any money for the moorings. Mike put the PC on to check emails. I suggested he tried searching to see if there was a better service than 2G, yes! Whoopee, we got 3G! (We were close to Montauban and the motorway at Lacourt) 3.6 Mbts per second instead of 238 kbts, fifteen times faster! 

Wednesday 18th June 2008 Valence d’Agen to Abv Prades lk 19. C de Garonne.

It was the first hot, DRY and sunny day for ages. Mike was up at eight and fetched some bread. We got ready and then disaster - Rosy wouldn’t start - air in the fuel lines; so Bill had to bleed it. Mike was chatting to Mike off yacht Shebah, so he went to help Bill. We left at 9.40 a.m. - our engine refused to start and it had worked OK earlier - it was an easily fixed electrical problem - wonky fuse (poor contact) - a few minutes after a hire boat had gone stooging past, also heading uphill. The hire boat had just cleared Valence, lock 30 as we arrived; Bill turned the pole, the lock emptied and we followed Rosy into the chamber. Water swirling everywhere from the lock emptying sent the bows left and right. Once in the chamber I went up the mud-coated ladder to press the green button and activate the lock cycle. The lock filled and the boats stayed at the back of the chamber, ropeless, as usual. 1.9 kms to Pommevic, lock 29. The boat in front was still in the lock when Rosy arrived to turn the pole. Nothing happened. We sat and waited. A few minutes later a VNF man in a van arrived. I got off at a new wooden landing stage below the lock and walked up. The man had fixed the lock and he and his van had gone before I got there. Once the boats were in I pressed the button and went to stand in the shade under the trees in front of a derelict lock house. The cherries had all gone but the nut tree next to it was covered in hazelnuts. 

1.5 kms to Braguel, lock 28. The water level was about a foot down. The hire boat had cleared the lock and another was in it coming down. VNF men were working on the lock side. I walked up and pressed the button and we rose ropeless again. One of the VNF guys, a cheeky young lad with face piercings, started telling Mike (in very rough English) that the rules state that he should have at least one rope on a bollard. A ten minute lecture ensued, one that he didn’t get all his own way either. A woman on a small French yacht was nasty, waving us away when we said “bon jour” as we’d kept her waiting while we were being lectured by the VNF guy. A longer pound of 5.7 kms to the next lock Petit-Bézy, 27. The moorings at Malause had a few new residents; a large Dutch barge with American and British flags on the front and a Dutch 

one on the rear, a British replica Dutch barge (large and uninhabited), a small French cruiser with some pleasant waving people on board and Steve and his wife Kit on the Dutch barge Vrouwe Jeanette (they waved too). Rosy was way off in front. The next lock was empty with gates open and a green light on long before Bill got there to turn the pole. The light went red, Bill turned the pole and the light reverted to green. I got off at the steps at the tail of the lock as the water wasn’t swirling about as it had emptied some time beforehand. Bill put a rope around a vertical pole in the wall on the right hand side of the lock, Rosy kept going forward and slewed across the lock to the left in front of us. Mike chucked a rope up on to the lock side, there was no bollard so it stayed on the ground. 3.8 kms to Espagnette, lock 26. We set off first. 

Mike had to turn the pole as it was much too high for me to reach. I got off at the wooden landing stage and Mike steered into the empty lock. Once Rosy was in the chamber, I pressed the button. The VNF lock house was inhabited, but they were all at lunch. A sign said that the lock was the last of the automatic locks and the next few were subject to closure at the keeper’s lunch break time 12.30 until 1.30 p.m. We followed Rosy up the canal into Moissac. As we went past the maintenance yard all the VNF men were getting into two vans and going back to work, lunch break over. A girl operated the swing bridge and asked if we were continuing or staying in the port. Continuing, we said, same as him in front. We slowed down as we went past Liberty and had a chat with Paul and Neil. Paul said his engine was working very well, he’d had his greenies on (overalls) and had found just one small oil leak which he could live with! I asked if he knew Mike off yacht Shebah’s ‘phone number, no. I told him I was going to ‘phone to tell him that the radio news had said there was to be a simulated nuclear accident at Golfech the following day and a two kilometre exclusion zone around the nuclear power station would make life interesting for the motorists at least! I couldn’t find his number - he’ll find out about it soon enough. We followed Rosy into the first of the three locks at Moissac. A man with a pony tail worked the first lock from a small console on the lock side. I got on the roof and slung the centre rope round a bollard. Mike looked after the boat and I made some lunch. Rosy rose ropeless up lock 25, Moissac. Two young ladies worked 24, Grégonne and 23, Cacor. Bill tied on with a single line to our stern. 2.5 kms to the next 22, Artel. A group of young lads on the aqueduct were about to swim in the canal (the river Tarn below was in flood and very muddy) They shouted “Do you speak English?” in English And we shouted back “Pas de tout!” (Not at all!) in French - that stopped whatever they were going to do next. There was a resident keeper (an enthusiastic young man) at 22, Artel. He checked we’d got ropes attached (Rosy had a single stern line to our stern) before he opened the paddles. Once the gates opened he cycled up the towpath to operate lock 21, Les Verriès. A short pound took us to lock 20, St Jean where an elderly bearded man pressed the buttons, and then he cycled on to lock 19 Castelsarrasin. 

There was no bollard our side, only a bar in the wall, so Bill slung a rope to the bollard his side from his roof and we attached to Rosy’s stern. We told the keeper we were continuing above the next lock and not stopping in the port. We lead the way through the town, between the floating duck kennels (loads of eggs in the nests); a barnacle goose was standing on one with the ducks and a few odd white geese roamed the grass by the senior citizens retirement home. The moorings were more or less full. A large hotel boat took up a lot of the space along the quay by the fountain. In the boatyard a lady in bikini top and shorts was working on a yellow topped Bermuda (ex-hire boat) and getting her back brick red – that’ll hurt next day! Two boats came down Prades, lock 18. I got off at the lock steps and went to press the button but there was a VNF lady waiting to do that, so I stood in the shade. We moored on the towpath side, opposite a sign for a restaurant, where it was surprisingly deep. Bill winded Rosy to moor bow to bows (keeping his engine room doors on the outside - like we do with our side doors, we can leave them open and not have passers-by peering in the boat). It was 5.10 p.m. We were hot and tired. Mike left the car at Valence to stay where it was, he said he would move it on Friday when we have a day off. 

The start of 2008 cruising season. Canal de Garonne. France.

After a very pleasant, but fairly damp, Winter stay in Valence d’Agen on the Canal Latèral à Garonne, 2008 started off slowly. Mike helped Paul sort out engine problems on his cruiser Liberty, then we changed our Internet tarrif (the latter delayed our departure) which started a chain of events that caused us eventually to change providers. Finally, we set off with Bill and Fanny the Woof on Rosy to dry dock the boats in Toulouse