the Marne and Paris

This entry begins without a map, as the route to Paris is already on the previous one.

Later on you’ll find a map with our trip through Paris.

In the first lock after Orconte, where the last blog ended, our journey comes quickly to an end also.

When entering the lock Michel gives me a hand sign indicating trouble. When I am up front we can only use sign language because you cannot hear one another.

It appears something has snapped in the hydraulics system and further inspection reveals that the thingy that dampens the pressure has come apart. Thus there is no pressure on the steering and on the bow thruster.

The system contains about 60 litres of oil and that has been forcefully emptied into the engine room. Luckily the tear is on the underside so most of the oil went straight down on the bottom, but still …. a mess!

the damper, supposed to hold al least 350bar snapped open like a tin

As it happens we were on a small canal, no other traffic and calm weather (this could have happened when entering the Kreekrak locks, in between the big commercials and 4 Bft).

We managed to reverse, backing out of the lock and to the canal side. That is, about one metre out as it was too shallow, but spud poles and a gangway took care of that. Not the best of mooring spots but it would have to do till the problem was fixed.

a meter from the shore, the hired car alongside and the drum is hoisted aboard

We were en route this Friday morning to Vitry-le-François where we hade made a reservation for a car to have a bit of fun on shore, visiting a few vide greniers among them (they are a kind of car boot sales).

Conferring with the guy who installed the hydraulics brought the good news that a piece of tubing of the same length would do as a spare. So now our mission was clear:

• unscrew the damper, which took so much strength that between the two of us we almost failed until we got so angry that we just made it and unscrewed the nuts;
• a bike ride to Vitry-le-François and hiring the car a day early – which was possible;
• taking the damper to a specialist in Vitry-le-François, thanks heavens there are plenty of those around in a region where all farmers use big machines that are all hydraulically powered;
• getting a replacement tube which could be done straight away and then getting both the tube and a 60 litre drum of oil back to the ship;
• using all our strength to unload the drum – easy in comparison to unscrewing the damper – and then hoisting the drum on board with our little crane.   
• fixing the new tube

the newtube in its place

Then it was time to begin with our weekend as we had no intention to forfeit our nice plans because of this mishap.

They were the hottest days of this summer and we enjoyed the surrounding country side from our A/C car, preferring it to staying on a small canal; every now and then we got out to take a walk or visit a vide grenier

Sunday night Michel got into the engine room to clean up, at least it was a bit cooler then and next day some real work was waiting; fixing the system and getting 60 litres into it. Unfortunately the opening for the filling in the engine room is rather awkwardly positioned, which was amended by fixing a hose with a funnel from the outside.

 a very ingenious construction by Michel with a tube and a fennel that made it possible to fill the system from outside the wheelhouse

A bigger problem was how to kip the drum slowly, there being no handholds and it weighing a ton.

So, by putting the drum on top of a few tyres, holding it in the sling from the crane, we could tilt it bit by bit.

From the drum into a smaller drum, you just cannot aim at a small hole straight away, into a jerry can, taking the jerry can to the back, empty it into the funnel, going to the foredeck and do it all again.

When you have to do this some 25 times, sun burning down, a 26 metre ship seems a long stretch (we should have gotten up at four o'clock). I would have preferred a small yacht at that time.

the construction on the front, it worked but of coarse not without spillage

And then the dreaded moment arrived, testing the system and moreover testing if the tube had been properly fastened. Fingers crossed, toes curved, tight  bum, Michel started the engine and slowly got the pressure up.

We are still cruising, so you may conclude from that that we did well.

After cleaning a bit of spillage – unavoidable – and returning the car we did not treat ourselves to a well deserved beer but left this unfortunate mooring straight away. 

We then cruised to Condé sur Marne, via a few well known spots from the leg up and after that it was all new territory, along the Marne to Paris.

When cruising, insects touch down on the ship, especially on the antennas, they stay with us for a while and after a good rest they disappear.

They’re often special, with beautiful colouring, that you cannot see when they are flying. It’s fun to be able to make such nice pictures with our new super camera. 

a nice orange one

Starting from Tour sur Marne we were on a stretch that we had been looking forward to, because everyone says that the Marne is so nice.

beautifl mooring next to the Tour 

And we were not disappointed, it’s really beautiful and very calm too, we only encountered very few boats.

That may be good for us but, as said before on this blog, it is not a good sign economy wise.

we were amazed as the lock doors opened and this boat came out

And this guy in his canoe doing the length of the Marne may be brave, it is not really a contribution.

From Tour sur Marne to Meaux what you see is vineyards, vineyards and vineyards and some beautiful, old villages in between the vineyards.

I like all those very straight lines

We of course visited a champagne house, not a major one where tourists line up for but a small entrepreneur, who does his own growing, wine making and selling; he gave us a grand tour of the premises and could tell us a lot about his company.

by the fields are stone with the name of the producteur, the more famous he name the bi

It’s hard work, indeed, but the product still sells very well. Everywhere in this region you can see the tell tales of doing well.

And of course we bought a few bottles of champagne and, yes, it did taste very well.

We made a few nice walks in between the vineyards, leaving our bicycles behind as it was climbing from the waters edge up and quite steep sometimes too.

view on Cumières where you can also see ’t Majeur

All along the Marne the moorings were used by swimmers and sun bathers, who sometimes, alas, had to give way to us although we tried to keep to the end of the jetty as much as possible.

we also make good use of the pontoons

Once we had left the canals we couldn’t use our spud poles anymore as the banks are shallow. So pontoons have been installed but then the water is too deep for spud poles.

though strictly forbidden they jump of the bridges everywhere

After Meaux there was less and less greenery, no vineyards and more and more built areas. Big city approaching.

Before mooring in Paris we decide it’s a sensible thing to remove all stuff from the decks. It at least doesn’t induce people to steal or to throw stuff in the water from pure boredom.

Everything goes down the hatch into the foc’sle , even the bicycles – a first . They were the reason the hatch has this particular format.

The evening before entering Paris we moor in Joinville, just in front of the tunnel. In the morning a little boat comes alongside and Michel is asked in German whether he speaks German. It appears to be a Polish couple that have no idea how to reach the traffic post for the tunnel in order to gain entry.

Michel tells them to get in line behind us as they speak not a word of French. They do and stick close to us till we turn around on the Seine (to be continued)

we turn around and the Poles continue on the Seine

And then, after that tunnel, we get off the Marne at Ivry onto the Seine and we are in Paris for real.

on this map the last part through Paris

We have to get off the Seine at the Arsenal onto the Canal St. Martin but we decide to make a real tour on the Seine to see all the highlights first.

We have seen them all more than once in the years past but doing it again, cruising on our own ship gives it a special flavour.

before Notre Dame to the right

 around Ile St Louis

passing the Eiffeltower

It turns out that traffic on the Seine at the Ile St. Louis is monitored by traffic lights because it is partially one way traffic, something you don’t notice from the quay side.

It can be very crowded on the Seine but when we are there it is moderate. Next to tourist boats in all shapes and seizes there are private boats, like us, in all shapes and seizes and commercials that have to use this route

That we didn’t know, that Paris has its own Statue of Liberty, decidedly smaller but beautifully positioned on a island.

and past the statue of Liberty

This was our turning point, going back on the other side of the Ile de la Cité and Ile St. Louis, straight into the Canal St. Martin.

in the tunnel with the lightbeams from the shafts

Now here is a very special waterway, 4,5 K long right through Paris, the first one third via a very long tunnel underneath the Place de la Bastille and the Boulevard Richard Lenoir where there are strategically placed ventilation shafts that give you a nice few from the top to boats passing underneath.

In the tunnel signs indicate which street you are crossing.

a ventilation shaft,seen from below

Coming out of the tunnel you immediately enter  the first of four double locks as the Bassin de la Villette is 25 metres up from the Seine.

The canal itself, it dates from 1825, is very picturesque and takes you straight through living, shopping and working areas.

Next to the tourists there are many people on the quay sides eating their lunch or just reading.

As it is mostly the tourist boats that sail by we were quite an attraction, people actually following us to the next lock.

lots of people looking down from the beautiful bridges over the canal

And then, after the last lock and the Place de Stalingrad there is the Bassin de la Villette, where ships moored in the olden days with all kinds of cargo for Les Halles. 

our mooring in the Bassin de la Villette

Now it is a place where the Parisians come after work to pick-nick, to play jeu de boule or just for chatting. There is a very lively atmosphere and just before we arrived there had been Paris Beach for a few weeks.

It’s a great place to start from to tour Paris and to ‘be’ a Parisian for a fortnight.

our view on the Rotonde de la Villette, on the right of the trees the Eiffeltower is visible

Just as we are moored, up shows the tine boat with the Poles again, now approaching from the other side as they had continued on the Seine and than returned by the Canal Saint Denis. They want to come alongside again to hear from us how they can get to Belgium. Michel tells them they have to do an about turn as they have taken the wrong canal and are now heading South. When he asks them if they have no charts (indeed, from Poland, without any maps) they are deeply offended and sail away. In the right direction, so far.

We have crossed all of Paris on bike these two weeks, as they run an excellent rent-a-bike operation where you drive from ‘station’ to ‘station’ and, when you are a bit keen, don’t have to pay extra. The metro is more expensive and not as much fun.

Paris is biker-friendly, all bus lanes are cycle path as well and there a quite a few bikers. We even did the Champs Elysée cycling to the Arc de Triomphe, going round and back again.

Once but never again as there is no cycle-path there and cars drive like mad around the Arc. But you have to do it once!

one of the many bicycle stations, sometimes tough luck and there is none or just one bicycle left, you have to walk to the next station or wait

around Arc de Triomphe

After two weeks our stay was over and we had to carry on.

We had decided to leave by way of the Canal St. Denis towards the Seine although we had heard many a story that it was dirty and not very agreeable. We thought we wanted to see it and we afterwards thought it was not all that bad. Although there is big contrast with the Bassin.

You pass through the poorer quarters of Paris, where there is a lot of renovation being done and in a few years time it will be quite different.

There are a lot of tramps and it is a sorry sight when you see people that live in caravans doing their laundry in the, not all that clean, water of the canal whilst the kids play in a pool filled no doubt from the same source.

Upon entering the canal there is a very narrow, steep lock that at the end boasts one huge door, swinging in, revealing a kind of gate.

It was symbolic for our farewell to Paris, but we’ll be back next year.

the laundry is done in the canal water, but if it gets cleaner this way......

the ‘gate’ to the Canal Saint Denis

Meanwhile we are slowly cruising back to Holland. The weather is trying its best to prepare us for autumn and winter as it turned cold and wet all of a sudden.

We do hope that it is temporary and that we will be able to enjoy the trip through Belgium and the Netherlands before mooring in Amersfoort for winter.

More about that in the next blog, the last one for this year.

To Bar-le-Duc and back and via Chaumont to Paris

Contrary to what is “normal” this time the same map as last time. As I already explained these last weeks have been spent on to-and-fro’s, hence.

Absolutely no problem as the trip back is always completely different from the way up, the company differs and the surroundings are beautiful.

We’re certain that we will return and then do the Canal between Champagne and Burgundy in its entire length. We now already know which spots are the nicest, which spots we passed but are on our list, which restaurants have to be visited, which bike-trips are still to be made etc.

Mussey-sur-Marne, what a surprise to come upon your own ship like this when biking

But first about our stay in Bar-le-Duc. We never made it to Toul, because of the broken lock we would have been underway too long to be able to meet the appointments we made with our guests

We could have gone a bit further to the next turning point (because of our length there are not too many of those) but we decided not to. The weather was not too good, cold and wet, so cruising was not nice. We decided to do a bit of DIY- work in a town with a nice DIY-shop, awaiting the arrival of our guests.

Bar-le-Duc is built on both sides of the river Saulx and the Canal de la Marne au Rhin, uphill on either side. One side is the historical town, beautiful old buildings and a nice upper-town and the other side is covered with big flats, but with a splendid view!

 

After a walk through the old town all the way up we made a picture of the view, looking at down-town. Later we noticed the added value of the beautiful camera we were given by our friends and family: : even ‘t Majeur’s crane was visible but only on the picture. 

Vue sur le grue is what Michel calls this picture.

We were moored behind the station, maybe not the most picturesque place but very convenient

 

and a field with poppies at our doorstep.

 

During one of our walks we ran into this nice kitten, lying in the gutter and shamelessly waiting for attention; she got it!

 

All canals that we cruise are close to one or more rivers that you frequently cross by way of a  pont canal and that run through towns and villages.

In some towns, like Bar-le-Duc, there may be as many as 4 or more water courses crossing the town. They make for a lively view and beautiful spots like here where the stream goes underneath a church.

We enjoyed the Fête de la Musique; since 1982 every year on June 21^st , Solstice Day, throughout France amateur musicians and others play their music on the streets in the evening. Great atmosphere and lots of dancing.

Unfortunately I deleted the pics I took so you have to use your own imagination.

We also went to a concert in a church, life’s little joys in a more urban environment.

And then it was time for us to cruise with our guests.

We heard and learned a lot about Australia and we think they learned a lot about living on and cruising with a ship. And foremost they experienced how nice life on board a ship can be.

They are all sold to the idea of barging and they all want their owns ship in the future. We hope to meet our new barge-friends often on the waterways.

First we cruised from Bar-le-Duc back to Vitry le François, no locks out of order this time and then we sailed South, an unknown stretch for Michel and me.

Of course not all went smoothly, because we soon were hovering in front of a bridge that had to be opened by hand without anything happening. There were a couple of boats waiting with us.

VNF (the waterways management of France) came to us to report that, alas, since an hour the bridge was broken down, couldn’t be opened any more, a specialist was called for and it could take days. The little boats turned and went back to Saint Dizier, the town we had just passed, but here again size mattered ….

We decided to give it a nights sleep and to confer with our guests then but, behold, next day there was a solution.

A commercial had arrived and for them VNF does what they don’t do for pleasure craft: they rig it so that the bridge can be opened just once and then we could come along.

of course our rescuing commercial could pass first when possible. The bridge in the foreground is not the broken one but an even older, derelict one in front of it.

On the way back, a few weeks later, the bridge was still out of order, but now it was permanently open, a nuisance for road traffic but okay for us.

Now we were on the Canal between Champagne and Burgundy, as said before very nice and we want more of it.

Meanwhile summer had started and as of July 1^st no complaints from us.

Nature shows the change as well, everything blossoms abundantly, not at least our on board geraniums.

 

On a lock quay I saw this tree, no idea what its name is, but I have seen it before with those nice deeply red leaves, but not before with these pinkly blossoming clouds.

All farmers have immediately gone at it on their fields, they are working everywhere and throughout you can find these big rolls of hay, each year I think it a splendid view.

Very often you can see local youngsters swimming in the canals but as we also see very often dead animals, mainly deer and fish, floating around we don’t dip. The water is quite often crystal clear with big and small fish everywhere.

In Amsterdam you will pay quite a price to have our feet nibbled by fish, here I just put them in the canal for free

 

and have my drinks chilled too.

After our first guests debarked we cruised two long days so we could reach Chaumont. Because we moored late in the day and planned to leave early we didn’t bother to moor properly, no one can pass you once the locks are closed. And as long as we can go on shore – and back – it’s all right and the boat sticks out into the canal, no problem with our spud poles. 

we just put it across, who cares

Next to the spud poles, ever since entering France we have rarely used our lines, the new canopy is a real success and very easy to handle. Down in front of a tunnel or bridge and then up again. And, when necessary, it can go down all the way without fuss.

going with the wind in your hair!

And another find, our solar panels. We have the genny on far less and there are still improvements possible.

Michel now cleans the panels each day in order to maximize the output.

 

There are very few pictures showing me and Michel together so it’s hard to pass this one over. It is a special place underneath this impressive “rail-duct” in Chaumont, where you can walk on the first layer and the train takes the top.

 

Near Chaumont there is a tunnel and just to show that not all tunnels are a horror I give you this picture. Sometimes you can see the end already before you enter and this one is so broad that it has two-way-traffic and it takes bicyclists as well.

 

On the way back from Chaumont, heading North, we were stopped by the VNF, because at he next lock there were two boats already in and the doors wouldn’t close.

It was great fun for the local youth who were swimming and lots of VNF employees, all shaking hands and then those two boats with all crew still onboard.

I don’t understand how you can stay on board in this heat and then in such a narrow empty lock, but there you are.

After a while this problem  was sorted out and we could get on.

In Saint Dizier we were moored on a quay and when Michel came into the pilothouse early in the morning he saw a car being towed from the water, just in front of us.

it was really very close

When we asked they told us that the driver had been running from the police and had driven straight into the canal.

Not only had we not heard a thing but neither had our guests and they sleep in the front. Good beds apparently :-)

Had we been moored a few meters ahead the car would have landed on our front deck.

Fortunately we also hadn’t moored on the opposite bank, which we had considered, because on the morning of the Quatorze Juillet there was a string of fishermen along the bank, a concours. Now, this is serious business and hard work throughout the day.

 

at least 40 fishermen and women on a row

The fisher just across from us won the day, must have been our good vibes.

each had an enourmous amount of equipment that had to be lugged in and out

We stayed on this quay for a few days because we wanted to see the Quatorze Juillet fireworks and when dusk came we admired the swallows who flew to and fro to the quay side where they apparently had their nests. Just the last evening we realised that we had been blocking 26 meter of nesting space for the past days and we did feel guilty at that time.

they had their nests under the concrete ledge

We couldn’t miss being in a wine region, there being caves, champagne-chateau and vineyards all around.

One of the most special caves is this one with a bas-relief wall and a door in the shape of a barrel. Such a pity they put up an ugly sign; there also was a white letter stuck to the door which I managed to photo-shop away. The sign is a step too far, maybe next year.

Now we thought we had enough blocked locks, but no.

En route again we were quickly stopped by the VNF as there was a car in the lock.

We moored and got on our bikes to ride quickly to the lock because we had a sight to behold.

We were just in time to see them towing the car out of the pond and then it smashed on the ground as the cable broke.

Never a dull moment on the French canals.

The divers, who were in the water in any case, cleaned the lock and with a bucket they brought quite a few rocks to the surface.

 We are moored now for a few days in Orconte, on shore power, using the washing machine frequently and having a spot with shadow to write the blog.

From here we go to Paris, where we booked the last week of August, we’re really looking forward to that.

More of it in my next blog.