Couldn't post yesterday because of poor internet connection. So here is the background. The hire boat moored with us turned out to be crewed by a perfectly competent group and we went through the last five locks with no problem. Then we found that we just missed the last lock which closed for lunch as we approached. So we tied up to the waiting stakes and decided to have lunch. The problem is that we have been nowhere to buy bread. We passed a town on the way here, so Richard offered to walk back and buy us a loaf to make up our lunch of cold meats and salad. Well, it turned out to be a long walk for nothing. We are in the area where all the shops shut at 12:30pm and don't open again until 4:00-4:30pm! I still can't understand how the economy survives on this routine. (Well, perhaps it isn't). So Richard just comes back with a bottle of Minervois, the local wine, to say he bought something. We have to eat our lunch without bread making it rather meagre, but we don't have much time to eat anyway, because after 15 mins the lock opens and off we go.
We are now in a stretch of canal that goes for 54km without a lock! Phew, no locks for a bit. But it is not clear sailing. We are having trouble finding a place to stop for the night. We had hoped to make it to a place called Poilhes, highly recommended by Nigel Gee. But it is much to far away and we want to go there to have dinner at the restaurant he liked, and we would get there too late. We pass two or three supposed mooring stations mentioned in the guide but they are full of permanently moored boats or reserved for hire boats. We particularly wanted to stop at Somail, but that too seemed to be completely taken up by hire boats. This is a real drag. So we wind up at a very odd little private harbour called Port Robine. It is pleasant enough and has a lot of facilities including fuel on the pontoon. I am worried about the fuel situation. Our fuel gage has stuck at over full and we have no idea how much fuel we have used since we left Toulouse where we filled up. On the hours run we think we should have used about 70 litres, which leaves us over half a tank, but we cannot be sure. So to be on the safe side we fill up. We find we have only used 30 litres. We can hardly believe it! The man from the Capitanerie says that you use very little fuel on the canal - no waves. Certainly, it is slow going and the engine is using very few revs.
There is nothing in the way of shops at this marina, so we decide to walk back to Somail to see if we can buy urgent needs. We particularly need bread and milk. On the way here Somail didn't seem to be very far, but it turns out to much farther than we thought. It takes us nearly an hour to walk there and when we get there we find that the only shop is in a barge and he has nothing to sell. You can only get bread from him in the morning if you order it in advance! He has no fresh produce and although he does have milk, I don't fancy carrying that back on the trek to the boat. Milk is the least important of our lack of food for the moment.
Fed up with the lack of ability to do any provisioning we stop at a very nice canal side cafe and restaurant for a cold drink. As we are sitting there Richard suggests we just stay there and eat dinner. I have nothing to go with the aubergine dish I hoped to cook or with the steaks I have in the fridge. The walk back is long and it is very hot and cooking will be a pain. So in the end we stay for dinner. It isn't wonderful, but it is nice not to be on the boat cooking. I have some Gaspacho, which is very good. My main course is squid. It is a bit chewy, but there is far too much of it. I have two very large squid on my plate.
The restaurant is very crowded and by the time we finish dinner and pay, it is starting to get dark. So we ask the restaurant to call us a taxi. That turned out to be rather expensive, but it was good not to have to walk back on the canal after dark. I must say that by and large the people here in southern France are unfriendly and sometimes downright rude. The nicest person we have met in the last couple of days was our taxi driver and he was from Brittany!
So back to the boat. We shower on board as the port charges for showers and everything. In fact this night's mooring is almost back up to Solent prices being about 20 Euro to include electricity but not showers.
We had a nice quiet night and I am looking forward to a whole day without any locks to do. I even put on a clean white tee-shirt! The weather is perfect (well maybe a bit too perfect). The sky is clear blue and it is hot. We start out and decide that with our lack of food we have to stop somewhere to go shopping. The next biggish town is Capestang. But it is so far away that we arrive there after 12:15, when all the shops shut until 4:30. Although it seems a nice place, we don't want to stop for three hours and would prefer to take up Nigel's suggestion and go to Poilhes and eat lunch there as we have nothing suitable on the boat that can be eaten without bread. So we do that. We find that all the hire boats and permanently moored boats are at the beginning of the town and no one is on the municipal mooring station which is very nice and convenient. So we tie up to the mooring rings. The stop is right next to the restaurant, again a good convenient stop. We also note an advertisement for an alimentation in the town. Maybe it will open at a reasonable time.
We have a very pleasant lunch at the restaurant. Not cheap, but good. We indulge in half a litre pichet of local pink wine. The bad news is that the shop does not open until at least 4:00pm. So no chance to buy anything for supper or lunch tomorrow. The restaurateur says they don't need much in the way of a local shop as the village only has 500 inhabitant. We decide to press on. We are told that there are shops at a mooring stop not far from here called Colombiers. Nigel said he disliked this stop, but beggars cannot be choosers. So we make for there. The stop is a basin which looks like it only has stern to moorings. We try to tie up to the bank just after the basin, but there is insufficient depth for us to get close enough to the bank. So we go into the basin. We see a space large enough to moor alongside, but we are sure they won't let us stay because basically we are using up three moorings! There is a supermarket, but it does not open until 4:00pm, just over half an hour hence. Richard speaks to the harbourmaster who says we can only stay where we are until 5:00pm. So we will just stay to do some shopping and then go. Richard is unwilling to try stern to mooring even with our new large round fenders.
The supermarket is just about adequate, but still doesn't sell fresh bread. I just buy some more bake it yourself baguettes and a nearly at sell by date brown loaf. At least that could be toasted to eat with cheese and or pate. I am unkeen on baking baguettes because it is too hot to light the oven - but if needs must...
I must say I am really fed up with this bit of canal. I don't understand how in the middle of France we can go for three days without buying fresh bread! I have no idea what everyone is eating on their boats, but I do keep seeing people eating spaghetti! Not my idea of suitable cruising fare. Also not my idea of how the French eat. I just can't understand it. I expected that every town no matter how small in France would at least have a bakery. How wrong can you be!
As we leave I am getting very worried about the last leg of the day. It is very hot and I am feeling the heat. I think it must be over 35C. Richard wants to rush on to Beziers. The problem is that to get to Beziers we have to go through a flight of 6 locks. I am really nervous about doing these locks. Firstly I am very hot and have no energy. I will need a lot to do a flight of 6 locks. Secondly, even if we can get through those locks, we have one more lock to go through before getting to the harbour in Beziers. I feel certain we will not be able to get there before the locks close at 7:00pm. Finally I am not convinced we can find a berth there. We have tried to ring, but the number given in our guide is out of date.
Nonetheless we press on towards Beziers. When we get to the locks it is 5:00 and perhaps in enough time to get through. But we note that they are doing a upward opening. We hope that means we will be able to get through. We try to just hand around, but there is not enough room. So we try to tie up to what we understand are the waiting moorings. Some waiting moorings. They are fully taken up by permanent commercial boats. Further along they are full of boats apparently berthed for the night (many facing the opposite way to the locks). We do find one spot to stop just behind a hire boat. The skipper of that boat (a Dane) says that he too wants to go through the lock but has been told that there will be no more descending openings until 8:30 tomorrow morning. So we are here for the night. With that news we manage to moor up in the space behind him. Richard goes off to look at the locks and see if we need to do anything to make it known we want to go in the morning. Just as he leaves a commercial boat taking tourists on the canal comes up and tells me I must move because we are in his mooring space. Now this is a problem. I can't move the boat myself and I can't shout loud enough to get Richard back. They are getting very impatient. I don't know how we were supposed to know it was their mooring. There was no sign at all as there usually is. The Danish family come to my aid and rope the boat out to raft up to them. They do a very good competent job, much to my relief.
So we are now rafted up in front of the locks waiting for them to open in the morning. Other than our Danish family neighbours I have no idea how many of the other boats here want to go through the locks. We have walked along the locks. They are much bigger than the ones we have been in so far, so they will take quite a few boats. We shall see in the morning. If all goes well tomorrow by the evening we will be out of the canal system and in salt water!
No comments:
Post a Comment