31st July 2009 Chazelles to St Jean-de-Losne

The sun only shone only intermittantly through rafts of grey clouds and the wind was chilly from the Northeast. Leaving our wild mooring near Chazelles we carried up the river Saone. Lots of boats were moored at Seurre, both in the big offline basin and on the short finger pontoons at ninety degrees to the river. Up Seurre, the last of the big locks, with several small cruisers and on to a 10 kms stretch of canal. Several black kites searched our wake for fish and the first cormorant we'd seen for ages struggled to take off from the canal alongside us. The river up as far as St Jean-de-Losne had been straightened for large capacity barges to access the silos and quays there. We picked up diesel to top up our central heating fuel tank at 67c a litre from the fuel barge in St Jean-de-Losne, then searched for a mooring. Gaps on the stepped quay weren't long enough for us so we tied on a pontoon by a campsite which we found was available free of charge for 72 hours. Mike went off on the moped to collect the car from Fragnes.

30th July 2009 Fragnes to Chazelles

Set off from Fragnes and dropped down the deep lock, 34bis, with two cruisers back on to the Saone. Upriver to Verdun-sur-Doubs, passing lots of traffic - mainly hireboats and cruisers, hotel boats and one or two commercials. In Verdun mooring space was not freely available for our 18m long boat where everything is designed for 6 - 8m holiday boats and what little there was - a short length of quay wall - was occupied, (yes, you've guessed it!) by 6 - 8m long boats. We looked a little way up the Doubs river, but wild moorings are not easy with high banks and thick vegetation. Back through Verdun and out on to the Saone again, passing a moored barge with no wheelhouse but its owners had added a Scania lorry to act as motive power - it still had steering wheel and wing mirrors! (see photo) We went up Ecuelles lock with a catamaran and a yacht behind a large pusher tug called Europa (20m long) pushing an empty pan called Gaillon (82.4m x 11.4m, 2,710 tonnes) with loads of room as the lock is 185m x 12m. Fishing is very popular on the Saone and many fishermen set up camp and fish for weeks from the same spot, so an unoccupied fishing place made an ideal mooring for one night's stop. Once the traffic stopped it was a very calm and peaceful place.

Today is the start of our online diary.

29th July 2009

Weather hot and sunny, day off moored at Fragnes below lock 34 on the Canal du Centre near Chalon-sur-Saone. The photo shows lock 34bis, which replaced three locks on the original line through Chalon and, as a consequence has a fall of 10.6m. (We're now moored 4.5 kms above this lock)

After reading Wandering Snail's blog, Mike and I decided we ought to do likewise. We've written diaries - boat logs - since we started boating in the UK back in 1969. Now we've a decent Internet connection on board, it's time to let all our friends and family have immediate access to where we are and what we're up to! And add a few photos too.