Briare

 

Well we still have no Bow Thruster so heading for Briare where there is a hopefully somebody who can help us.

 

Left Cepoy, and with lots of locks and nervously motoring we head towards Briare.

And passed our first Locoboat. ( Bumper-boat) then a night at Chatillon- Colligney where we find a good old French fete with a band, dancing ( yes we had a quick smootch) and then amazing fireworks celebrating some religious day.

Stopped for lunch at Rogny below a staircase of 7 locks that climb up 30metres. Unsure whether we should do it as there is a very strong wind. Met a lovely Scottish couple, Stewart and Susan who had also just broken down with a flat battery.( we met then again at the next two mooring places. They said it can be pretty windy at the top. Anyway we took a chance. Not too many new scratches.(Thankgod).( but whats a bit of a scratch that some paint can’t cover up, says Lucy )

Picture of the OLD ecluses at Rogny..

Moored at Ouzouer-sur-Trezee and came across 2 other Kiwi couples who are also heading in our direction. We have waved to them before in passing so thought we should now catch up officially so we went across to their boat with a bottle.Next morning headed off and 2 locks later arrived at Briare.

It is a beautilful place and very easy to spend time in and photos don’t do it justice on a sunny day.-.

The Aquaduct was designed by Leonce-Abel Mazoyer and Charles Signault but was built by Gustave Eiffel  between 1890 and 1896. It is built of masonary pillars but a steel channel. It spans the wide Loire River by 662.69 metres and allows the canal to link the Seine and the Saone rivers thereby connecting the Atlantic to the Med. These people were amazing with their planning and inginuity for making the canal network through France so connectable  for their commercial trade.

We found Charmes Nautique, in the commercial Port, who were very helpful and with Lucy’s bad french and their fairly good english, we organised for a technician to visit the boat to see what is wrong. Well it appears that it is out of his depth and needs to be repaired by a specialist.

So we searched the internet for the manufacturer, and managed to locate them in ‘Holland”  !!!! and phoned. Again people are very nice but it will have to be sent to them for repair..

17th Aug  Next morning we had to jump on a train and go and collect our car from behind us in Montargis and we arrived back at the boat about 3pm. The technician, Alain, a lovely man, again spent about an hour with his head down in our bow under the visitors bed,( sorry, forward cabin) and has now removed the motor. He then  kindly took the motoe , all 20kgs of it, back to his shop and packaged it up and then took me and raced for the Main Post Office and managed to get it on the courier for Holland.

Hurrah!!!   Repair on its way. STRESS GONE …..All we do now is wait in this lovely little beautiful town and drink wine and enjoy the ambience.

Picking up Yasmin tomorrow from Orly Airport. (sat 18th)

Yazmin stayed with us for 5 nights and in that time we had weather up to 40 degrees in the shade….shit is was hot!!!!!. Spent very lazy times,eating, drinking, reading and resting, finding trees and shade anywhere, even sitting under bridges to escape the heat of the sun. Even the breeze was hot.,

We did a little bit of motoring and stayed out of Briare a couple of nights and then it was time to get Yasmin back to Orly.

In the mean time we had found out that French postal/couriour service is not what we are used to,, and when they say a package will arrive Monday, ( when sent friday) it is in fact finally arrives in Holland on the Thursday..

So while driving Yaz to Paris we find out that we need a new bow thruster motor,  WHAT SHOULD WE DO??  We are MAD!!  We decide as we are in Paris anyway, why not drive on for another 6 hrs and go and pick up and pay for the bowthruster in Holland ourselves, and then we can return on Friday to our man Alain, We carry on with only what we are wearing and stay the night at a Best Western, near Arnhem, in Holland, who kindly supplied toothbrushes.  Next morning with the help of TOM TOM, we found DUCO and lovingly picked up our new bow thruster.

Only a 650km drive back,( actually took 7 hrs) on motorways with the little Yaris at 120 kms /hr most of the way, and finally arrived in Briare at 6pm and Alain is still at work and willing to replace it for us that night.

SO WE NOW ARE READY TO GO… GOSH, THE BOW THRUSTER SOUNDS SO GOOD. (The little things that please us).

So lazy time now for the weekend awaiting the arrival of Ric and Dianna from NZ. The weather another 36 degrees today.