Afloat in France

We spend two of our five weeks in France afloat, in a hired canal barge on the river Lot. Babou Marine is in Cahors, which is about one third of the way along the navigable part of the haut Lot. We begin by going downstream to Luzech, then return to Cahors, continue upstream to Cenevierves, then back to Cahors. All but one of the twenty odd locks on this stretch of the Lot are manual, so we get plenty of exercise, going through each twice, once in each direction. Occasionally we are helped by young boys in their teens, very happy to work the lock for us, and we are sufficiently glad of the assistance to give them a few Euros for their trouble. An advantage of the manual locks is that that you can go through them at any time during daylight. On our last canal trip we had enforced breaks in the middle of the day because the locks shut then so that the eclusier/eclusieuse could go to lunch, and you had to be through your last lock by 8pm. On this trip we enjoy being able to move in our own time.

The little 8m Renaud barge is old, tiny, but perfectly adequate. The bunk is a bit short, but there are two small single bunks which are convenient spots for backpacks, clothes etc, a head, a shower, a hanging cupboard, then a long galley beside a table with banquettes on 3 sides. Has the advantage that you can put dishes in the sink without getting up from the table. The driving position backs on to the forward banquette with no seat so we steer standing. Small area in the bow with just enough room for a couple of chairs and a table, although the latter lives on the roof with the hired bicycles and we never bother to get it down. After a couple of days aboard we buy two mugs to add to the kitchen equipment as its crockery includes vast cups that are really large bowls or demitasses, nothing in between. Morning tea in a demitasse doesn't really work, nor does a huge bowl with a teacup full of liquid in the bottom.

As seems to be the pattern for our trip, we have rain the first day, then the weather becomes steadily hotter. I swim in the river almost every day, sometimes late in the evening when it is still warm. The Lot is a lovely river to cruise. Over the millenia it has cut its way through a limestone plateau. Its twisting course now has river flats on one side, limestone cliffs on the other, with the two features alternating as the river bends, cliffs on the outside of the bends, flats on the inside. Some of the villages are on the flats, some are on top of the cliffs or built into them. Many of the villages and towns date back to the medieval age, some like Cahors go back to Roman times. Chateaux appear here and there, usually high on a cliff.

Another feature of this river we particularly like is "nature" stops. Most villages have a small jetty or pontoon, marked with a picture of a blue bollard, which is where you can tie up. Although there aren't that many other boats travelling on the Lot, there are sufficiently few villages with mooring points that one is generally sharing the mooring. The nature stops are marked with a green version of the bollard sign attached to a tree, and you simply pull in alongside the bank and tie off to said tree. And there is only room for one boat, so you have a lovely quiet spot all to yourself (and the mosquitoes). We anchor at nature moorings for eight out of fourteen nights, spend four on town jetties and two at the marina in Cahors. As the weather gets hotter, we also use nature moorings as a cool place to eat lunch and have a rest and a swim in the middle of the day.

There are some extra challenges in travelling on a river, rather than a canal. One is the current, the other snags. Locks allow you to bypass weirs, and as you exit or enter the lock on the downstream side you are steering through the eddies created by the water pouring over the weir, making it difficult to keep the boat on course, especially as you try to enter the lock. You have to watch for bits of wood floating in the river, some of which are quite large, whole trees, and these tend to get into the locks and congregate there, sometimes jamming behind the lock gates as you open them. We became expert in moving the gates back and forth to swish them out. With some skilful rope work and the assistance of other boaters we moved one large tree ashore from the entrance outside one lock, and on another occasion were grateful for the extra long boat hook of one of the commercial party boats to assist in major log removal.

Highlights of our trip on the Lot are some interesting engineering: a train track on a long arched platform on the side of the deep gorge before it goes into a tunnel, riverside roads cut out of the cliff and diving through tunnels, small hydro power stations beside several of the weirs; medieval towns and villages like Luzech, Cahors, and St Cirq Lapopie, recently voted prettiest village in France; the prehistoric cave paintings and 25,000 year old footprints in the grotte at Pech Merle; a tour of the Chateau of Cenevierves given by its sprightly octagenarian owner; watching pétanque games in Luzech; buying provisions at the huge market in Cahors, where you can buy everything from earrings to pigs trotters, and which even had a very French accordion player and a jazz trio; several outstanding meals at restaurants; cycling to villages away from the river and up one of the tributaries; seeing the houses built into the cliffs at Toulzanie, and the towpath cut into the cliff at Ganil; seeing the amazing horloge by Zachariou in Cahors, the ultimate Heath Robinson clock which we watch mesmerised as the ball bearings roll back and forth.

Peter is now completely bitten by the canal boat bug, and we have started doing research in earnest with the idea of buying one in a year or two.