Thursday 16th April 2015 Ercheu to St Christ-Briost. 19.4kms 2 locks

Boats at silo quay above Languevoisin lock

5.7 C Sunny and damp after a heavy dew. Set off at 9.35 am, winding to follow MR to first lock of the day. As we set off I noticed my wild strawberry plants in a pot on the roof had started to flower, such tiny flowers. The first hotel boat we'd seen this year went past heading towards Paris, it was called Anna-Maria II from Amsterdam and it had loads of bikes on the roof but no passengers yet. He was followed by an empty péniche called Doma. A loaded pair of push-towed péniches went past just before we arrived at lock 15 Languevoisin. A big boat (61.5m) went into the lock and went down. Above the lock there was a silo quay where péniche Univers was loading and

Church at Rouy-le-Petit

Octopus and Export were waiting to load. The lock refilled for us and we dropped down about 5m, by which time there were two more empty péniches, Homer and Razorback, waiting to come up. They were into the chamber as soon as we'd cleared it. There were more silos below the lock, but no boats. It was about 10kms to the next lock, so I starting typing up my notes on my tablet. Mike took photos of an impressive church at Rouy-le-Petit and a grebe with a fish. An empty called Baltic went past, crew taking photos of us as we passed. Not long afterwards a loaded boat called Pen-Duic went past, it was so well loaded at the fore end that water was curling over its gunwales. As we passed the junction Mike took photos of the now abandoned Somme link canal. The navigation was now wider and more like the river. At the village of Villecourt there was a Gendarmerie van doing a tour of inspection on the quay, so we gave him a toot on our hooter and a wave and he replied with a short blast on his blues and two's as he drove back up the ramp on to the bridge. Hazy clouds started to obscure the sun, making it a bit cooler. Low hills appeared on the left bank and a few nice houses and gardens bordered the canal as we approached the village of Pargny. Lots of coots were dashing back and forth across the canal as we neared our last lock, 14 Epernancourt. Loaded Dutchman Tessa (about 60m)

Grebe with a fish

was just leaving the lock, heading towards Paris, so we went straight in. This lock chamber has steel piled sides and, as it was only 4.1m deep, there were clapper gates instead of a guillotine at the bottom end. At the next silo quay there was an uncoupled push-tow pair, Stella was already loaded and the hold covers were back in place, but the fore-end péniche, called Sevenzo, was still loading grain - but the loader had gone off to lunch. A couple more kilometers and we arrived at our chosen mooring spot in St Christ-Briost. A pleasant mooring next to the river Somme, where we tied to bollards in a long layby. The depth of the water in the layby was OK for us but not for the commercials

Closed link canal to Ham & St Quentin canal

nowadays as it had silted up quite a bit. Mike and Graham went in Graham’s car to collect our car from Pont l'Eveque. We all agreed it was an ideal spot to spend the weekend, so more BBQs if the weather holds.

Moored in the layby at St Christ-Briost

Friday 10th April 2015 Pinon to Abbècourt. 25.4kms 5 locks

Lock 4 Leuilly, different style of lock house (others were red brick)

0.8° C Sunny and warmer, breezy later. Mike and Graham went to move vehicles early, they left our car at Abbècourt and came back in Graham’s. We set off at 10.15 am in glorious warm sunshine. Almost 4kms through woodland turning to jungle, dead and live trees overhanging the canal. There was another dead pig floating in the water, but many birds in the trees and butterflies in the grassy towpath. Still signs of the towpath haulage system they used to use on this canal with the occasional concrete pole that supported the electricity cables to power the little electric mules that towed the

Into the locks side by side. Leuilly

barges. Down lock 5 Vauxaillon and another 5kms of woodland. Woodpeckers in the distance and pied flycatchers chasing flies across the canal (first ones this year). Lock 4 Leuilly followed by a shorter pound to lock 3 Crécy (with De Nogent on the lock house plaque) A loaded boat called Prodest from Dunkerque went past heading uphill by the silos at Pont-St-Mard on the short section to Guny lock 2. We delayed lifting the blue bar while we topped up our water tanks from the convenient lockside hose,

Moored at Abbecourt

housed in a hole with a metal lid. On to the long pound, just over 11.5kms, still in thick woods. As we approached the last lock the canal was on an embankment to cross the tiny river Ailette, whose valley the canal had followed from the summit. Then over the Oise on a grander aqueduct and into the last lock. Abbècourt lock 1 is a deep lock, just over 4m deep and is now surrounded with high fences of green plastic coated wire to keep people off the locksides now there is no lockhouse or resident keeper.  Followed MR round to the left on the Latèral à l’Oise and we both moored on the old quay. It

Not long before the rodent population decreased by one
thanks to our neighbours' mouser par excellence Daisy cat.

was 4.15pm. Mike and Graham went off to get Graham’s car. I put the satellite dish up and started on the log. Hooray we have 4G, a good fast signal. BBQs out when they returned.

Click here to look at lots of interesting info on (mostly) long extinct canal haulage systems in France

And this one (all in French but loads of pictures) of towpath mules of all kinds used in France. An excellent site, explains a lot!

Monday 6th April 2015 Bourg-et-Comin to Pinon. 19.8kms 8 locks

Renovated lock house at Moussy-Soupir lk12

-0.5° C. Sunny with mainly white clouds, chilly. We got ready to move and after chatting with our neighbours on the pontoon, Jeremy and Elaine with their cruiser Becky Abby and some young French people who had recently bought a Dutch cruiser. We said au’voir and left at 11.15 am, us heading up the Oise à l’Aisne and them off to Berry-au-Bac on the Latèral. Four locks uphill to the summit, each one about a 3.5m lift; zapped the first one, lock 13

Loaded boat coming down, below lk11

Verneuil, it was empty so the gates opened and Mike lifted the blue rod (two sets, one at either end of the chamber) and we rose slowly. Up 12 Moussy-Soupir, 11 Metz and 10 Moulin Brûlé, all in relatively close succession, passing one loaded péniche (Jaël NL) coming down below lock 11. All the lock houses were empty except the top lock, but lock 12’s house had been recently renovated with new windows, doors and shutters. No water was coming into the canal from the feeder,

Summit feeder and old engine shed

beyond the sluices there was an old engine shed for the long gone towpath traction engines. Sections of the rails are visible in the undergrowth in lots of places along the towpath side of this canal. Behind us the top lock remained open with a green light and we met a loaded boat called Ballantine as the canal became narrower, with trees overhanging the canal, just before Braye tunnel. The tunnel lights were on red, but the tunnel keeper saw us and the light changed to green. Only the first few lights were

South end of Braye tunnel

illuminated, orange sodium ones, so we used our headlight for the first time in many years as we went through the 2,365m long, dark, dripping tunnel. I made lunch which we ate before we emerged again into the sunshine. Fishermen with a large green tent and a bright yellow van were camped on the bank of the Monampteuil lake as a new road had been constructed around the canal reservoir, which is fed from the bigger lake at Aillettes (the site of a large Centre Parcs leisure complex now, we noted when

North end of Braye tunnel - covered in graffiti as no keeper at this end

we drove past it on Sunday). The sunshine had brought out lots of cyclists and walkers to do the circuit around the lake. One sheeted over cruiser was moored on the pontoon at Pargny-Filain and a converted péniche houseboat called Harmonie was moored close to the first lock downhill, lock 9 Pargny-Filain. We zapped and it filled. Again the top lock had a very well kept house that was lived in. We met the next boat, an empty called Maringo, on the short pound to lock 8

Some of the remains of towpath traction engine  tracks
A picture of towpath mules in action 
left of picture next to a chain driven tunnel tug

Chavignon. Mike had trouble getting the blue rod to work. Looked around and couldn’t see an intercom or a VHF channel number to call on the lock cabin, so Mike checked the sensors, noted that the “navigation alarm” light was flashing and within a few minutes the lock started to close and empty. When we arrived at the next lock, 7 Chaillevois, there was a young man in a VNF van who was just coming out of the lock cabin. He was checking that all was working OK, he’d seen that lock

Moored behind Matilda Rose on the quay at Pinon

8 had failed (an entrance sensor hadn’t worked, he told us) and Mike asked him what the sensor was for on the control rod post at about head height. He said it detects empty boats. We weren’t quite sure what the relevance of this was to the working of the lock and came to the conclusion that it must be for more VNF statistic gathering – in the days of  lock keepers at each lock they used to keep log books, but now it must be done electronically. When we asked what VHF channels to call him on he replied that all communication on this canal is now by mobile phone and we checked that we had the correct number in our old guide book, yes, and he told us the number for the next section.  Into the forest of Pinon and saw a floating dead wild pig. A great white egret flew off

In Pinon lock 6 as train crosses tail end bridge

in front of the boat and a rough legged buzzard flew over shortly after. Spotted a sounder (had to look up that collective noun, Mike said it should have been a grunt!) of sanglier (wild pig) in a small clearing, but they melted away into the forest before Mike could get a photo. A long plantation of white poplars had netting around the bases of their trunks, which set us wondering if that was protection from attacks by pigs or deer or maybe they have beaver here now too, we’d seen no signs of any? Into lock 6 Pinon (another fine lock house) and a short distance beyond the lock we came in to moor on the quay at the back of Carrefour Market behind Matilda Rose. We tied up, packed up and went to see Jill.

Monday 30th March 2015 Berry-au-Bac to Bourg-et-Comin. 20.2kms 1 lock

Canal bank covered with spring flowers at Berry

7.8° C Sunny with white clouds, strong westerly wind. The banks where we were moored were covered in flowers, cowslips, violets, daisies, speedwell and red dead nettle. Four empty péniches were moored on the quays plus one below the lock and a Swiss-flagged Dutch barge. When Mike walked into the village for bread, the boulangerie was closed and the mini-market that I thought they’d built recently was a figment of my imagination. He came back for the car keys and went to the

Four storey house at Maizy

boulangerie in Guignicourt. Worth while going as the bread was a good price 1,10€ for a 400g pain. On Mike’s return, I went to see the lock keeper to tell him we’d be at his lock in about ten minutes, OK, and I asked him if there was drinking water still available here, yes. I went back to the boat to hang on to the centre rope while Mike used a wrench on the mooring pins to extract them. Winded at 11.50am and went into Berry (Aisne) lock 3. Mike refilled the water tank while I became human mooring

An old farm shed

pin again as there was no bollard on the lockside for our centre rope. The keeper came out of his lock cabin to take our licence number and he gave us a zapper for the next lot of automatic locks. Once the hosepipe was back by the tap and Mike was back on board, the top end gates closed and we dropped down on to the long pound (20.5kms) to lock 4 on the canal Latèral à l’Aisne. The Dutch barge that had been there when Mike returned with the bread was no longer there moored behind péniche Logica. We both said we’d got a good

A mistletoe tree

idea where that’s gone, fully expecting it to be on the pontoon we were heading for. The very strong west wind was right in our faces and trying to rip all the flags off the masts. Not long after we set off two empty boats, both named Poulebot, but one from Nancy and one from Dunkirk, went past heading for Berry. Ten minutes after that a third boat, Tonga, followed them up to Berry. I made some sandwiches for lunch which we ate on the move. A lovely new house, a three storey wooden chalet with balconies all around it had been

Sugar works and silo quays at Oeuilly

built right into the hillside at Maizy, a splendid village sprawled out along the banks of the canal. La Paix (empty) was moored on the silo quay at Oeuilly having some work done as there was a van belonging to a maintenance company parked next to it. On the opposite bank the sugar works quay was empty and silent (and, thankfully, odourless), we debated whether the screw type gear was for loading or unloading boats. Our fears of having nowhere to moor at Bourg were unfounded as the pontoon on the junction with the canal Oise à l’Aisne was vacant except for one small cruiser and a sheeted up speed boat,

Pontoon mooring at Bourg-et-Comin

both looked like permanent moorers. Gave Mike a hand to unload the bike and he went to collect the car from Berry. Pleased we’d managed to escape the forecast rain as it started to cloud over with grey ones again around 5pm and before long the rain was pouring while the gale force wind howled.