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| Leaving the pontoon at Pagny |
5.1ºC Overcast but sunny later, rain after we’d
tied up. Set off at 8.30am an early start as we wanted to clear the industrial
Moselle. Through Foug tunnel to the top of the long flight down into Toul. A
lovely lady keeper worked the top lock for us, a deep one, number 14. All 15 locks were less than a kilometre apart and we had only two problem locks, 15
which filled but didn’t open and I was just about to get off and walk down to
the use the lock intercom
when Madame opened the gates for us from her control
panel at 14. Lock 18 had failed completely and had two red lights (en panne –
broken down). This time I was almost at the lock when Madame arrived in her VNF
van and she worked the lock from 18’s cabin. We had already noted that
vandalism must be a problem here as the usually large lock cabin windows had
been bricked up and now had only tiny windows, not big enough for a vandal to
climb through. Just after lock 24 was the Port de France in Toul, a majestic
mooring basin which was pretty full of boats of all shapes and sizes. On past
the Vauban fortifications and under the former railway bridge which is now a
footbridge where we spotted two kids sitting in the window hole, their bikes
leaning on the wall behind them. Took their photos in case they were thinking
of doing any mischief. They didn’t. A short distance and we came to the
automatic lift bridge. There was a queue of cars waiting to cross it as we
passed through. A couple more locks and we arrived at 27, where a chatty man in
a van arrived to ask us which way we were going, Neuves-Maisons, OK, and
he
booked Toul lock on the Moselle for us. Straight on was the continuation of the
Marne-au-Rhin that had been abandoned in 1978 when the navigation was modified,
we turned right into the lock 27bis and dropped down on to the canalised river
Moselle, turning right to head uphill. A huge gathering of swans took flight as
we approached Toul lock, the first of three big locks (180m x 11.4m) built to
take very large cargo boats to the industrial area alongside the upper Moselle
in Neuves-Maisons. The first lock had a pair of chambers,
plaisance use the “small”
lock – péniche size 38.5m x 5.05m. Up the wall with recessed bollards, lifting
the rope higher as the lock gently filled lifting the boat 4.4m. The canal
above the small lock winds past Toul. I made some lunch but Mike found a
problem – no cooling water – the filter must be blocked. He took it apart and
the pipe leading to the big metal filter was blocked with weed and bits of
twig, picked up on the Marne-au-Rhin. Tapped a pin into the bank and he cleaned
it out, glad he noticed it before the river, but annoyed it was delaying us.
Ate our lunch as we went on up the canal and then straight out on to the
Moselle. Lots of four-man (mostly women) coxed rowing skiffs were flying up and
down the river with two orange RIB speedboats keeping an eye on them on the
8.5kms reach to Villey-le-Sec. No small lock this time, up the wall gently,
this time rising 7.20m. A very pleasant 13kms meandering through forests, with an old railway track on the left hand bank. Noted trees that had
been felled
and stripped of bark by beaver below the next lock. Neuves-Maisons
lock was a trifle less deep at 7.10m. When it was full the keeper came down
from his tower to hand us a new zapper. We asked what time the locks closed on
the canal de l’Est Sud. 6pm. It was gone 5.20pm and would take fifteen minutes to
reach the next lock! We were going to moor two locks higher, so we asked
if we could moor above his lock and move on in the morning. Not a good idea,
there was already one big river
barge at the quays above and another one due
early tomorrow. Moor below the next lock was his advice. We did, passing the
heaps of scrap and a German 2,000 tonne boat called Luma from Trier, then a
steel works producing coils of steel wire which was stacked along the canal bank
and on lots of railway wagons. There were bollards and old trees to tie to on
the piece of wasteland below the lock. We tied up just before 6pm.
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| Foug tunnel |
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| Lock cabin on Foug flight - note tiny windows |
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| Rods and intercom with funny face Foug flight |
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| Lock 14 chamber with bottom end gates open |
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| Boats in Port de France Toul |
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| Kids hiding in bridge window Toul |
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| Church at Toul from the Moselle |
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| Moored in Neuves-Maisons below lock 47 on canal de l'Est |
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| 2,000T river barge at wharf in Neuves-Maisons |
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| Coils of steel wire on wharf at Neuves-Maisons |
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