Wednesday 4th April 2018 Soulanges to Brusson 16.7kms 6 locks

9.1ºC fine drizzle as we set of at 9.55am. Showers, some pretty heavy, all day until we stopped, and then sun came out and the black clouds turned to fluffy white ones. Past the old lime kilns

A plethora of signs below lock 70

and cement works at Couvrot and up lock 3. A man was making a call on his mobile outside the VNF workshop above the lock. Lock 2 Lermite was a deep one with a recessed bollard in the wall for our centre rope (Mike’s decided that we will use a rope when we can, keeps the VNF happy). Last lock on the Latèral à la Marne, lock 1 Vitry, a shallower one. Round the town of Vitry-le-Francois on an embankment with the town below us on our right. Noted there were tall poles with CCTV cameras, one in the town and one on the next road bridge, both

Welcome to the Marne-au-Rhin canal. Phone number for
Bar-le Duc central control in case anything fails to work.

were overlooking the travellers’ camp which was down below us on our left. The site of the fuel depot had now been cleared – it burned down a few years back. Two péniches were moored at the junction with the Marne à là Sâone canal, NDL at the silo and Cobra on the opposite bank. On to the Marne-au-Rhin and up lock 70 with signs below it welcoming us to 131kms of canal with 97 automatic locks. A short distance (and more heavy rain) to lock 69 Adecourt. Below the canal on our left the little river Ornain had been turned into a series of pretty ornamental lakes.

The old welcome sign with the old phone number that
doesn't work any more.

The towpath had a long avenue of ancient plane trees with primroses and wood anemones growing along the edges of the rough path (no cycle path here – yet). Decided we’d had enough of the rain and as the batteries were re-charged we went up lock 68 Brusson and stopped at 1.50pm, banged mooring pegs in behind the piling edges next to a wide open empty field on our left. We’d stopped here before so we knew we could get satellite TV through a gap in the trees – it rained on us again as we finished tying up and setting up the TV.