Friday 22nd June 2018 St Jean-les-Deux-Jumeaux to Charly 34.1kms 3 locks

Floating fisherman's cabin near La Ferté

6.7ºC Clear blue sky. Sunny, white clouds forming later. Cold wind still blowing hard. Set off upriver at 9am. Paused on the pontoon (now empty) to use their bins to empty our rubbish and Mike put an empty 10 litre petrol can in the car to remind him to get petrol for the bike. 13.5kms to the first lock. Winding  bends on the river, which was bordered with thick belts of trees both sides. At Fay-le-Bac there were huge silos on both banks at KP93. A couple more kilometres and we were going through the large town of La Ferté sous Jouarre. Spotted a fisherman’s floating open-fronted tin shed (not seen one like that since

Landslip and felled trees KP78

Germany). The town had built a new mooring with finger pontoons that was only suitable for much shorter boats than ours. On through the busy town centre with high sloping concrete banks as flood defences. On the outskirts of town there is the most delicate of accesses to a floating pontoon behind a tree-covered island which has an underwater sandbank extending downriver - the channel is marked with several green buoys and a red and white striped post marks the end of the sandbank. Another 3kms brought us to lock 9 Courtaron, which was

Water extraction for the vines  KP68
21 pipes with 21 diesel engines.

automatic and emptied when Mike zapped. Up 2.20m and as we left we spotted the VNF workboat Massabielle was below the lock about to come up. 11.5kms to the next lock. A short distance upstream we came to a four-arched railway bridge, going upriver the arches to use were the one on the right nearest the right bank – we gave that a miss as it was half obscured by trees – and the other was second from the left, we took that one as the easiest to navigate. Further upstream we could just see the houses in Ste Aulde through the trees. On a left hand bend near KP78 there were four trees that had fallen down into the river due to a substantial land slip.

Needle weir at Charly lock 7

Massabielle caught us up just before lock 8 Méry, so we hovered under the bridge before the lock and let him past so he could go up the lock first. He zapped from the bridge and the lock activated and emptied. Once he was in the lock and the gates were closed behind him, Mike zapped and we got an orange light to tell us the lock would prepare for us when the VNF boat left – which it did, perfectly. As we were going into the lock and attaching to one of the vertical recessed bars, a Dutch cruiser called Welldone arrived and came in with us. The lady on

Below lock 7 Charly

the boat asked us to go further forward in the chamber – Mike said no – she looked shocked until Mike explained that there was a notice on the lock telling plaisance boaters not to go further than halfway up the lock chamber – they hadn’t seen that. Probably it would be turbulent at the front of the chamber as the lock only has gate paddles. It was! They moored on the other wall opposite. Up another 2.10m. Mike waved them on in front, then to our amazement they tied up on the quay above the lock, there was just enough space beyond the péniche (Helene) that was moored there. We motored on upriver expecting them to overtake us on the 9kms to our last lock of the day. Above Méry the landscape opened up, with forest covered hills on our left and

Lock 7 Charly and its weirs from the road bridge

at Nanteuil-sur-Marne there were vineyards on the lower slopes – nice to be back on the doorstep of Champagne. At the small village of Crouttes there were four little boys aged about ten who were at the water’s edge and Mike said are you going to dive? No, swim? Maybe – they then threw stones in the water and waved au’voir. At KP68 Mike spotted a naked body of a man on the bank – is he dead? He lifted his head and waved, thank goodness for that. First nudist this year. A group of youngsters watched us lock up through 7

Moored at Charly

Charly, up another 2.20m. They asked the usual questions about the boat. At 4.20pm we moored between a Dutch cruiser and a retired péniche, with a fisherman at our bows (he volunteered to move but we said he was OK, we’d got plenty of room). We left the rest of the quay free in case a péniche turned up once the locks were closed at 6pm (like they did yesterday). Loaded boat Florimonde went past and down the lock as we finished tying up.