Grey skies with a few sunny spells. Chilly and breezy. Rain later in the evening. Up at eight to get ready and moving for ten. Finished putting the gear we’d stored over winter in GV’s wheelhouse on to the boat, (thanks to John and Lizanne) Mike disconnected our electric cable and I helped get it back on board. Peter and Pauline came to wish us Bon Voyage as we finished getting ready. Then we had the Roanne send off – Peter had got a canister fog horn and that started the rest of the DBs hooting as we went down the basin to the lock at 10.00 a.m. The keeper had the shallow lock ready (No 1, Roanne) and we motored in. In minutes we were down and out through one gate. The keeper asked if we were continuing through the next lock, yes as we were going as far as Melay today. Set off on the 8.3 kms pound at 10.10 a.m. passing quickly out of the suburbs and into the countryside. The chateau de Matel was visible through the trees now they were devoid of leaves. The canal banks were starting to sprout the first few cowslips. We ducked under the N7 rocade (bypass) and around the prison’s high concrete walls topped with barbed wire, then past the old Arsenal still surrounded by more high concrete walls, barbed wire and electrified fence - but these were for keeping people out, not in. The old loading wharf bore graffiti from the last days of commercial traffic – Taci (a péniche, was here in) 1988. The walls were crumbling and beyond them were mature conifers, which also suggested long abandonment of the unloading wharf. Several coypu swam across the canal and one went up the bank and bounded into the undergrowth.
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| Lock 2 Cornillon |
At lock 2 Cornillon a new lock keeper greeted us, a man in his fifties wearing specs. We were in and out through one gate, dropping down 3.00m ropeless. As we left the keeper said he would see us at the next after lunch at 1.00 o’clock and told us there was a small tree that had fallen in the canal and advised us to go carefully round it. It was 4.3 kms to the lock so I made lunch before we got to the lock. The boat gently touched bottom three feet from the bank by the bollards above the lock so Mike jumped off and put a rope around the bollard to stop the boat drifting about while we ate our lunch, we only had half an hour. Into lock 3 Briennon just after 1.00 p.m. Again, we went in and out through one gate after dropping down 2.97m ropeless. Into Briennon and past the basin. A small DB was moored across the end, called Aqua Ludens it was flying a German flag. The restaurant/trip boat L’indefatigable was taking up a fair chunk of the available mooring space in the layby, the rest was filled with small cruisers mostly moored end on to the wall. An old péniche called Dhuys was moored beyond the end of the layby in what looked like a blocked off old arm, it was still surrounded by water but had a door cut into the side of its hold at ground level.
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| Burgundy tiled church tower. Briennon |
Mike took a photo of the smart Burgundy tiled church tower in the village of Briennon. The bank was ablaze with the yellow stars of spring-flowering celandines. Jays called out in the woods alongside the canal and new notice boards were spaced out along the non-towpath side showing what flora and fauna cold be seen. We wondered why this was on the off side, perhaps this had been designated a tourist walk while the red gritted (hateful stuff, the path at Roanne was covered in it too – gets everywhere on the boat even into the shower) towpath now served as a cycle path. Quo Vadis was moored at the quay in Le Champ opposite the town of Iguerande and the skipper waved as we went past. A great white egret was wandering in the field opposite the moorings at Melay, it was large, the same size as a grey heron. We moored at 3.35 p.m. on an empty quay at Melay. Ran the cable out to the electric box by the road and settled down for the night.
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