Today was in interesting journey as almost everyone in Châtel Censoir decided they wanted to leave at 9h00, the earliest you can enter an écluse. We made the first batch leaving a few boats waiting for us to go down and the écluse to fill for their turn (putting them about 15 minutes behind us). Things were going smooth, the first couple of écluse were open and waiting, in fact so was the third but no éclusier. We waited and waited, (shut our engines off) and looked back up the canal to see the next group of boats arriving so we met them and helped get them tied to the bank. By this time Joan was calling our first éclusier to see if she knew what was going on, she didn’t but would see if she could find someone to take care of us. When the éclusier finally arrived it turned out that there were way more boats moving this morning than normal, and they just plain got swamped.
Saussois Rocks & the Canal du Nivernais
About half way through our day we passed through a tight 180 bend at Merry-sur-Yonne and the beautiful limestone cliffs of Saussols Rocks. One of the more unique and beautiful settings we have experienced on the canals of France
Around one more bend and we were tied up in a beautiful cutout, complete with power. Set up for lunch, reuniting with a boat that we'd met the night before. After lunch it was time to scale yet another hilltop town. This time Mailly-le Château - now a town with a château, the Keep remaining from a 14th century fortified castle. The walk up the steep road was a bit on the hot side (we did manage to hit the heat of the day). We explored the 13th century church, then found the grocery store we were looking for. Not much to choose from but, they did have ice cream and that sounded like the perfect food for an afternoon snack. While wandering around town we found trail markers that lead to the cliff - must be a trail back to the boat. While steep, the trail offered a bit of shade, no cars and it was much quicker.
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| Mailly-le-Château |
Being May 31, Joan and I were celebrating our 36th anniversary. We'd planned a nice dinner to cook along with a nice bottle of Crémant de Borgogne (Burgundy's answer to champagne). We opened the bottle to have a wee apéritif when Albert from the only other boat in the harbor dropped by and asked if would like to join he and Kathrin for a glass of wine - we of course accepted, bringing the rest of our Crémant with us. Wellllll around midnight we made it back to Juniper. Between crémant de borgogne, wine, conversation and the goodies that Kathrin found to eat, we didn't even think about dinner, till we were back on our boat. If I recall the 36th anniversary is the potato chip anniversary - in honor of that milestone we snarfed a bag of chips, then off to bed.
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| Celebrating our Potato Chip Anniversary A toast with Crémant du Borgogne (36 Years together) |
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