Settling in to La Ganne and Escaping Roanne!

 

Our lap of honour with NB Puzzler before exiting the port!

My apologies for the lack of transmission over the last two(!!!) months…. We’ve been a bit busy…..  We have now become home owners again and finally made a break for freedom from the Port of Roanne, saying goodbye to friends on land and water as we set off on our summer marathon cruise (2500km!).  So with a bit of date manipulation (pretend it’s last week), here’s a catch up on what we’ve been up to until the end of March.

We signed for our new house on Friday 9^th February and the first thing we did was go to the supermarket to buy 2 plates, knives, forks, spoons as it turned out our ‘sold as seen’ deal didn’t stretch to the crockery and cutlery after all and we had nothing to eat our tea with.  Everything else was left however, though we did have to use pool towels for a few weeks until John Lewis delivered the bath ones.  The second thing we did was light the fire as it was bloody freezing (the micro-climate Jerry????!), and the third was have a bath.  We then headed to Jerry and Caroline’s to join them for drinks for Caroline’s birthday and meet some new friends.  It was a chance to reconnect with our neighbours and B&B owners we’d stayed with last visit, Jeanette and Richard, which was lovely.

At last - OUR house :)

Rather a wintry view from our bedroom window

Our friends Michelle and Kevin had put us up the night before we signed, they live about 20 minutes away.  When they came to us for lunch, Kevin brought his toy with him!

Walking from the house down to Jeanette and Richard at Labarthe

When we were building the concrete base for the pool heat pump, we had to clear some vegetation around our well, so then had to make it safe until we will restore it later this year.

Apparently the migrating cranes signal the arrival of spring.  I'm still waiting......

One of our many frogs from the garden trying to get into the sitting room!

We then spent the weekend unpacking what we’d brought from the boat and going through every cupboard and drawer in the house, clearing out what we didn’t want/need and shifting things around to how we wanted them.  On Tuesday we woke up to no water.  A quick call to Jerry, our estate agent (and friend) and he discovered that the previous owner had cancelled his contract meaning our water had been shut off.  Jerry had specifically told them not to do this, as he would contact the water and electric people and simply change the name on the contract from theirs to ours, thus preventing anyone being cut off…….  It all got sorted out by Jerry and by late afternoon, our taps were running again.

By the time Pete and Jane arrived for the weekend on 22 Feb, we’d set up our EDF and Saur (water) contracts and direct debits, tried to set up our internet, but the house didn’t appear on Orange’s system, so an appointment was made for an engineer to come out the following week, purchased towels and sheets for letting the property out over the summer, taken our lives into our hands and travelled to IKEA in Bordeaux for everything else we were missing, bought and had delivered a new tv, got a pool person and gardener in place for over the summer and found a couple of good local wineries (5 minute drive from the house!).  We’d also started the ball rolling to get a pool heater installed, which was going to prove to be a bigger job than we thought…….

We took a couple of days off to do touristy things with Pete and Jane; our local Chateaux de Duras, being one of them.

The chateau is a great visit and we were all greatly amused by the secret door in the wall!

Could've done with these bellows for the fire......

Super views of Duras from the tower.

And looking the other way towards our house :)

Then we went to St Emilion

Mike was there too!

When we were booking our hire car to take us to our house, we discovered that it becomes very expensive to hire for an extended period of time as they won’t hire for longer than 28 days.  The only way we could get around this was to hire for three and a half weeks, then return to Roanne for a few days, then pick up another car for another couple of weeks.  Unbeknown to me, Mike had decided to squeeze in a quick trip to Paris for a couple of nights as he had bought tickets to see First Aid Kit live on 5 March, as an early birthday present for me.  Very early – it’s not til the end of May!  We had a lovely couple of days and the concert was fab.  We then had a couple of nights back on board Quaintrelle and then it was the 4 and a half hour drive back to Baleysaggues.

Sacre Couer

Paris

The beautifully harmonic First Aid Kit - fantastically talented young ladies :)

This next chunk of time was spent getting the house ready for rental over the summer.  We’re not going to do this as a business, but we’ve bought a bit quicker than we intended and rather than leave the house sitting empty over the summer, decided to do some rentals.  The bookings would be managed by Tracy and David of HolidayCottagesandVillas.co.uk and we’d need to get House Managers in place to do the turn around between guests.  We had to have the house ready for a photoshoot presenting it exactly as it would be when rented out, so some tweaks here and there, painting some old tables to make them look more contemporary (thank you again Caroline!), and shifting anything not included out of the way and hiding all our own paraphernalia.  The visit with Tracy and David went well and they were confident we’d get a few bookings.  The only thing left to do was have a pool heater installed……..

On 15 March, we drove the long drive back to Roanne again as Mike had a commitment.  Over the long winter weeks, he’d got together with Dave (musician) and Roger (wannabbee, but more advanced than Mike) to play his ukulele.  As talk of the Roanne Rockers went around the port, there was much interest (curiousity?) and suddenly they were doing a gig at the Thursday night port social in L’Authentique on 15 March.  I got pulled in to sing a couple of numbers and thoroughly enjoyed myself doing so.  As Dave predicted, the night was a roaring success.

Then two days later, we were back in the car for a final 10 days at the house to try and get the pool heater installed.  Ordering the heater and arranging installation had been straight forward, until Paul the electrician arrived, and along with pool lady Katie, confirmed there was not enough power at the pool box and we’d need to install a new supply from the house to the pump – a distance of roughly 35 metres right across the garden, but more worryingly, right across the EDF mains supply to the house.  Mike spent a couple of days trying to find somewhere to hire a scanner so we could see the route of the mains, but they don’t seem to do this in France.  He contacted EDF who remarked on what an unusual request it was, but they’d pass it to their technical team.  With a week to go, Mike contacted EDF again, told them we’d be excavating that week and we really needed someone out ASAP to show us where the line lay.  By the way, Mike hasn’t become fluent overnight, EDF have an English Speaking helpline………  Someone would call us back.  They did.  They didn’t speak English, but they were only calling to say someone would call us back.  Yes, we know that, we were told that this morning by the English-speaking person…..  And then there was a call to say someone would come the next morning – wooohoooo!!!  At last.  I may have glanced over this issue on here, but it was causing us quite a lot of stress, to say the least! 

We could now book in Will, our grass cutter, with his mini-digger to dig the trench and we could begin lifting the turf on the part of the route before it would meet with EDF.

It was back-breaking, and there was only more to come……

My first ever concrete base - not sure I signed up for manual labour!!!

Then we lifted the turf

Mike digs around the EDF cable by hand - the wine bottles mark the route (as the EDF man had run out of spray paint......

Then having dug out the trench and laid the ducting, Will begins to fill it in again and re-lay the lawn....

The day after we dug, it absolutely chucked it down and whilst this was great for the trough across the grass as it settled the grass back in nicely, it turned the clay at the front of the house into slush!  Mike hurried off to the local Batiland (builder’s stuff) and bought several bags of stone which he dug into the clay and then tamped down with his new screwfix hammer.  Ten days on, he still has some soft tissue pain in his hand from this, and the front of the house was such a mess, we had to stop using the front door and use the side one instead.  The timing with Paul the electrician wasn’t great as he was going away for a few days so we were now faced with having dug in the ducting, he may not be able to pull the cable through and have to get Will to dig it all up again, and we wouldn’t be there.  The rain continued as we tried to get the house in the final state for renting, completed the Guest Information book etc.  Our House Managers, Stuart and Ursula, came round for a final visit on Monday 25^th March and assured us that they’d make sure everything was okay and not to worry.  Clair the gardener had also done her first session for us, and then invited us round for drinks before we headed off.  She also assured us that she and Will would make sure everything was tidied up and looked good after the installation was complete.

In amongst all the housey stuff, we had also being thinking about our winter mooring for Quaintrelle next winter.  I’d initially contacted the port at Castets en Dorthe, who had sent a booking form and pricelist, which we’d held back on completing until we’d looked at all our options.  It turns out that Clair, our gardener, and her husband David have just bought a boat that they are refurbishing, and it is moored at Fontet, so on her recommendation, we went and had a look round the port, found the prices online and emailed the local Mairie, who manages the port, about wintering there next year.  When we visited, there appeared to have been spaces, so we were confident it would be all systems go and were therefore slightly shocked when we got an email saying sorry, they were full.  We had a back-up plan though, and headed to Meilhan sur Garonne, where we had visited last year when on a house-hunting trip in September.  Last year we had met the English Capitain, Mike, who was retiring and now the port had been taken over by someone else, who it turned out, was the father of one of the girls opening the new florists in Monsegur, the opening night of which we’d dropped in on when visiting Clair and Dave for drinks…. (to keep it short!).  He was there working on the Capitainerie and was more than happy for us to over-winter there, although it all seemed to good to be true when he said it wouldn’t cost anything, we could just stop.  He gave us his contact details and said to ring him round about August to remind him, so it was all a bit loose, to say the least, but he was a nice guy, spoke good English so we were confident there hadn’t been a misunderstanding.  As we were about to leave, Mike, the old Capitain turned up, thankfully, as once the new Capt. explained what was going on, he quickly said we couldn’t, despite the DBA guide notes on the mooring saying you can…..  Up until 2011 you could over-winter there, but then the licence changed and it became a Haulte Nautique, rather than a port, and under which terms you cannot overwinter.  Mike suggested Castelnaudary, but that’s too far for us to get to the house and back to check on the boat, and Buzet sur Baise, where an English couple run the old port and take over-wintering.  We knew we still had Castets on a back-burner, so Mike contacted Buzet and they said yes, they’d be happy to have Quaintrelle over the winter, and at a cheaper rate than Castets.  We haven’t seen the port, but as we won’t be living on her, it doesn’t matter so much.  As long as it’s safe and secure, and it’s only a 50 minute drive from the house.  The deposit’s been paid and that’s another thing ticked off the to-do list!!

And so, leaving a half-installed pool heating system, a big hole in front of the house and a pile of clay under the tree we handed over wadges of cash to various people who we’d only just met, left them with our house keys and drove off into the sunset.  Well, we drove off into torrential rain and had a horrific journey back to Roanne on Wednesday 27^th – it absolutely chucked it down for all 5 and a bit hours back – exhausting.  We really did have mixed feelings.  We are so excited about the house and have only just started making friends there and we’ve had to leave them until October.  But we were so excited at the thought of being on the move and cruising again, breaking jail from the port.  But we’ve got some great friends there, who we’ll miss……….

Meanwhile, Marmande Piscines managed to install the heat pump in between the rain, but we’re still waiting to hear from Paul if he’s managed to install the electrics.  Once he has, Marmande will go in and connect it all up and test the pump.  I hope it all works.  And then, if it ever stops raining, Clair and Will will be able to go in and fill in the holes left and make it look nice again.  Crikey, it’s making my heart race again just thinking about it all.

Back at Roanne, it was a quick catch up with friends and then stocking up ready for our departure on 31^st.  Saturday dawned cold but bright and sunny – a good cruising day!  Just after 9.30am, Sally and Andy on NB Puzzler pushed off their mooring and headed down the port towards us, amid blasting horns from the other boats and shouts and waves as they passed by.  We were even accompanied by the sound track to Titanic at one point – thanks Nikki – we’re still afloat!!!  We followed them out to complete a lap of honour and were at the lock to the port ready to leave at 10am.  All our friends came to the lock to see us off, it was really quite emotional, but what a great feeling to be out on the canal again and on the move.  We did quite a long day, stopping at Artaix for the night, and I couldn’t stop staring out of the window at the trees and rolling fields that provided my view, instead of the back-ends of Portheus and Grizzled Skipper!  These are boats by the way……… 

On your marks!!.......

Here comes Puzzler - Get Set!!!.......

Go!!!  Saying goodbye at the lock.

Puzzler taking it easy.

Where Else Would You Want to Spend Bastille Day?

Mike didn’t sleep as well on the night of Wednesday 12^th July at Villette as he had half an ear open for kids running on the roof again, but all was quiet and I slept like a log.  We had an easy start on Thursday with the usual confusion trying to radio the lock keepers to seek passage.  I radioed Ecluse Temple, which controls the flight through Saint Martin during July and August.  I got a reply from Ecluse Flandres saying I had to call Ecluse Temple.  I said I thought I had called them (on VHF 20), and slightly confused we pushed off anyway soon reaching the lift bridge into the Villette basin.  We hung about for the red light to change, and as the bridge lifted Mike started to head through.  As our nose came towards the bridge a voice boomed over the loudspeaker, “Attendez! Attendez!!”  Although we had clearance under the bridge, it wasn’t fully lifted and the light hadn’t changed to green for go.  Naughty Mike!!  At the other end of the basin we reached the first pair of locks and tried calling Ecluse Temple on VHF 20 again, as the sign on the lock said.  Again, Flanders replied saying we had to call Temple.  We’d realised, ‘appelez’ meant they wanted us to call by phone but we’d looked in our books and the only phone number given (and on the sign at the lock!) was for Flandres, so I said to the guy I didn’t have a phone number, I’d looked in my book but didn’t find one – all in French too!  Flandres then replied in English, ‘Okay, I’ll open the lock for you……’ ????????  I thanked him and we waited for the green light, entered the lock and started our descent.  He took our name, and then must have gone off to phone Temple to tell them we were on our way. 

Heading for the lift bridge on red!

Villette Basin

The Paris Plage set up at Villette for the summer with sand and beach huts included :)

Back down the Saint Martin

There was another message from Flandres all in French as we came out of the second pair of locks, the only part of which I understood was ‘go in on the green light’.  We only ever go in on a green light anyway, but as we went in could see some action in the chamber below.  There was a boat in it coming up.  So the message must have been, there is a boat coming up the next lock, but you can go down and swap chambers half way.  We didn’t get shouted at over the tannoy or anything, so we must have done the right thing, but it’s the first time we’ve ever seen the lock keepers do anything as risky as have two boats pass each other in a staircase lock…….

All too soon we were at the bottom of the flight and I returned the key for the Ourcq locks at the little control hut.  There were three guys in there, waiting on phone calls to navigate the flight when there is no advertised phone number to call them……..hmmmmmmm.

Looking up the Bastille's bottom again!

And back to Bassin D'Arsenal

Plaques showing the flood levels over the years in the Arsenal basin

Returning to Arsenal felt quite nice and we radioed the office, and were told to take space 134, which we had just reached, so we moored up and Mike went off to dispose of our used oil, having done a change a few days before, check us in at the office and collect a parcel they’d taken in for us.  He took ages to come back because he bumped into Paul and Carol from Birmingham who had arrived the day before.  Once he came back, we had some lunch and headed out with our target being to go up the Eiffel Tower.  We took the Velib city bikes and managed to get so far but then started to come across road closures and police and armed guards.  We had been following a couple of young German girls who looked like they knew where they were going, so once diverted we continued and catching them up at some traffic lights asked if they were going to the tower, which they were, and they were following a French couple they thought were going the same way.  We got closer to the tower and dumped the bikes at a Velib station and walked through the park to the tower.  At the foot of the tower it was all fenced off and an orchestra was practising which could only mean one thing – the Donald was in town, and not our feathered friend the Duck.  We tried to get around the tower to the other side but had to go a long way round, so Mike stopped and asked a young policeman if the tower was open.  ‘No, it’s closed today. ‘  Mike then asked if Donald Trump was there and the policeman smiled and said, “Maybe.  I don’t know.  It could be him.”  He wasn’t sure if the monument would be open the following day, Friday but it was most definitely closed all day today.  It was a bit disappointing to go all that way and then not get up the tower, especially when it was someone like the Donald that had spoiled it for me.  But it gave Mike opportunity to voice his little ditty, “Donald Trump, did a dump behind the kitchen door.  Ivana Trump cleaned it up and then he did some more.”  It’s supposed to be Donald Duck laid some muck, but I think the Trump version works rather well.

We strolled back along the river and around 5.30pm decided to treat ourselves to a wee glass of wine in one of the boat bars that line the Seine.  As we drank, there was a flurry of police and armed guard activity on the water and a grey reinforced boat went past, pulled up on the other side, where the occupants exited and were whisked away in a fleet of ominous looking black cars – the Donald again…….

Closed, but the orchestra were very good

You can never have too many pictures of this bridge.....

The Donald's less salubrious river transport

Back at the Arsenal, as we started thinking about dinner, Paul and Carol and Ollie the dog came by to say hello, and after chatting for some time, we arranged to meet up at theirs’ after dinner for a drink.  We got there at 9pm and staggered home just after 12, after a really lovely evening with them, exchanging stories and plans. 

The next morning, slightly woolly-headed, we got up early and away by 8.30am on the Velib bikes to get to the Champs Elysee for the Bastille Day parade.  Again we hit roadblocks fairly early on and abandoned the bikes to complete the detour on foot.  By the time we got there, the crowds were already thick and we weren’t going to be able to see anything more than the peaks of some caps and flag poles going past, so we found a patch of grass to sit on and wait.  Some people were obviously seasoned parade attenders and had brought small sets of step ladders with them or stools to stand on, others were climbing any bench, tree or fence available, but for those of us remaining standing only on our own two feet, you weren’t going to see much at all.

We managed to see Macron pass between heads, a tiny figure in the distance, waving and about half an hour later as we lay on the grass, there was a mighty roar and the French equivalent of the Red Arrows did a fly past.  We didn’t have the camera ready, but quickly got it out and managed to catch some of the other planes going past.

We're probably not going to see much from here.....

Unless we look up!!! :)

Shortly after that we headed off to wander back into town and as the parade ended could see various elements heading off out of the city centre, but we seemed to be in the wrong place at the wrong time and had either passed the place they were or they were on the other side of the river.  Until we turned onto a bridge to cross back over the Seine and in the distance on the other side I could see some horses……

Woohoooo - front row view as they head back to their stable.

There were several flurries of helicopters going home

We continued wandering back to Arsenal where I had a wee siesta and we had an early dinner as Paul had popped by to say we were to lock down on to the Seine at 7.15pm.  We had talked about taking Quaintrelle up the Seine for the Bastille Day fireworks on Friday night, but decided it would be too busy and rough and she would roll around even more than she did on the Wash last year.  Our friends Jane and Billy on WB Lazybones had done it last year and said it was the most amazing experience, so as Paul and Carol had been thinking about it, we convinced them (it didn’t take much to be fair) that they should go out and they would take us with them – wooo hoooo!!!  We were getting quite excited about the evening and that only increased as we locked down with Paul and Carol on yacht Triona and headed up to find a good spot to watch the fireworks.

Mike clocks up some sailing hours at the helm

A HUUUUUUGE and very ugly hotel boat

Negotiating with the Greeks to come alongside.  The young girls were very funny and would blow kisses and dance at young men passing on the tour boats :)

Not a bad view for the evening's event

Glass of a little something while we wait anyone??

About to start.....

And then it was time to drive home - past that bridge again ;)

We had to wait for the lock to get back into Arsenal as there were a few boats all going up, and just as we were about to get a green light to go, a passenger boat came across the radio, “Bateux Prioritaire S’il vous plait.”  Yes, even though they were empty and just heading home for the night, the passenger boats still get priority apparently, so we had another half hour to wait while they went up and the lock was emptied again for us.  It was quite a nerve-wracking climb in the lock as control decided to get the four of us waiting in together and we ended up pressed quite tightly against the wall of the lock and our fenders on the other side tangled with the large cruiser next to us, but with four of us all keeping watch at various positions we managed it and finally got moored back up just before 2am.  I was ready for bed, but when Paul suggested a night-cap, it seemed like the perfect end to the most wonderful night – what an experience, we’ll never forget it.

It was 11am when we stirred the next morning and after a quick dash to Monoprix for bacon we had our usual weekend breakfast before slowly getting our act together and heading out to site see, with today’s target being Montmarte and the Sacre Couer.  We started off walking, stopping for a lovely lunch around 2pm then picked up a couple of bikes to continue on.  As is often the way for us on bikes we soon found ourselves in the very dodgy area around Gard du Nord and too worried to stop and check directions until it felt safer when we decided to abandon the trip realising we’d have to go back through the dodgy bit again.  We found a station to leave the bikes and headed off for the nearest Metro and made our way back to Arsenal where we chilled out for a couple of hours before Paul and Carol came round for some dinner.  Having had a couple of heavy nights, we were all quite tired and we had an early start the next day, so it was very civilised and we were tucked up in bed by midnight.

I bounced out of bed at 7.40am on Sunday and Mike was not far behind me as we readied to leave Arsenal and head down the lock at 8.30am.  We had spoken with the staff at Arsenal about taking Quaintrelle up to the Eiffel Tower and they said if we went first thing it would be fine as none of the big trip boats start til around 10am, so the water shouldn’t be choppy.  We were a little late leaving and just made the green light at Saint Michelle which is timed and changed to red at 8.50am.  It was a gorgeous morning and on the way up we only passed one commercial barge, which created little wake.

Calm waters at 8.50am

Passing the stunning Musee d'Orsay

Morning ladies!!

This old girl was also taking advantage of the stillness being moved back to her mooring.

The newer bridges also have some handsome keepers

Quaintrelle and the Eiffel Tower

A quick turnabout and we're on our way back

Thankfully the Bateau Mouches are all still in bed

Don't look now Mike but we're being followed - as the clock drew close to 10am, more traffic began to appear

As we left Paris and the tourist boats behind the waters were getting a bit busier, though the worst wake we rolled around in was caused by a tiny, private little cruiser that sped past us regardless.  Half an hour later we reached the junction and took a left onto the calmer waters of the Marne – and…… breeeeeaaaaath…………….. The Seine has been a real adventure, very special, but we were both looking forward to coming off her and back to tranquillity again.

Passing the Josephine Baker Swimming Pool - yes, that's right, this is a swimming pool!

Approaching the junction of the Seine and Marne where there is a huge Chinese restaurant and hotel

Leaving the industrial Seine behind we turn onto the Marne