Counting Down the Last Few Days in Auxerre

Out stretching her legs

Well, here we are…. The final blog entry from Auxerre.  I’m now feeling slightly nervous about moving off.  I’ve been institutionalised and got used to having water, power and L’Eclerc to hand.  I will do a large shop this afternoon for milk, toilet roll, bacon – you never know when we will next be in civilisation……(Probably a day after we set off….).  We think we will move on Thursday or Friday, after Mike’s telecom with the doc about his knee scan, and we’re waiting on a delivery of Tung Oil from Amazon which should come Wednesday or Thursday and this is France, where deliveries work on canal time……

Since the last entry (a mere 11 days ago) we have been busy little Hectors and the boat is looking hot to trot.  On the afternoon of 16^th, our diesel delivery arrived courtesy of Truchon supplies at Vincelle.  We had thought we’d need 300/350 litres as we were almost operating on fumes but the tank took 230 and the two cans 40 litres.  It was a tricky operation as the hose nozzle from the truck was too wide to go right into our tank, so Mike improvised forming a seal around it with a bit of rope.  But we probably stopped the delivery before the tank was properly full as we didn’t want it overflowing and diesel going everywhere as it was quite a fast flow.  The next day we topped up the domestic tank from the cans and then took the cans to L’Eclerc to fill with white diesel for the proplulsion.

Man-stuff, truck, fuel.

We shouldn't have to get red diesel for the domestic tank until next winter now.

Waterfront diesel suppliers are few and far between in France so it's off to the nearest garage with the cans and trolley :)

I got my five coats of varnish on the shutters and boating paraphernalia and moved onto assisting with the paintwork, giving the front doors a few coats of white.

A locker clear-out allowing Mike to check the hydraulic fluid for the bowthrusters.

You've missed a bit......

The garden has had a tidy and been replenished.

 We then started on the inside and what started out as oiling the worktops in the kitchen and other ‘oiled’ surfaces ended up in a major sanding back, creating lots of dust job.  There were quite a few marks on the sink-side worktop, so we ended up stripping the whole thing more or less back to bare wood.  After three oats of tung oil we ran out and discovered that the local Mr Bricolage (B&Q equivalent) doesn’t stock it – hence the Amazon order arriving later this week.  Oiless, we moved onto waxing the interior wood and floors.

Spring has definitely arrived, they’ve turned the town fountains back on, and it’s been like a good Scottish summer the last few days finding Mike not only casting off his thermal base layer, but putting his shorts on too!   

With spring came a fair!  Unfortunately all kiddies rides so we could only look on enviously.

John Lewis.  They deliver to France.  For £7.50.  It arrived in three days.  Ahhhhh......John Lewis......

Temptation won last week and we decided to take Quaintrelle for a half-hour leg stretch up to the lock, then back down to the last lock we did in December and back to our mooring.  Chris and Liz were up for coming with us and we had a great mini-cruise with Captain Chris (being ex-US Naval and all that) confidently taking the helm.  Although we were only out briefly, it felt lovely to be moving.

A wee pootle between the locks

Putting in a turn - not long 'til we'll be going up that lock!

The tiller in competent hands.

Negotiating the double bridge

And back to our mooring

Realising that it was our last couple of weeks in Auxerre we have made full use of having Maison Roy on our doorstep.  I think we will be hard pushed to find a baker as good elsewhere.

Tarte Cafe and Saint Paul

Bourgogne and Tarte Agrume

Last night we enjoyed our extra hour of light (it was still gorgeous here at 7.40pm!) with a game of boules with Chris and Liz.  We are not looking forward to saying goodbye to them and Cosette and Hugo, the cats, when we part ways later this week.

Cat cuddles with Cosette

They are heading north to then turn south onto the Loire and they will continue southwards eventually picking up the Rhone to take them to Carcassonne, they hope by June.  We’ve been invited to visit them there, so we mustn’t have behaved too badly over the winter ;)

Liz and I using a very technical method of measuring who's closest

Mike took an early lead - which he kept - and then won

Close up of Mike's balls - I mean boules - a close up of Mike's boules (showing how close he was)

Enjoying a seat in the sun and a cheeky wee glass of Lillet between rounds

I think this must be one of my shortest entries on the blog, but it’s too nice a day to sit writing to be honest – although I am on the back deck, sitting in the sunshine, which is making it a bit difficult to see what I’m typing, and I can feel my left arm burning a bit……

All being well, next time you hear from me we should be underway…….