Sunday 26 June 2011

St Fargeau-Ponthierry

It is 8.30 in the evening, John is reading, Tom is fishing, I am eating cherries. It has been a very hot day we slept most of the day (!) and we swam in the river to keep cool.

After rushing to get to Paris by Thursday (when we were supposed to meet Tom) life has quietened down nicely. No more worries about loosing oil pressure or other technical things. We are definitely in relaxed river mode, still delighting in the absence of tides and the easiness of tying boat at night and, dare I say, also getting more confident in the locks.

 Arriving in Port of Paris l’Arsenal was very stressful though. Between the one way system, the whizzing bateau-mouches and the waiting for approx an hour in all that hullabaloo (well, we realised later that we were waiting in the turning area of the bateau-mouches, ooops!) outside the lock of  l’Arsenal John has become a very capable barge handler and my confidence in him has soared up! We stayed there for a couple of nights, I did 3 washing machine loads and had a quiet time whilst John and Tom did the “sights”We left yesterday late morning, managing to manoeuvre deftly past the hundreds of expensive boats moored there and doing quite well on our first “descending” lock. On the way here we saw a sunken barge, worked through 4 locks (not counting the one out of Paris Arsenal, our first “down” lock) and moored in this lovely quiet woody curve of the Seine 50km south of Paris.

Friday 24 June 2011

In Paris!!! We made it across the channel, made it roaring down the Seine towards Rouen at 11 knots, made it through our first lock (huge, sharing it with an enormous peniche who made poor little Wilhelmina bash about on the side) and made it into Paris Port de l'Arsenal which wasn't an easy entrance...

Thursday 9 June 2011

Preparations

After spending a busy Spring working on the boat: trying to sort out alternator, installing AIS, converting the exhaust system, renewing all the water pipes in engine etc etc. we are spending a very busy few weeks trying to get ourselves ready for THE BIG TRIP.

Now that we have passed the ICC and CEVNI and that we have a generator in case the alternator doesn't perform, the plan is to leave Cowes midday on 10th June weather permitting, to catch the tide to Bembridge and from then point to le Havre...
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We are still recovering from the excitment of seeing Erick from Purmerend, who arrive on his barge Nooit Gedracht, younger sister (by 1 year) to Wilhelmina but bigger by 3 m. We learnt more in the 5 days he stayed alongside us than in the last 10 years! Erick is now sailing towards the West Country.

Wednesday 8 June 2011

These last months have gone like a flash...we have hardly had time to settle back (in fact no time to settle, just time to work) that we are getting ourselves ready to leave with Wilhelmina to Le Havre. John has itchy feet...