Day 53: 04/08/17 Orconte to Saint Dizier. Finally we met some more boat kids!!!!

Today we had a rather late morning as we were all pretty tired from the long day yesterday and we only had 15kn to get to Saint Dizier. We took advantage of the large sink at the halte and did some hand washing before setting off, just a little too late as the peniche we were following yesterday was ahead of us.

We followed the peniche to the first lock, waited for them to go through and then tried to operate the lock using our remote... no joy! Another phonecall and opportunity for  me to practice my French brought us another VNF guy to help with the lock and give us yet another replacement remote. We're starting to wonder if having mobile VNF guys is actually a cost save on individual lock keepers given how frequently we need them, although it seems that the beautiful lock keepers houses are now either sold on or rented out.

On the plus side, apart from the issues with the remotes we have entering and exiting locks pretty much down to a fine art. I drive us in and slow us right down while Patrick takes the plastic boat hook, (AKA the Nimbus 2000 as AJ likes to pretend to be Harry Potter and use it as a broomstick,) and lasso's the first bollard with the stern line which he then throws at me. I then try to manoeuvre to get the bow close enough so that he can also lasso the bow line. We then use the remote or a lever to operate the lock and Patrick usually drives us out after dropping the bow line.

A lock or so later we noticed another mastless yacht behind us which appeared to have kids on board. Several locks or so later this was confirmed and we finally met for a chat when came alongside at a quay to wait for an engineer to fix the last lock before Saint Diziers. The family were Danish and were also travelling to the Med, however they only have a year so will go to Spain after exiting the inland waterway system.

Once alongside the quay at Saint Diziers the kids got to really make friends proving again, that lack of a common language is no barrier to friendships. The kids played pretty much all afternoon while I went to get the tokens which would allow us to have free water and electricity. I also checked out the prices and times of the swimming pool which seemed ridiculously cheap compared with everything else here. On taking some tokens to the Danish boat we decided to stay at this free halt for 2 nights and take advantage of the cheap swimming tomorrow.

After dinner the Danes came over to Laurin and the adults enjoyed some beers and pleasant company while the kids watched films and ate sweets! A lovely evening and even better that Ole was a boatbuilder so could give us a second opinion on Patrick's fix of our seacock. He said it was fine to leave it until the Med to fix! Result!