Day 66 & 67: 17th and 18th August 2017 Chalon Sur Saone to Thoissey

We decided to take a gamble on going to a place named Thoissey. In the Cruising Association's "Captain's Mate" app there was an entry from earlier this year talking about a halt up a small tributary passed a derelict barge which was "close to a children's activity centre". We wanted to pause for a day or so to rest and catch up on boat jobs so the fact that this place appeared to be free with only a 1 Euro charge for water and electric made it very appealing.

I have to say as we approached the 80km mark and saw a couple of other possible moorings we were tempted not to press on the further 3km to check this place out but I'm glad we did. After a successful morning of boatschool and a very hot afternoon of motoring I somewhat tentatively motored us under a small bridge and up a small stream. Patrick was also nervous but we had already seen the swimming pool from the river so were keen to give it a try. I was very relieved when Patrick shouted that it looked ok from the foredeck and we tied up on a small pontoon in front of another yacht.

It was a beautiful tree lined spot which although attracted a few biting insects, brought welcome shade. We piled ashore with drinks, crisps and a picnic blanket to enjoy the shade of a tree. We had a bit of a laugh at ourselves as the beer I had bought in bulk and had chilled in the fridge turned out to be shandy, however it was actually really refreshing on such a hot day!

Patrick then took the kids over to the playground on the opposite bank. After a while he brought back news that the swimming pool was open until 7:30 so I took the kids over while he had some rare quiet time on the boat. The pools were lovely, one very shallow for toddlers, one very deep with a diving board, and the other just perfect for Esmé as she could just touch the bottom at the deep end so after an hour I got out and read a book in the sun while the kids continued playing.

Next morning we got up and did minimal boat school of reading, English and Maths as I wanted to wage war on the kids cabin which by now looked like a nuclear bomb had gone off in it. By lunchtime I had done about half  and it was starting to get hot, with possible thunderstorms later in the afternoon so we decided to swim after lunch and then come back to the boat jobs.

We all went over this time and spent an enjoyable couple of hours over there, this time having fun on the water slide which hadn't been open the previous evening. Back to the boat for more tidying and then a Chinese meal made with a "caramel" sauce which I had bought a few shops back, mainly due to the novelty of finding a Chinese sauce available in a French supermarket. It wasn't quite what I was expecting and Esmé voted with her feet and ate plain rice up in the cockpit as she didn't like the smell. The rest of us quite enjoyed it but it wasn't the sticky sweet sauce I was kind of anticipating.

I also got the phone number for the Lyon marina from the tourist office next to the pontoon as I had been searching unsuccessfully for it all day and thought with it being a large city we should probably book in advance. So, we are now booked in to Lyon Confluence for the next 3 nights. Two full days, one for exploring and one for jobs!