Day 52: 03/08/17 Chalons to..... somewhere peaceful after a lock!

Today was all about the locks. We were trying to make some progress as in 2 days the canal closure would be lifted, so Patrick and I dropped the lines at 8:20 then waited for the kids to wake up before having breakfast on the run. Some of our bread was going stale so I made cinnamon eggy bread which everybody enjoyed.

I'm always amazed at the peniches which seem to be run by husband and wife teams who take their cars along and crane them on and off the boats.

We had an idea to stop at Vitry le Francois to visit a chandlery but this was dependent on there being space at a quay as the marina was too shallow. They quay's were either full of commercial vessels or very weedy looking so we continued on. It was about 2pm by this time and the next sensible looking stop was 13km away, and about 5 locks which should have been doable in the 4 hours before the locks stopped operating for pleasure craft. We entered the first lock after Vitry after waiting for a boat to clear the lock. We were then handed a remote control for the remaining locks as we struggled to keep Laurin safe as the water came right up to the top of the recessed lock sides.

Onwards to the next lock which would not open with the remote. It was really breezy so after struggling to hold position in the canal I made a phone call back to first lock, which,  with my broken French was somewhat successful in that the lock suddenly started to operate. The remote then operated the gates once in the lock.

It struck me that in England a lock is the end of our journey, usually complete with the friendly face of a lock keeper and the promise of a meal and a beer afterwards, where as in France, the locks are largely deserted, and very violent!

The next lock seemed to cycle and we had red/green on our approach which soon changed to green. In we went only to find that we couldn't get the lock to cycle. Another tricky phonecall and we were told that a man was coming. By this time we had lost so much time I couldn't see us making the deep water halte before the locks stopped working. I spoke with the lock guy and he kindly said he would follow us and open all the locks until we got somewhere with a suitable mooring. We quickly put some beers in the fridge to repay his kindness as I'm sure he was supposed to be going home much earlier than he eventually left us.

So tonights halte is in the middle of nowhere but has showers, toilets and a beautiful sunset. The kids loved scooting down the track and generally having fun.