Day Six – Cambrai, France

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April 6, 2010

I know that I will not be able to keep up with a journal type blog as Internet locations are few and far between so I won’t bore you with long tales of the day. We were on the E’scaut Canal most of our past two days. And today we will depart and turn left to meet up with St Quentin Canal. This will bring us ultimately to Reims. But before we get there we will travel through several tunnels including one that we will have to be towed convoy style. Can’t wait…

This morning we cast off around 7:30 heading to Cambrai, France. Sun was out and we had little canal traffic to encounter. Today we encountered our first canal lock that is manual (no attendant). This was very interesting as it has sensors to open for you, you enter the lock and then after tying up, you lift a blue rod. This closes the gate and the water starts to fill the lock. What we did not know was why the lock when filled did not open to let us out.

After calling on a Emergency remote phone at the gate building, we received a push button remote control through a trap door on the lock house, (like TV remote) that we take with us to open locks and such. Very clever!

We will use this for the remaining St. Quentin locks and will “deposit” the remote in a designated lock box at the end of that canal. The locks are now smaller and one or two boats our size would fit. Our second lock of this type, we hit bottom and got stuck going out. The lock keeper was there and helped us back out of the lock and enter a lock that was to the left side of this one. We learn to follow the big barges, they seem to know the deeper waters!

The lock keeper was surprised at the level of silt on that side of the lock. He thought we should with our draft make it without any difficulty. We maneuvered the remaining locks of the day with too much trouble. I drove most of the time into the locks and Ken would tie us up. Today we did only 7 locks, tomorrow we will have to get close to the St. Quentin’s famous tunnels where we will go through 17 locks and 23 km’s to get there.

We have a cute little mooring in Cambrai and after walking a fair amount, we found the Tourism office where they directed us to our Internet Café. I have done some shopping for staples and of course a bottle of wine. Ken is catching up on his never ending work and when he is done we head for dinner and back to the boat. Tomorrow, the TUNNELS of St. Quentin!!!

Day Four – Easter Monday, and Day Five

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April 5th, 6th

Left dock at 11:30, Shower, breakfast and another several gallons of diesel.. Thank you Walter! Kristine at the helm we started the official Ringvaard of Ghent. Only ½ around and we take the canal right heading to Oudenaarde. Our first big lock, I climbed up the ladder and went ot the office to get my “permit” to motor the Belgium canals. About 23 Euros. Good for 3 months ! Lock keeper was great and held the lock open until I got back into the boat. Not a lot of traffic then (is a holiday day) About 6 hour with locks and bridges trip. Very cold! But quiet, and a bit boring on the canals. The levies are so high you miss the towns and villages you pass. Only the bikers on the tow paths.

Reached Oudenaarde, Belgium around 4:30 and decide to tie up after the local bridge. Only boat there.

Walked to city center and there was a full-fledged carnival there. We walked the circle and found a wonderful wine bar. We were a bit “under-dressed” but that wouldn’t stop us. Great Sicilian wine for 5 euros.Walked back to the boat to regroup and ate salad for dinner. Plan, to leave early anticipating another 6 hour motor to Conde, just inside the French border.

Day Five – Tuesday, April 5, 2010

Today was a tough day. Each lock has brought us closer to perfecting our skills as two-handed boaters, but we find each one a challenge. Some locks take their time to fill, and others, it feels like a tidal wave crashing into the boat. We have also found the locks to get increasingly slimey as we go South. Our plan was to stop at Valenciennes, past Conde, but did not realize we actually went past it. No real town along the canal and more important, no bollards to tie up to. It was getting late and we finally found a mooring past the last lock of the day near Trith, France. Still cold and dreary, but the evening proved better. We found we had not eaten all day and so we almost inhaled our pasta dinner and salad. With the locks closed after 6pm, we had a quiet night at the lock bollards.

Day One of Canal trip

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Spent the beginning of the day filling the water tanks, waiting for our box from the USA to arrive with many of our personal items we didn’t want to take on the plane, and stowing gear. The biminy finally got up, bikes folded and lashed on the front deck. New “gangplank” we are hoping wasn’t a foolish purchase.

The weather, sunny, cool, windy. 12 kts average. Our plan, is to leave the marina and motor (of course) over to the locks about quarter mile from marina. Get through the locks after 5:30ish, and then moor on the opposite side of the locks until morning. If we went too soon, we would be shooed off. Our plan is to leave by 6:30-7am to motor the 60 K to Gent. Hoping Gent will be seen by 3pm. Dinner of left overs and Lyle on the stereo. Ken is sleeping on the settee and I went above to see how the lines were holding. Did I mention that we tied up just in time for the rain to start. Noticed we have company on the Quay. Another sailboat. The lock is a 24 hour lock, but most don’t like to travel after dark. It is cool in the boat, we have plenty of wool blankets and I have the hotwater bottle under my feet as I sit here. (taking it to bed tonight)

Day two – Heading to Ghent through the Oosterschelde

We left our mooring around 7am and with reasonable warm weather gear on headed to the Oosterschelde to motor through the Zuid-beveland Kanaal.

This is the first real lock we will encounter and it opens up to the last saltwater we might see in a long time. Motoring became miserable only due to the blowing, freezing rain. We believe we were getting pelted with sleet. Finally resorted to full-foul weather gear. Went through several sets of gloves as they would get wet and then our hands would freeze.

Our mission was to reach Terneuzen, Belgium the start of the Belgium canals. Be in Gent by mid-afternoon. Tom, from Bruinesse (Van Swaay) told us to stop at the KYCG yacht club at the top of the Ringvaart of Gent. We almost went past it as we were finally “off” the nave charts and using paper charts. A boating skill to rediscover. Very small yacht club, but they let us dock and after finding out that Tom had sent us, they became very friendly and by early evening, we were drinking at their club bar like old friends. Sunday, Easter, Walter (Harbor master) is going to drive us to the petro station with several small liter cans. We are almost on empty and the diesel is hard to find. We have a 2 gal tank, and that would be many trips to the gas station on our bikes to fill 35 gal boat tank. Walter has collected several small tanks from his other boaters here and has offered to drive us twice to the station.