St Sienne to Chusey then Piepape

We spent a lovely quiet night on our individual mooring then after a ride into Fontaine-Francaise to see the 18th century chateau and its ornamental pond (more like a large lake) we headed on, relatively smooth sailing through all the locks just 8, only downer was bursting one of the fenders on an uncovered bolt on the exit gates of one of the locks as it got pulled off, snapping the eye. The bolt ends are usually covered with dome nuts but not this one and with only 70cm spare, 35 each side and no freeboard to use as the locks are filled to within 8inches of the top it’s a miracle we haven’t actually run aground! We saw lots of kingfishers, they are incredible, the bright flash of blue catches your eye and then you try to track them to their next branch. There are also lots and lots of damsel flies, dragon flies, frogs 🐸, and other aquatic insects. Our stop last night was at Chusey on a large concrete quay with picnic tables and bizarrely electricity. We met up with an English couple who have been traveling on their 81year old wooden boat for 20years and they said the Arsenal marina in Paris is open but in high season costs £150-200 a night and you need to book ahead umm we will have a think about that sounds ridiculous but we might have to. In Chusey we rode to see the viaduct a Badin and realised it’s actually an aqueduct and we would be motoring across it, we also tried to find the fort listed in our canal guide, but it was nowhere to be found and we have no internet so couldn’t google it. This morning we set off just before 9, the temperature is a lot more bearable early on. Yesterday it was still 30degs at 10.00 when we went to bed. Our first 5locks formed a chain and each opened as we arrived so we completed five locks by 10:30, we then had only another either 3 or 6 to go depending on where we stopped, the first option was very open and it was only 11:15 so we carried on to the halte at Piépape on a beautiful tree lined stretch of canal so we should be shaded early. Unfortunately the large orange bourbon the bow was the casualty this time again pierced by an uncovered bolt end !!
Tomorrow we will start early and head to the summit and the 5km tunnel across to the Marne side, so 8 more up locks and then 2down to reach Langres at pk149. The Canal entre Champagne et Bourgogne is 224km long and these are marked as pk on our canal and river guides with 43 locks from Saône to summit and 71 from Marne to the summit, down locks are supposedly easier we will let you know.Read more