Espiere canal via Antoine to Blaton (23rd to 24th June)
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Prior to leaving this lovely stretch of water, over the weekend Nicki and I walked along the canal to the next lock, and were interested to note that at this point the canal seemed somewhat wider – maybe there was potential to turn the boat the right way round – and after I had spent a little time pacing out the width across the lock gates, I felt confident that I should in fact be able to make it. So, as arranged on Friday afternoon with the lock keeper, she turned up at 9am in St Leger to open up the bridge for us to begin the final stage of our cruise along the Espiere, but before moving on I spoke with her and explained my idea about trying to change direction to see what she thought … not what I was hoping though, as she didn’t seem to think it was possible, but just to check, she phoned her husband for his take on it (as he had been managing the canal for the past 8 years). He agreed with her that it would probably not be possible, but being ever-optimistic I said that I would give it a go anyway.
With their ‘encouraging’ words ringing in my ears, Nicki and I carried on to the next lock, at which point the canal seemed to look quite a bit tighter than I remembered, but still I felt compelled to give it a go. So, with several spectators and both lock keepers watching (it turned out they are a husband and wife team living in the house next to the lock) we very, very slowly swung round as cautiously as possible (just using the thrusters as I did not want to risk the propeller engaging with obstacles close to/at the bank) – and we made it !! We didn’t touch anything on the way round and both lock keepers were very impressed with the manoeuvre, as were Nicki and I. It feels good when a tricky manoeuvre actually works.
Once through the lock and now travelling in the right direction, we continued on to the Spierebrug where we moored up for the night. It was a very hot night and we were surrounded by the noisiest frogs you will ever encounter, so to get a reasonable night’s sleep we had to choose between the windows open (with the deafening sound effects) or closed (for the oven baked effect). In the end we came up with a third solution, and settled for fans and windows open in the salon with the bedroom door open, which gave just enough cooling without too much noise intrusion, although it transpired early the next morning that there were also cockerels nearby but compared to the frogs, they were just soft background noise.
Our plan at this stage was to stay here for a few nights, but what with some movement from commercial traffic out on the main canal making our ropes creak overnight, and with our very own frog chorus still following us on this stretch, Nicki had had enough and wanted to move on after just one night. So we re-scheduled our trip and were off again that morning.
23rd June – Yet another lovely day out on the water, and a nice, sunny trip over to Antoing via Tournai with its ‘one-way’ system through the town. There seemed to be very little commercial traffic on the waterways, so it was an easy stress-free trip, with everything seeming to more-or-less go in our favour, and on arriving at Antoing we were pleased to find just one other ship there which meant we had our pick of mooring spots. Once settled in we headed off to the local Aldi (maybe a 5 minute walk away) leaving Casper on the stern deck as it was so hot – but then, waiting in a short queue to enter the store, Casper suddenly appeared! He’d decided to jump off the boat and find us – thank goodness we hadn’t gone far, and that we hadn’t actually entered the store or who knows where he might have ended up.
We spotted a large rat swimming in the water nearby the boat, which Nicki wasn’t too impressed with, especially when later in the evening she took Casper out, and another (or maybe the same) rat was out swimming parallel to her as she and Casper walked along the canalside.
As it turned out, we only stayed for one night in Antoing, and before we left the area we called into the local fuel barge to top-up our diesel, which was quite an expensive top-up considering that prices elsewhere were pretty low at the moment. That done, we moved off along L’Escaut Belge to Blaton where we would stay overnight before joining the Blaton-Ath canal – the mooring was not as idyllic as we had expected, but it was quiet and frog-free and we were happy with that. A chat with the lock controllers seemed to ensure they were aware of our presence and would escort us through the locks the next day.
We took the opportunity for a quick stroll into Blaton, but weren’t that impressed with the town – maybe we’d missed the town-proper, but what we did find was just a bit tired and grubby. Still, later that evening Nicki and Casper took a stroll back along the canal away from the town and it was delightful, a complete contrast to the town.
