June 2023 – Part 1
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The first day of June saw us still undecided about travelling the canal, but after taking a walk up to ecluse 18 I felt we should give it a go, and so we arranged with the locking team to start our adventure through to (hopefully) Ladeuze at ecluse 15 the following day.
Happily all went smoothly, and just three hours in gorgeous sunshine took us through seven locks before reaching Ladeuze, one of our favourite moorings. Here we were able to take full advantage of the ready water supply and power-washed the boat, along with various rugs and carpets and anything else that needed a clean, not to mention the water tap housing on the canalside! I also began constructing a new dog ramp. Keith called in again on his way back from visiting a friend nearby, and we arranged for him to cycle back and re-join us at ecluse 10 and travel to the end of the canal at ecluse 1 and on to Peruweiz. Keith had left his campervan here, and we moored a few kilometres along from the campervan parking at Pont de Vermantois; he returned to the van for a few hours and we dashed off for groceries, returning in time to welcome Keith onboard again for dinner later on.
Setting off the next day (Sunday, 4th June) we cruised for less than an hour before reaching Peronne Ecluse 1, where we radioed the eclusier to await our entry to the lock, only to find out that the lock is closed on Sundays. Being another beautiful day, we decided to take a circular walk from Ecluse 1 around the basin to Ecluse 2 and beyond. It turned out to be longer than we’d expected, but it was very nice to explore the area a little.
Preparing to leave ecluse 1 in the morning, we spotted a familiar barge passing by in the opposite direction – Cool Swan – who we last saw in Flandria a few years ago. Both entry and exit to/from ecluses 1 and 2 were very smooth this time round, and we made good time to Antoing where we went straight to the fuel barge to source a new gas cylinder (26.50 euros) and to top-up fuel (1.68/litre (464.16 euros)). From there we returned to the little harbour area and made ourselves at home before popping over to Aldi to spend even more money that day.
With great trepidation, the following morning (6th June) we crossed the border into France at Pont de Mortagne and made excellent progress all day, ending up at a public quay at Pont de l’Abbatoir, Waiverchain on the Escaut. (Unfortunately as we travelled Casper became unwell with a very poorly stomach – possibly caused by his habit of scavenging and combined with the very, very hot weather that has set in – so he/we had to suffer his discomfort and anguish, spending quite a bit of an otherwise pleasant journey on clean-up duty.)
There was no real improvement for Casper on our next day’s travel, but he was more settled so we decided to just keep him quiet with little food and lots of fluids. Continuing on, we passed our first ecluse onto the Canal du Nord, with the eclusier advising us that the canal would be closed for a few hours due to divers searching for a body in the water! Mooring up we took the waiting time to do a little boat maintenance, and then headed off hoping we would be ok to continue further. As it turned out, the closure was downgraded to a ‘slow down when passing’ notice, and as we approached the area we could actually see the divers with a body at the side of the canal – grim!
Journeying on, we passed a couple more ecluses before mooring at a small parking area at Sains les Marquien, still on the Canal du Nord, which was pretty peaceful once the ecluses had closed down at 6.30pm.
We were ready to leave fairly early the next day, but at the first ecluse we encountered, we had to wait for a double length commercial ship to pass before we could carry on … there was no way we’d have wanted to argue with that big beast.
At around midday we approached the Tunnel de Ruyaulcourt (aka Tunnel du Nord) a 4350 metre long tunnel which runs between the Dunkirk-Scheldt canal and the Oise side canal, which is managed by red/green traffic lights and which were happily in our favour as we got closer.
The journey through took us around 30 minutes, and it was good to see the ‘light at the end of the tunnel’.
Having left the tunnel behind us, we found a nice mooring at the edge of a bassin de virement (turning basin for large ships) – we had to jiggle round a bit as it was quite weedy in places but finally we found the perfect spot for our stopover, which we shared with a few fisherman during the early evening.
In the morning, from the bassin we set off for the next waypoint at Bethancourt sur Sommes, taking the opportunity after exiting a nearby lock to top up with water (and giving the boat a quick wash). The mooring was alongside a large dusty concrete carparking area, where there were lots of fishermen, a few cars driving in and out as well as a lorry pulling up to park for the night. There was also a lovely little fishing reserve very close by, ideal for walking the dogs and to get a little shade from the sweltering heat
After a good night’s rest, we set off again on another very hot sunny morning, travelling for about four hours to Noyon along the L’Oise river.
Our mooring this night was on another dusty quay next to an old factory, good enough for the night and quite quiet, and we made a hot, uncomfortable walk into the nearby town to re-stock supplies, which was as much as we could cope with in the heat.
In the morning we made a quick visit to a local carboot before taking our leave and moving on to Campaiegne, where we meet up with Janos and Rachel on Czarvargo and moored in front of them. There was quite some strain on the ropes from passing commercial traffic, and we opened directly onto a cycle path, but otherwise it wasn’t too bad a mooring.
Having settled Shensi down, we spent an enjoyable afternoon and evening on Czarvargo, arranging with Janos and Rachel to visit a local chateau with them the next day. Nicki and I wandered round the town centre in the morning, and the four of us walked up to the chateau in the afternoon and spent an interesting couple of hours looking at the interior. (It was too hot to walk around the gardens.).
Leaving the chateau we called into a local bar for a couple of drinks before heading back for dinner together on Shensi. When we reached the mooring we found Paul and Diane (Beatrice of Hull) moored in front of us, so invited them along too, and it turned into another very pleasant evening.
Two nights in one place and we were ready to move on, so we left our friends behind and set off to the first lock (where once again we were able to top up with water) – it was another beautiful sunny day and today’s four hour journey was very relaxed and pleasant.
At this point we decided to look out for somewhere to stay for the night, and happily found a lovely grassy bank just in sight of a large lock. This proved to be an excellent spot, very, very quiet with no roads or cycleways, just a path trodden down in the grass at the top of the bank, and a little further on a nice grassy area for the dogs with easy access into the water for them.
Yet again, in glorious weather we headed off along the Oise river, through the nearby lock and onto Creil just a couple of hours away. Although the moorings weren’t too many and what we did find seemed a little tired, we did come across a space not too far from the town. It got quite busy and noisy late afternoon with schoolchildren pouring out from coaches, but it turned out that there was a school a few hundred metres away and once they had all dispersed it was actually quite nice there for one night.
We made our way further along the river the next day, spending the morning cruising towards our planned mooring on the Quay de Persan/Beaumont sur Oise, where divers were making practice dives very close by. The mooring was along a pontoon, and Czavargo arrived a little later, mooring up just ahead of us.
