May 2024 – part 1 (1st to 15th)
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1st May saw us moored alongside a children’s play area in a quiet little spot, (with the added bonus of a tap and free water). Nicki was on foot rest today, so I took the dogs for a good, long walk by the canal returning later to see firemen behind the boat performing what appeared yo be hose management. Luckily Nicki had spotted them earlier so she was able to get a photograph.
After our obligatory coffee and toast break, I took advantage of the free water and hosed down the boat to clean her up a little. As ever, this was merely a precursor to a pretty heavy storm later on in the evening – thunder, rain, lightning, the works – although there was a brief window when the dogs were rushed out for their final wee-break of the day.
Waking to a very briefly drier day, we set off at 9.15 and headed towards Tonnerre some four hours away, but the weather quickly deteriorated for the rest of the day. However, today’s real excitement came not too long after our start, when we encountered two machines in the water, dredging and removing the masses of weeds.
Reaching our destination of Tonnerre just as the eclusiers’ lunch break began, once again we were abandoned for an hour in the final ecluse of our day with our mooring in sight just beyond the exit gates! I took the opportunity to make a dash up to a very nearby Aldi and buy some of our heavier supplies, pop along to check out the mooring area, arriving back at Shensi just as the eclusier returned to open up the gates. A couple of minutes later and we were cruising into the basin to choose our mooring spot for the next couple of nights.
After securing ourselves along the canalside, we popped into the Capitanerie/restobar for a snack and coffee before heading off to stock up at a nearby Aldi. Then a nice walk in dry, warmer weather, followed by dinner, TV and bed. We decided to spend our full day in Tonnerre sightseeing, and the town held a few delights for us, but particularly the Fosse Dionne which was pretty exceptional – apparently it is a seemingly bottomless spring-fed pit that gushes 311 litres of water every second. The Romans used it as a source of drinking water; and later the French enclosed it in a circular stone rim with an amphitheatre and then in the 17th century it became an elaborate public wash house.
Interestingly, more recently, in 1974 two professional divers descended into the passages of the pit to try and locate its source. Unfortunately they both died. Then in 1996, the town hired another diver to attempt the descent. He also died. In October 2020, Tonnarre’s mayor hired professional diver, Pierre-Éric Deseigne, who descended more than 70 meters, venturing 370 metres from the cavity’s entrance but he was still unable to locate the spring’s source. But happily he survived.
After an exhausting few hours strolling through Tonnerre we made our way back to Shensi for a relaxing evening on board.
In the morning we were ready to move off for a 10 am meet at the first ecluse (95Y Tonnerre), starting off in heavy rain which sadly lasted the rest of the day. Still, with the able assistance of our eclusiers we passed through the following three ecluses (94Y Arcot, 93Y Arthe, 92Y St Martin) and into ecluse 91Y Commissey where we were left during the eclusier’s lunch hour. Stopping at Ecluse 94Y Arcot, we noticed a strange metal box on the side of the lock, and on asking the eclusier about it, we were told that it was an éclusophone – a musical instrument made up to include a crank, a drawbar and a resonance box, which produces bizarre, melodious sounds, designed to echo the sound of water, nature and the lock.
one of five dotted along the canal
To date there are a total of five instruments positioned along the canal – the Éclusophone, the Fonocanal, the Points d’ouie, the Ornithoratoires and the Entre 2eaux, so we still have a few more to look out for.
Further along the canal at ecluse 91Y, I briefly left the boat to check out a nearby weir on the Armançon river which oddly seemed to have a built-in salmon run alongside it, although I could find no information about it.
Our final ecluse (90Y Tanley) of today’s three and a half hour day opened a short distance ahead of our intended mooring, and we managed to squeeze onto the end of the quay in front of a hotel barge, in the lovely pouring rain.
The attraction of Tanley for us was the chance to visit its historic Châteaux de Tanley, a castle whose construction began at the beginning of the XVIth century on the foundations of an old fortress. The great castle was added 1550 -1568, and small castle completed 1610. Since the early 1700s the chateau has belonged to the same family and is currently occupied by the Count of La Chauvinière, the son of Ambassador Edouard de La Chauvinière and Marguerite de Tanlay.
and the small castle to the left
The castle occupies three sides of a quadrilateral surrounded by a moat. The wings are closed by two round towers with a domed roof topped by a lantern. At the rear of the main building, are two high towers covered with a dome and two lanterns superimposed on top of each.
The Nymphaeum feeds the 530m long canal. (Nymphaeum (from the Greek word, numphaion) was first used to describe a sanctuary dedicated to nymphs. As nymphs were considered deities of water, the term was soon used to designate monumental public fountains.)
Moving on after two nights in this quiet location, we travelled through yet another five sets of locks ending our day at Lézinnes on a grassy quay just beyond the ecluse.
On our wanderings close to the ecluse we came across an ‘ancient lime/chalk factory’ that we believe was finally abandoned and subsequently destroyed around 2018, so that just the skeleton of the massive works seem to have survived.
Continuing on, we negotiated another four locks today to finally moor at Ancy-le-Franc, where we were planning a visit to yet another chateau. This was a nice long stretch of grassy bank with just a few fishermen for company. We popped along to pick up a few extra supplies at a large supermarket about 20 minutes walk away only to find a sign saying it was closed for that particular day (8th May) … maybe that should have been a warning to us, but we agreed that I would head over again the following day (Nicki’s foot was aching after so much walking today) and do the honours. Our first full day here, we headed out to tour the castle with its more than 20 rooms and 123 acres of parks and gardens – although obviously we didn’t manage to walk round all of the grounds! Returning ti the barge, I grabbed the shopping trolley and on a very hot, sunny afternoon I set off to the supermarket … and arrived hot and uncomfortable to find it was still not open. And at this point I found out that the two days of our visit were both Bank Holidays, hence the closure of all the shops in the village. I think for the future we probably need to check not only our routes and potential moorings, but also if any visits coincide with public holidays.
The following are various shots of the lovely Château in Ancy-le-Franc (luckily this was open despite tge bank holiday), showing some of its stunning interior and the well tended grounds, and where we came across an unexpected metal sculpture of a horse. It seemed that 2024 is also given over to a Playmobil exhibition “From Fine Arts to Playmo’Art” with several of its rooms given over to scenes of art history, including some recognisable characters such as Vermeer or Da Vinci in giant Playmobil, a reconstruction of a scene from Molière and other operas, Gothic art, impressionist art, modern art, sculpture, architecture and paintings from Antiquity to the present day, and all areas were shown as a giant Playmobil, as a painting or as a diorama.
The 4 metre high, 2.5 tonnes sculpture was created by the sculptor, Laurentiu Ivan, to welcome visitors to the gardens, and is “composed entirely of recycled materials; toothed wheels, connecting rods, rakes, spades, forks, wheels, plates in all directions juxtaposed and interpreting animal beauty, its strength, grace and power. Anatomy, muscles and harmonious curves, leaving mechanics and machines forgotten”. It really is an incredible piece of work!
Moving on again after two comfortable nights in Ancy-le-Franc, we continued through another five ecluses to reach the small town of Ravières where we settled in for two nights, 10th to 12th May. Located in the ‘country of stone’, Ravières was mainly known for its white stone quarries which played a large part in the local economy (and it is possible to take a self-guided tour of a white stone quarry still in operation today, although we decided not to). In the town, there are remains of a 16th century castle, and still some old houses from the 16th , 17th and 18th centuries, as well as the remains of destroyed defensive fortifications – the town’s walls were mostly destroyed in 1591. There is also a wash house (lavoir) with seven openings, dating from the first half of the 19th century, which we could see as we cruised into the town.
Another nice fact about Ravières is that the mooring offered free water and electricity, always a bonus.
Leaving this pleasant mooring and town on 12th May we cruised for a massive five hours today, passing seven locks before reaching and passing through Buffon, finding a spot to moor just on the edge of the town, no bollards or rings, just good old fashioned stakes hammered into the grass verge. So far our moorings have been very comfortable and quiet, and this one was no exception.
Buffon was mentioned as well worth a visit because of The Grand Forge de Buffon, an iron production complex built over four years spanning 1768 to 1792 and designed by George-Louis Leclerc, the Compte de Buffon, and a renowned naturalist of the time. It incorporated a crusher, concentrator, smelter and forge, and was the first time that the three processes of furnace, refinery and foundry had been brought together in one place, with the forge master, workers and their families housed on the property, and food produced on the land. There was even stabling for 40 oxen which were used at the Forge. The complex was years ahead of its time and was “an ingredient marking the beginnings of the Industrial Revolution in France”.
We spent a few hours wandering round the complex, which was full of interesting sights and facts, with lots of information available in English which is always great. One of those facts was that whilst the forge was built on the banks of the river Armançon, when work began in 1768 the local villagers were enlisted to dig out and divert a portion of the Armançon river to construct a mill feed and pond. The water was then dammed and controlled to power the water mills which in turn powered the blast furnaces. The blast furnace was in operation in 1769 and the rest of the buildings were completed in 1772. However, following a massive flood in 1866 the forge was transformed into a cement factory until 1923, when a fire destroyed part of the industrial buildings.
Flood markings on a wall of the forge indicate many of the extreme flood levels over the centuries, and even as recently as April 2024, the forge awoke in the water that continued to rise until the night time when it began stagnating and the following morning began a very slow decline . The floors of three workshops of the forge were muddy and gullied, and it took several days of work to make it even passable.
Our intention was to leave Buffon on 14th May, but we had not informed the eclusiers of this so we’re planning on just heading towards our first ecluse of the day and hang around until someone from VNF turned up, but luckily while Nicki was out with the dogs that morning she saw three eclusiers about to pass by so flagged them down to see if they could accommodate us at some point- the response was “do you want to go now”!!! So we quickly got ourselves together and set off again, this time for Montbard, and hopefully a local vet for Pip whose rabies vaccination was shortly due for renewal.
Arriving in Montbard we easily found a mooring right outside the VNF office, not difficult as we were the only boat there! Settled in and connected to services, we got ready to walk across the road, less than 50 metres away, and into the local veterinary clinic.
Everything was going smoothly … until we realised that the pet passports, a necessary prequisite needed for the vaccination, were still in our car. The car which was now in The Netherlands awaiting our return in October. Whoops. Fortunately we did have a previous (out of date) UK health certificate for her which provided all the relevant information a vet eould need so we thought we would at least check if there was something that could be done. Turning up in the clinic, there was a vet who was able to see us without an appointment, and who spoke good English, which helped explain our predicament, and within thirty minutes we had a replacement passport and a freshly vaccinated dog. The only additional cost over and above the rabies jab was10€ for the replacement passport.
