Canal du Centre: St Berain-sur-Dheune - Fragnes (Or Wine Comes Before A Fall)

A Spring Has Sprung photo :)

We have now been travelling for a month, but as canal-time seems to operate on a slower level than real-time, it feels a lot longer since we pulled away from Auxerre.  Today is May Day and a national holiday in France, so everything is closed, including the canal – none of the locks are operating.  Thankfully the wonderful boulangerie at the port in Fragnes was open for a few hours this morning so we could treat ourselves to some croissants for breakfast instead of muesli – well, it is a holiday after all.  As with normally in the UK, poor weather has come with the holiday and I hope the boat behind got its lunchtime bar-b-que finished before the rain came on.  It was sunny ‘til they started cooking……..

It was raining when we left St-Berain-sur-Dheune last Wednesday and it continued for most of the day, but we only did a short hop to St Leger-sur-Dheune where we moored at the little port. 

A hotel boat turning on a wet day at St Leger-sur-Dheune

 A quick wander along the canal brought us to Le P’tit Kir restaurant which had been recommended and we hoped to have dinner that evening.  We hummed and hawed about going in to make a reservation or just leave it to chance, and having been plagued with unexpected restaurant closures since setting off, decided to go in and book.  “Ferme ce soir.” Was the reply – closed tonight……… We debated some more with my suggestion being that we just have a nice lunch, do the French thing, then have something light in the evening….. We did just that and what a good decision.  We had the Menu Midi, a delicious three course meal for 14 euros each.  As it was lunchtime, we just chose a small bottle (50cl) of wine as we didn’t want to sleep for the rest of the day, or have it turn into a session……..  Back on board, I went along to the Capitianerie to pay our mooring fees.  The mooring was a fairly rough, uneven piece of ground with bollards, power and a connection to the water mains under a manhole cover, so we thought it would be in line with the other ports and between 6-9 euros.  15 euros is what they wanted and when I presented a 20 euro note she said she didn’t have any change – they didn’t keep money in the office, but it was okay, I could come back later with the correct money.  As it rained the rest of the day, I didn’t head back until gone 6.30pm, expecting them to be there til 7pm, but they were gone, so I’d need to go back in the morning.  Meanwhile we had filled up with water which had given us the chance to try our new hose…..  The hose we had was a narrow-gauge one and at a few of the water points we’d used, the pressure was too much and kept blowing the hose out of the connectors.  It seemed a shame to waste good water pressure squeezing it through a narrow hose so we decided to invest in a fatter one.  The only problem was, it no longer fitted into the reel and the connection in the reel was factory made for the hose we bought with it so Mike had connected it with a jubilee clip holding it on.  It leaked badly but got the tank filled, but there was still work to be done on the connection and whilst there was the possibility it might not work, the old hose took up residence on the bedroom floor just in case.

By the time we’d faffed about with that Sally and Andy had arrived and asked us over for a drink after dinner, so we spent a pleasant evening with them and enjoyed seeing some of the puzzles they used to make.

In the morning I made my third attempt to pay at the port, this time taking a card to pay as we still didn’t have change.  There was no one in the office but I could hear someone cleaning the showerblock so went and asked to pay.  I had the receipt from the day before but the cleaner had no idea how to work the card machine and didn’t have change so suggested I went to a shop and got change.  Mike had cast off by this point and as he pulled in to pick me up, jumped off and gave the woman all the change we had; 5 euros 16 cents, and we left.

So far, no one has come after us for the rest………

It was another short journey to our next stop at Santenay where we’d stay a couple of nights and hopefully do some wine tasting.

Catherine Clark on the outskirts of St Leger

A nice still day.

Another hotel barge.

Moored at Santenay with The Puzzler

The view at Santenay - just lovely!

The mooring at Santenay is one of the prettiest and very quiet; surrounded by trees with beautiful views across the vines to the hills.  The sun was out and we decided to take the bikes down to the town for a look around.  It’s a really pretty little town and after a stop at the Tourist Information Office we visited Le Cave de Santenay to taste some local wine.  It was the usual case for us in Burgundy; we end up offending the locals by not liking the red but making up for it by gushing over the whites….. We bought a couple of bottles of the chardonnay from Guillaume and headed back to the boat where later on in the afternoon we were joined by The Puzzler.

The next day we had a nice lazy start and shortly after lunch Jake and Rachel on Catherine Clark arrived.  We chatted for a while at the little picnic spot on the mooring whilst Jake worked on a wooden model of an aeroplane then as we were all planning to visit the supermarket in the town, we headed off into the village together, only to find the supermarket was closed for another 45 minutes of the lunch hour.  We decided to have a walk further up into the town, and found ourselves outside the Chateau de Santenay and it didn’t take much debate to decide to go in for the tour and wine tasting there.  It didn’t start til 4pm so we wandered a bit more, found a bench to wait on and found out that the Catherine Clark is actually a Humber Keel built in 1924 and named after the builder’s mother – fantastic.

The pretty fountain in the square at Santenay

One of the caves at Santenay

Chateau de Santenay - see the traditional Burgundian coloured roof tiles.

My attempt at a panorama of vineyards at Santenay and Mike, Rachel and Jake

The tour of the Chateau was brilliant, probably one of the most interesting wine tours we’ve done – the cave is just great, and their different barrels for different domains was really quite complicated.  The guide spoke fluent English and was happy to answer all our questions and then pour us some wines to taste.   

 

These are only used for three weeks a year at harvest time, then cleaned out and left til the next year.

Same with these.  In the UK they'd be repurposed the rest of the year and seen to be a waste of money if left sitting.

Lots and lots of wine.....

Jollied up by this and with a couple of bottles in the bag we headed back to the butcher, boulangerie and supermarket for supplies.  Back at the boats we unloaded the shopping and were soon back outside chatting as it was a nice evening.  It was Mike who uttered the fateful words, “Shall we have a glass of wine….” And minutes later the six of us and the two dogs, Shannon and Trigger were sat at the picnic table with some wine and nibbles.

Darkness had fallen and we’d worked our way through two bottles of white and one and a half boxes (yes, BOXES!) of red when Mike (who doesn’t like dogs) decided to have a game of tig with Trigger.  Trigger is a Boston Terrier, one year old, who should really have the first ‘r’ taken out of his name as he is bouncy, trouncy, flouncy, pouncy, fun, fun, fun, fun, fun and even Mike couldn’t resist him.  Thing is, Mike’s not quite as nimble as T(r)igger.  Behind the picnic table was a steepish bank leading down to a trench of nettles and a barbed-wire fence keeping some horses in the next field secure.  T(r)igger went down the bank (nimbly) followed by Mike (not so nimbly).  Mike couldn’t get back up so Jake went to help.  Thankfully he wasn’t hurt, until the next morning when his hands were tingling and we could see he was covered in nettle stings.  His cap was missing, but a quick foray at the scene of the incident recovered it.  We felt very rough having indulged in so much wine and no dinner – why, why, why……

It all started off so well....

Jake facilitates a rescue of the rubber-legged man.

The other two boats were up and away as we lay in bed nursing our sore heads and our hangovers were only compounded when I realised that the packet of bacon that I had thought was full only had four slices in it.  I was relieved to find two eggs still available, so egg rolls with a bacon garnish were served, after which we started to feel more human.  We set off in the sun, still with a cool breeze present planning on stopping at Chagny for the night.  However, when we got there the port was pretty soulless and it was such a nice day we didn’t really want to stop yet, so we carried on, managing to pick up a couple of logs on the way as we’ve more or less finished the wood we bought in Auxerre and have had to have the fire back on this week.

We decided to stop at a little quai near the town of Rully which was lovely.  Mike got himself settled in to listen to York City playing on the radio again – an important match which, along with other results from elsewhere, would make or break them in terms of relegation.  They drew, which would have been enough, but someone somewhere else won their match meaning that York go down.  He was devastated.  While he licked his wounds I walked the 2-3km into Rully and discovered a very pretty town with lots of wine caves – shame that my stomach turned at the sight of them on that particular day……..  I found a small corner shop which had no bacon, but had some chipolatas that would do for breakfast the next morning.  As the day had got hotter, I snuck some ice cream lollies in the basket as well.  Back at the boat, hearing how nice the town was, Mike decided he’d like a look, so back we went.  I was shattered by the time we got back!

Rully is really pretty but it was hard to get photos to show it as it is.

Cute street in Rully

A small river, The Thalie, runs through the town.

A modern sculpture showing the wine making heritage of the town.

Lovely rural view for the evening

In the morning a strong wind greeted us and as I cooked our sausages a hotel barge went past us ahead down the small flight of 8 locks that would take us to Fragnes for the evening.  We relaxed and finished our breakfast as you don’t want to get stuck behind a hotel barge as they go reaaaaaalllllllllyyyyyyyyy slowly…….. But seeing another coming into the lock above us to come down, we quickly cast off and got under way.  The first lock was set against us so I did as the lock keeper had suggested the previous day and pressed the ‘emergency’ button to contact the central control and let them know we were there and wanting to go down.  The lady blared through the speaker from the other end to ask where we were going and soon the lock was resetting for us.  It should have been a lovely cruise as the countryside in this area is just stunning, really beautiful but it was so windy and whenever we had to hover for a lock to set or someone coming up we were getting blown about like mad.  At one lock, the keeper arrived and we had a chat and he reminded us that we need to enter and exit the locks in the centre, particularly when leaving as the sensor telling the lock we’ve gone is in the middle above us.  Since Andy had enlightened us with this, we had been careful to do so, but I think in some of the deeper locks, it’s just too high above us and doesn’t register.  This means it thinks we’re still there and doesn’t let the next lock know we’re on our way – I think.  We’ve just not been able to work out how these automated locks work and it’s been hit or miss whether they’ve been ready for us or not when en route.

 

Looking back up the canal you can see the Hotel Barge behind us waiting to come down our previous lock.

You can just see how strong the wind was, blowing our little Yorkshire flag at the front.

Pretty little ruin on the way to Fragnes

At the last lock til our mooring we’d had enough of the wind, it was getting stronger and we’d caught up on the hotel boat in front of us, despite leaving an hour after it passed at the top of the locks.  As it exited the lock we waited for the lock to reset for us but it didn’t and there was nothing coming up, so we had to buzz control again to get them to sort it……..

Along the way we had noticed a huge amount of dead fish in the water and it transpires that they are killed by propellers.  The hotel boats cause a huge churn and another boat that was behind the hotel boat behind us said they could see the fish trying to get away from the back of the hotel boat and not sucked into the propeller.

So we finally arrived at Fragnes which is a tidy little port with all facilities, including an outdoor table tennis table which we have made use of today with Andy and Sally.  We’ve caught up with them, Jake and Rachel and Jane and Billy on Lazybones as it’s a good place to spend the May Day holiday, and yesterday enjoyed coffee and cake with them all at Lazybones’.  Thankfully a quiet evening was the want of everyone as I still wasn’t in the mood for wine and we wanted to watch the last episode of Line of Duty.  What a brilliant programme that is, just fantastic.  Today has been very British in terms of bank holiday weather; we’ve had sun, a bit of wind, rain, thunder and some cracking hailstones round about mid-day.  But we managed out for our table tennis game and managed to get the leaky hose fixed with the help of a tool from the French gent in the boat behind us.

The port at Fragnes

Tomorrow is a big day for us as we complete our navigation of the Canal du Centre and head on to the River Saone.  Better go and get the anchor connected up……..