Tesserae 2014

Monday 22nd September
It’s sunny again and yesterday’s bad weather seems to have been a one off. As we cannot cruise the German waterways we turned Tesserae around and headed south. Our first stop was 15 minutes along the canal at the local supermarket, as there few shops along canal de la Sarre. We returned to Wittring and enjoyed the afternoon sun; the restaurant reopens tomorrow.

Autumn colours

Tuesday 23rd September.
Thick fog in the morning prevented leaving until 10 am and even then we needed to switch on the navigation and streaming lights. The sun was out by the time we reached Sarrable where we moored at the new town mooring which has free electrics and water. The electrics are only 4 amps and we had to keep resetting the shore fuse while using the washing machine. A German couple moored here showed us a crafty solution for low ampage, D needs to do a little wiring job so we don’t have the same problem in the future.

New mooring at Sarrable

Thursday 25th September.
Yesterday we stayed at Sarrable and did some end of summer jobs, took off the mosquito nets and shade cloth, touched up some scratches and repainted the dog box. Today we continued south. There are very few boats on this section of the canal but just before lunch we spot three hire boats moored on a blind bend before a bridge – not the best place to moor. We sounded our horn and approached cautiously. Just as well as another hire boat appeared round the corner. We went into reverse and waited while this fourth boat moored up with its mates, it took a while! They were a group of elderly Americans, travelling in convoy. We explained how to use a spring to get your boat alongside the bank and why there was a sound your horn sign on blind bends like this one. We jokingly asked if there were any more of them and yes, there was one more to arrive but one of their party had thoughtfully walked back and told it to wait before the bridge until we were through. We continued without passing any another boats and moored in a rural spot near Mittersheim. There is a restaurant next to the mooring but we discover it is not open Thursday evening. We are not having much luck with restaurants on this canal.

Rural mooring near Mittersheim

Friday 26th September.
We left early, this morning to go back up the 13 locks towards the summit of the canal. All the locks were ready for us and we made good time, mooring up after the penultimate lock before 1pm. It would have been a different matter if the American group had been travelling this section today!
Le canal de la Sarre is picturesque and tranquil with ever changing scenery of lakes, forests and valleys. There are many pleasant moorings and no weed in the canal. The trees are spectacular, apples and pears groaning with fruit, wonderful beech and oak trees and towards the summit a variety of pines. Unfortunately the many ash trees are dead or diseased as on the Marne au Rhin and will have to be felled.
Of course the very best thing about canal de la Sarre is that all the locks worked all the time!!!

Decorated lock keepers house

Mooring at top of the Sarre

Saturday 27th September.
We left the Canal de la Sarre and re-entered the canal de la Marne au Rhin heading east. We travelled to Niderviller, which is the last place we could turn around before the broken boatlift at Arzviller. In the afternoon we start to meet hire boats zigzagging along on there first day out. We moored up at Xouaxange, a village with an unpronounceable name but a restaurant that was open, hooray! We had jolly evening with French and Madagascan food as the wife of the proprietor is from Madagascar.

Mooring at Xouaxange

Sunday 28th September
We left Xouaxange heading west and hoping the dozen hire boats that went past us last evening were well ahead of us. There are no locks for 14km but the first one we come to is the Ecluse de Rechicourt. This is 15.4m deep and is the deepest lock on the French canal system. Two boats were waiting to go down and we had to wait an hour before it is our turn to descend. We finally make it through at 12.30pm only to join a queue of boats at the next lock. It is not working, all the other boats are hire boats and the occupants are not sure what to do. We called the VNF. Exiting the lock we pick up a piece wood in the propeller and have to stop to clear it, the prop seems okay. We are joined in the next lock by a hire boat full of French senior citizens who we had passed earlier when they were moored up having a rather liquid lunch. They seemed to be in a hurry keeping close to our stern and we were glad to loose them a couple of locks later were we joined a German family who were travelling more sedately

We stopped at the new at moorings at Xures where water and electrics are paid for by credit card. The French senior citizens arrived later on and try to get some water but are unable to work out the system (possibly the effect of their lunch?) D. sorted them out and is now there new best friend. We will let them go ahead of us in the morning so we do have them up our rear again.

Ecluse de Rechicourt

Mooring at Xures

Monday 29th September.
The French seniors left at 8.40 and we went 30 min later to let them get well ahead. No problems at the first lock, a 20 min queue at the second and double red lights at the 3rd lock where a maintenance crew are working on the gates and sluices. We have a 50 min wait; fortunately we have only planned a short trip today. Our destination is Einville au Jard and when we arrive the French seniors are there, enjoying another lunch. They greeted us warmly and they were all very jolly when they left a couple of hours later.
We have laundry to wash so need shore electrics. Here electricity is paid for with jetons (4hrs per jeton) purchased at the resturant. We buy a jeton but when we go to plug in we realise the socket is already working and we do not need to use the jeton. A committee of 8 or 10 people turned up in the afternoon and seemed discussing the moorings they spent 20 minutes at each electricity point. When asked we told them it was very good system. After 4 hours the electricity went of so we used our jeton for another 4 hours to get the batteries well charged. A couple of hours later a maintenance man arrived (he must be on overtime) he has to switch our supply off but says he will set it for 4 hours when he reconnects us. Ten hours electricity for 2.50 Euros, not bad we think.

Waiting for the lock maintenance team

Tuesday 30th September
The shore electric are still on this morning!
Tonight we stop at lock 25. It is a quiet mooring, on one side of the canal is farm land but walk for 5 minutes on the other side and you are in a busy suburb of Nancy. The automatic lock is not working and is being manned by a lock keeper and we tell him we want to leave at 9am tomorrow.

Mooring at lock 25

Wednesday 1st October
Thick fog this morning and no keeper at the lock at 9am; we wait for it to clear a bit before contacting the lock keeper. We travel a short distance towards Nancy and moor up next to a supermarket that is a convenient place to top up with diesel. We spotted this mooring when we were leaving Nancy last month and noticed a group of winos camped next to it. As we approached this morning we see a shadow in the mist. L says “its too big for a wino, it’s a camel”. Surely she is hallucinating? But no, there is a camel and lamas and miniature ponies, a circus has set up in the supermarket car park. After filling the fuel tank we move on to the centre of Nancy and moor up at the same spot we had left 3 weeks before. It turned into a hot sunny afternoon and we walked up to Place Stanislas, which had been transformed, into a garden dedicated to the memory of WW1.

Camel in the mist

WW1 garden in Place Stanislas

Thursday 2nd October
We to the Excelsior Brasserie again for lunch today and afterwards looked around the shops. Well D was looking, L was buying!

Friday 3rd October
We left Nancy this morning. The first obstacle is a lift bridge. We have been told our automatic controller operates it but we need to get very close. We try to activate it with the controller but nothing happens. We ask the skipper of the tourist boat that is moored next to the bridge how to operate it. He says there is no system “this is France”. We phone the VNF, no help there. We moor up and try pressing all the buttons on a control panel by the bridge but it does not look as if it is working. We wait and 15 minutes later the bridge opens; it’s magic! We leave the canal Marne au Rhin East, enter the Moselle and mooring for the night a Pompey. Pompey’s only claim to fame is it is where the Eiffel tower was built and then shipped down in sections to Paris. A couple of commercial barges go past in the evening, one is very big we have not seen any that size since we left R. Seine two years ago.

Mooring at Pompey

Saturday 4th October
We left our mooring at 9am and contact the lock keeper by VHF. We are told to wait, as there is another boat approaching and we can enter the lock behind it. In fact there are 2 vessels, a large commercial and a private barge about the same size as us. We expect progress will be slow behind the commercial but despite it being fully laden it travels much faster than us, the other private barge is quite old and struggles to keep up. The commercial enters locks very slowly so we can catch it up and by the time we are in the lock the old barge is in sight of the lock. We think the commercial must be fed up with waiting for us but it is only for 3 locks. We make it up to Toul in much less time than we expected but we need to top up the fuel tank again.