Male & female common blues by the Australian national memorial |
We fancied having a few days staying put so decided to remain in Corbie for the weekend. As we were on moorings supplied by the département it meant we could stay a maximum of three days which would take us to Monday afternoon. If we found we wanted to stay longer then we would drop down the lock in town and tie up below, where there was a handy 20-metre mooring with four bollards.
Saturday morning at Corbie |
Passing the mairie at Fouilloy on our way up the hill |
The Australian national memorial |
Only one household was allowed up the memorial tower at a time
but as it’s so quiet this year there was no one else there and the three of us were able to go straight up. Because of its strategic position at the crest
of a hill the tower was used by the French as a look out post during WWII. Consequently, it was damaged by attacking
German gunfire and the scars can still be seen today. These were the views from
the top:
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We were glad we’d visited the site but did wonder if we'd have found it so moving and poignant if it’d been packed with visitors. Quite a large area around the cemetery was left to wildflowers and walking around it we saw dozens of butterflies. Most abundant were freshly emerged common blues. I took the picture of the male at the top of this entry and Karen the female.
In the afternoon we had a quick trip to a supermarket and also popped into the tourist office in Corbie to see if they had any other interesting walks. What we saw of the town was quite inviting but as it was getting rather warm we thought we'd leave the sightseeing until the morning and spend the rest of the day back at the boat.
Corbie abbey from the supermarket car park (the only picture we took in town on Saturday) |
Other than walking tours around the town itself, the
tourist office could only suggest one trail to follow out of town. As it was a nine-kilometre circular walk we
thought it would be perfect for a morning walk on Sunday and we'd do the town trail another time. I took the leaflet and was pleased to see
there were quite a few numbered stopping points and accompanying text but didn’t
pay too much attention to it.
Before we started the walk, I emptied our two jerry cans of
diesel into the fuel tank. We then popped
to a local fuel station to refill them.
At €1.15 a litre it was the cheapest we’ve seen this year; last year it
was between €1.40 and €1.50 a litre. When
we got back I filled the tank to the brim with one and a half cans worth but
didn’t refill them again as we wanted to have our walk before the heat of the
day.
The walk took us through woods between some lakes and then through the village of Hamelet before branching out across the fields towards a second village, Vaire-sous-Corbie. It wasn’t until we reached the first numbered point on the leaflet that we realised that the French texts accompanying the numbers were the directions to follow and not points of interest as we’d expected.
Following a track towards Vaire-sous-Corbie |
In the corner of a field of mangelwurzels was a patch of a plant we’d never seen before. When Karen investigated it later, she found it was jimson weed, an invasive and hallucinogenic plant native to the southern United States. Apparently, it’s very popular with the youth of today over there but can have bad side effects.
Modern day peyote, the mescalin providing cactus? |
We did find our first dropped walnuts of the season, albeit only three. We have both been carrying a plastic bag in a pocket ready for the occasion, but it hardly seemed worth it for today’s harvest
The last few kilometres were back along the towpath where
we did pass a couple of points of interest that we found for ourselves. First, we saw a large house by the side of
one lake and later found that the lake and property belonged to the abbey in
Corbie. Staff lived in the house and
their main job was to breed and catch fish in the lake in order to feed the
inhabitants of the abbey. The second
point of interest (for us) was a kilometre stone, only the third we’ve seen on
this canal.
73km from the original eastern end of the canal at St Simon |
I know you could argue that our points of interest are not
much better than having none at all but at least it taught us to read the
information contained in a guide before setting out.
Well, that’s two days we’ve not moved but we have to
tomorrow otherwise we’ll be in breach of the three-day mooring limit. We’ve still got to pop into Corbie to do the
town trail but will probably move on before lunch.
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