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| Male mazarine blue in between the showers at Foulain |
We had a circular walk on Sunday that brought us back through Foulain village and Karen was really excited when we came to a fresh egg dispenser. We’re used to seeing dispensing machines in villages that provide a selection of baguettes. Pizza dispensers are also popular with a range of choices that can be delivered hot or cold. So far, we haven’t been able to bring ourselves to use them because we don’t really feel it’s supporting the local economy let alone keeping the local boulangerie in business. Fruit and vegetable dispensers are slightly different as they are the equivalent of the local farm shop. The egg dispenser was the first one we’ve ever seen, and it also purported to contain locally sourced eggs so Karen couldn’t resist buying a box. They were good value too at €1,20 for half a dozen.
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| Egg dispensing |
As we passed the booking office at the long-closed railway station we had a peak through the windows. Considering a couple of windows were ajar we expected to see the place had been trashed inside. We were amazed to see nothing untoward had happened and there were even a couple of old passenger rickshaws:
Heading back to the boat across our green Karen pointed out that,
but for our residence permits, we would have to be travelling back to the UK
this week. Since Brexit, the 90/180-day
rule has applied to UK citizens as the UK is now classed as a third-country as
far as the EU is concerned. The
90/180-rule works on a rolling basis, so after 90 days in a Schengen country,
if you return to the UK for say 14 days, you will only be allowed to stay for
14 days if you return to a Schengen country before having to go back to the UK yet
again.
One way around this is to apply for long term visas but when
we left England in February the post-Brexit visa application process hadn’t
been agreed let alone implemented! The
procedure has now been introduced and some boaters we know are applying for long
term visas valid for anything up to 12 months.
Looking at the process it does seem to be expensive as well as time
consuming with at least two trips to a passport centre for each application. On top of that the procedure can only be
carried out in the country of origin and there are no guarantees of
course. These are the reasons we applied
for residency, it does mean we are subject to things like French income tax,
are in the French healthcare system and need to be in France for at least 183
days a year, but it certainly feels worth it for simplicity and peace of mind. I probably mentioned before that Buddy has an
EU passport so isn’t bound by the post Brexit regulations and associated costs on
every crossing.
It’s been another week of mixed weather and the end of spring certainly feels a long way away at the moment; however, there are signs around:
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| Unfurling leaves of the Hart’s tongue fern… |
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| …and most cowslips have gone to seed |
As we planned to move on to Rolampont on Thursday I set off to move the car halfway on Wednesday and then walk back. All was well when I suddenly realised that I’d driven the whole way. It was only 15 kilometres so I could have walked back from there, but it would have taken an extra 1 ½ hours. Again, this wasn’t the issue, it was the heavy rain that was forecast in an hour or so. I turned around and drove to Marnay-sur-Marne, my original destination. It was a very pleasant walk back with only a few showers. I was lucky enough to see a freshly emerged mazarine blue as shown at the top of this entry. These blues became extinct in the UK at the end of the 19th century but are fairly widespread across mainland Europe.
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| An underside shot of the male mazarine blue I saw |
While on butterflies, Karen saw our first marbled white of the year during her Wednesday run. These are not usually on the wing until June so maybe summer is just around the corner after all.
Although it’s not a butterfly, the lady orchid is also a
widespread species in Europe and can be fairly common in some countries
although there are only a handful of sites where it can be found in the
UK. I came across a few during my walk
back and Karen spotted one on a run a couple of days previously. Using your imagination each petal shows the outline of a lady with chubby legs or bloomers as Karen, who's a bit more sensitive, says. Now if we could find a man orchid the reason for the name is even more obvious - thinner legs and a long appendage between them!
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| Lady orchid |
I followed the towpath on the way back but had a little detour when I saw a disused railway line. These are often good locations for butterfly spotting which probably really confuses Buddy as he can’t have a clue what I’m doing bobbing down all the time. There wasn’t much about, but I did come across a couple of tunnels which weren’t blocked off. It’s rare to find disused tunnels in the UK that still have access, but this wasn’t the first time I’d come across open portals here.
I passed a couple of sets of dolphins and realised that I
used the term the other day without really explaining what
they are if you're not a boater. They are upright mooring
columns placed about 30 metres apart with access ladders. They are only meant for overnight mooring and,
because they are so far apart, only commercial sized craft can use them.
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| A pair of dolphins (and Buddy) |
Occasionally single dolphins are seen, and they have a bollard either side at a distance of about 15 metres. We could probably moor using one bollard with the front or back of the boat against the dolphin, but we would have to be desperate, e.g. if there were no more moorings to be found before the locks close for the evening.
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| Single dolphin and bollard |
Most of the locks on this canal don't have lock landings where bollards could be used for an overnight mooring, although we've noticed that most of the locks do make provision for commercials to moor to vertical rails. These are placed 40-50 metres apart and painted in bright colours so they are easily spotted.
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| One of a pair of commercial rails |
In places the canal ran very close to the river Marne which
is quite a bit lower on this stretch as can be seen here.
When I got back home, the mooring at Foulain looked idyllic as all sign of rain seemed to have dissipated.
In the end the rain stayed away all day, so really I should have bitten the bullet and left the car at Rolampont after all. During the afternoon an elderly couple with two young children turned up in a small camper that was crammed full of fishing gear. They spent the rest of the day happily sitting by the cut and fishing.
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| Our last evening at Foulain |
It was a strange evening as it was the first day that the
curfew had been put back to 9pm so people were out walking and fishing until
much later than we’ve been used to for the last three months. The couple in the camper obviously stayed
overnight as they were packing up when we got up on Thursday morning.
Thursday was our moving day and we set off after our bridge
lesson and had lunch on the go. All the
locks we had to go through were just over 3.5 metres deep so presented no
problems as far as getting lines up and onto the bollards. In fact, we had no problems at all, and all
the locks operated perfectly so we didn’t have to call out VNF as we seem to do
every couple of weeks or so.
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| Entering our first lock of the day |
We set out in blue skies but by the time we’d moored up it had clouded over but at least it was still warm. In many places the canal was so close to, and raised some way above, the river Marne that the banks were reinforced by stone walls:
Nearly all the leaves are out on the trees now with the ash
and the oak being the last to appear.
The tall light-coloured trees on the left in the picture above are oak
trees. I’ve not mentioned walnut trees
yet this year and that’s because we haven’t come across any for a long time
which is really disappointing as we normally see so many. Last year we wanted to pickle the young fruit
which are ready around June time but missed out on the harvest as we popped
back to the UK for a month. This year it
doesn’t look like we’re even going to find any trees let alone pickle any. Once we’re the other side of the summit and
in the Côte d’Or heading down to the Saône we may be rewarded.
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| After cruising for a couple of hours the clouds rolled in and we lost the sun |
Even though we are getting higher, the countryside has become more open which feels quite different to the steep sided valley we’ve been in. We turned away from the river at one point along a two kilometre straight more reminiscent of the early parts of the canal 120 kilometres to the north. As we went along the straight we could see the fortified hill town of Langres dead ahead. With a three-kilometre-long walls that can be walked around we are really looking forward to exploring there in a week or so.
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| The long straight |
Signs that we were nearly in Burgundy were also appearing such as the cattle being predominantly Charolais.
When we arrived at Rolampont we could see a boat was already
at the mooring. It turned out to be a
French couple who live in Chaumont and keep their boat at the port. We’d met them briefly
when we were moored there a couple of weeks ago. There was just enough room for us to moor
behind them and the guy, who had quite a fishing set up going on, came to greet
us. He was really excited about telling
us that there was free water and electricity available. I’d known the water was on when I checked on
a scouting trip but wasn’t so worried about whether the electricity worked.
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| Moored in a grey Rolampont with a neighbour! |
As power was available, we thought we’d connect up; at least we would save gas by getting the electric kettle out! It also meant we could use the washing machine without having to run the engine. The bornes had domestic sockets rather than the robust waterproof types normally encountered. The trouble was I couldn’t find the converter I’d put together for such an occasion. It’s amazing how things can go missing on a narrowboat, but we couldn’t locate it anywhere. In the end I called up our son Steve, our electrical consultant, who suggested plugging a France/UK travel adapter into the borne and then making up a UK plug to waterproof connector on a short lead. This was something I’d thought of doing but thought we’d left the travel adapters in the UK. Karen soon pointed out that they were in the bottom of our suitcase in the wardrobe so it didn't take long before all was resolved.
We’re now looking forward to a weekend exploring Rolampont
and the surrounding area.
On Thursday we cruised nine miles up seven locks.
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