Gray (plant happy Karen)

Saturday in Gray at 5.30am (French time)

Stuart & Vicky decided to stay in Gray for the weekend and leave on Monday morning, so with three British couples moored next to each other it was a weekend of socialising without the added complexity of different languages.  Variety was added by alternating whose boat we sat outside each evening.  The full sun of the last couple of weeks had disappeared and at least it kept dry all weekend, but the week ahead doesn’t look so good with rain forecast at some point on most days.  At least, if it does rain then Karen won’t have to worry about the plants dying while we’re in Barcelona.  As it happened, Dave & Helen were staying for another week and offered to water the plants if need be.  They needed to stay around Gray as they would be getting their second vaccinations next weekend.

On Saturday we walked down the river and then cut away from it to the village of Gray-la-Ville.  It had a nice wide main street but not a lot else.  A square at one end looked promising as it was called Place de la Fontaine and sure enough, we could see the tell-tale sign of a lavoir ahead.

Place de la Fontaine in Gray-la-Ville

Of course, there was also a church; this one was rebuilt in the 18^th century and had a Burgundian roof to its odd-looking bell tower.

Église Saint-Maurice with village war memorial

Looking at old photographs of the village we found out why the bell tower looked so strange; it had lost its spire.  Further investigation unearthed that a localised tornado on June 19^th 2019 destroyed the spire.

Prior to losing its spire

The mairie was a rather uninspiring looking building and it didn’t have the standard display of flowers that most seem to have, thus making it look even less attractive.

Mairie and village postbox

Entering up the boat log later I realised that we’ve now been through more than 1,000 locks in France, but we completely missed the occasion which was on 5^th June on the Saône side of the Canal entre Champagne et Bourgogne.  It was lock number 32, called Fontenelle after the village of the same name.

One of our outings on Sunday took us over the river into Arc-lès-Gray where one of the sights was an interesting lavoir.  As regular readers know, I do try and keep lavoir mentions to a minimum but this one was quite unusual.  Not only did it have an elaborate animal drinking trough (abreuvoir) but its situation was quite odd as some modern flats had been built close to and almost all around it.

The abreuvoir in front of the lavoir at Arc-lès-Gray

Stuart & Vicky left on Monday morning and boats seemed to be coming and going all day.  At one point a sailing boat appeared, and they were clearly having difficulty mooring as the depth is only one metre by the quay and being a sailing boat, they needed a much greater depth.  I gestured that they could moor alongside us which they duly did and then came and introduced themselves.

They were a lovely young couple; Oskar was a South African German and Rosa was German although they both had impeccable English.  They were on their way from Berlin to the Med for the summer and we spent time exchanging boating and life stories.  We all thought it was a shame they were on a mission as it would have been fun watching the England-Germany game together on Tuesday.  Mind you, if both teams continued playing like they have been then it wouldn’t have been much fun.  Obviously, the noise from around the town won’t be anything like the France-Switzerland game - one minute we could hear riverside bars erupting in cheers, followed by similar from most of the hire boats which were occupied by Swiss holidaymakers.

April moored alongside (their blog sailing-april.de is worth dipping into)

Before they went, Oskar & Rosa left a bottle of wine on our back deck as a thank you for letting them moor up against us.  They ignored our protestations and insisted we keep it and we were reminded of a bunch of Germans we met at Mantoche.  We’d lent them our water hose and in return gave us a bottle of wine, again unnecessarily, but most welcome at the same time of course.

Not much has changed on the butterfly front over the last few days but I did see my first confirmed sighting of a southern small white.  These are very similar to the small white found in the UK but have slightly different black markings on their forewings.  The much-used phrase, ‘cabbage white’ covers the small white and large white butterflies in the UK, both of which lay eggs on brassicas.  The southern small white is not a garden pest as they lay eggs on candytuft and it does not occur in the UK.  It is slowly extending its range northwards and has purportedly been seen as far north as Calais so it may not be long before it can be seen in the UK.

The warm weather brings plenty of lizards out to sun themselves on warm walls and wooden fences.  They have been so skittish that I still haven’t been able to identify any of the species seen other than this common wall lizard spotted on Monday.

While chatting with Dave & Helen on Monday morning it transpired that they really enjoy card games and have dipped in an out of learning to play bridge a few times.  They were very excited that we play bridge as they haven’t met any other bridge playing boaters so invited us around to their boat for an enjoyable evening of social playing on Monday.

I spent Tuesday afternoon lavoir hunting in local villages and found many, most of which had drinking troughs outside like the one in Arc-lès-Gray from Sunday.  I’m mentioning lavoirs yet again because this blog will serve to jog my memories in years to come and as I had such a delightful afternoon this will help with that particular memory, so please indulge me.  We are currently in the Haute-Saône (70) département which apparently has more lavoirs than any other – over 2,500 were built there in the 19^th century alone, so it wasn’t surprising I found at least one in every village I visited.

Most were of the style we’ve started to come across in Haute-Saône, square stone pillars supporting semi-circular arches or horizontal lintels.  As I mentioned, many of them had abreuvoirs and other similar places where livestock could drink.  A couple of them were a good way outside their village which really brought home to me what a hard life it must have been for the women carrying their laundry.  The only reason I found those two was that one was on a Rue du Lavoir and the other on a Rue de la Fontaine.  We always look for these or similar street names when on a lavoir hunt.

Living quarters above this one in Autrey-lès-Gray

Very clear water and some of the smoothest washing stones at Auvet-et-la-Chapelotte

At Bouhans there was a very old lady in the garden of the house opposite.  She went indoors before I could get her attention, but I bet she would’ve remembered when the wash house was in use.  The pool by the lavoir is called an égayoir which is a term from Lorraine meaning a pond dug to bathe horses. The bottom of this égayoir was paved and the lavoir was constructed in 1850.

Égayoir at Bouhans lavoir

This view of the lavoir shows the horse wash on the left, then the lavoir, then an animal drinking trough and finally the well with a raised wall around it, which fed all three.

The one at Chargey-lès-Gray had an impluvium style roof.  These roofs slope inwards so rainwater drains into the wash basin and was the first we’ve come across for a while.

Impluvium style roof at Chargey-lès-Gray

The same lavoir seemed to be used for the storage of Christmas items

One of the lavoirs at Essertenne-et-Cercey was reached by walking through a field behind the church.  The track led down to a stream where the wash house had the date 1865 inscribed on a central stone in the rear wall together with four sets of initials.

Nice location in a field

A smaller lavoir was found at the other end of the village and was also built over a stream and was just as far away from housing as the first.

The other lavoir at Essertenne-et-Cercey

The one at Feurg was quite a way from the village too; the closest houses can be seen in this photo of it.

Another remote location, this one at Feurg was restored in 2017

One of the two wash houses at Nantilly was also used as a storeroom like the one at Chargey-lès-Gray.  This one had a real eclectic mix including three stills and a dummy!

Outside…

…and inside

The other one at Nantilly had notices from the mairie forbidding entry because of the state of repair of the stonework.  There were loose stones and dropping arches all around, so it did look particularly unsafe but still managed to look quite grand.

Complete with a fancy abreuvoir at the front

The final one, at Poyans, had an abreuvoir running the full length along the outside.

All in all, a successful trip on Tuesday and I was also privileged to look around some pretty little villages.  The other big thing about Tuesday was the evening’s football match with Germany – such a shame Oskar and Rosa hadn’t stayed neighbours for another night 😉