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| Don't normally have to get off the boat to do this! Some joker had moved it. Below lock 13 Asfeld. |
Cold overnight, sunny spells and
grey clouds, no rain until late afternoon but the wind was still chilly. Set
off at 9.25 a.m. after Mike had moved the car from the edge of the quay to by
the hedge. We could hear warblers in the trees. Not far from the moorings the
towpath (which was about a metre above the water level) was closed off where a
large section was missing; there were more chunks missing further on due to
bank erosion. Mike spotted two men with clipboards among the trees and we
wondered what sort of survey they were doing. It was only about 1 km to the
first lock, 13 Asfeld. I had to get off the boat and walk back to the turn
pole, (one that is suspended from a wire going from a post on either bank) as
someone had pulled it right up on to the towpath. Usually they’re at least two
to three metres from the bank. Luckily it worked OK.
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| Leaving lock 13 Asfeld |
A jogger went past and
there were more men with clipboards, too far away to ask them what they were doing.
Might be a bird survey, it was surely never a boat survey. We’ve only seen one
other boat moving! The lock house had curtains at the windows but had that
looked un-lived-in look. No car, no plants, no woodpiles. 7.9 kms to the next.
Above lock 13 about a 2 kms section of the non-towpath side had been flayed –
trees and bushes smashed into shreds, plants
all decimated – just a few cowslips and primroses growing amid the loose soil.
Prefer the wild look to moonscape with twigs. The towpath had almost been
washed away over the next few kilometres.
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| Silos at Chateau-Porcien |
The turn pole below lock 12 Pargny
was halfway across the canal where it should be, and it worked so the lock
emptied and we went up. Two cars were parked by the lock and the people from
them walked off up the path into the woods as we entered the chamber. The lock
house this time was lived in, it had cars parked outside and rows of woodpiles.
7.7 kms to the next. The non-towpath side above the lock was ablaze with
cowslips and violets where the VNF had kept the grass well shorn. The towpath
all the way to Château Porcien was in good state too. The silo quay was empty
and beyond the VNF house there was a workshop with three VNF vans and an old
workboat (but no tug to pull it). The canal became wilder again and more like a
river on the long stretch to Nanteuil lock 11.
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| Leaving lock 11 Nanteuil |
A pair of cormorants were
fishing in the wider section of canal and kept flying away in front of us,
landing, diving and catching more fish, then flying on again until we the canal
became narrower. Turned the pole and Nanteuil lock emptied. The walls, ladders
and control bars were very muddy. Again, the house was lived in and a new lock
cabin had been built on the opposite side to the house. I made sandwiches for
lunch on the 2.15 kms pound to the last lock of the day, 10 Acy-Romance. The
resident VNF man went from his car to the house and wished us both bonjour and
left us to it. Above the lock we passed a fisherman, a cyclist and a walker on
the 2.5 kms into Rethel.
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| Fishermen's camp on towpath abv Nanteuil |
Nearer the town two young lads were throwing stones –
but along the path by the footbridge rather than into the canal – they’d gone
by the time we reached the bridge, we don’t think they even saw us. Under the
new bridge taking the busy N51 up the hill and around the town, past two empty
silo quays and moored on the quay before the port-de-plaisance at 2.15 p.m. A
British registered tjalk (Dutch barge, called Claes Campaen) had been left,
moored on the quay, and there were two boats in the port, a French yacht from
Givet and a Dutch cruiser called Marrkesh, both of which looked like they’d
been left there for some time. We tied up and went to look in the port to see
how much they charge nowadays.
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| Lock 10 Acy-Romance. C des Ardennes |
Hmm. No water and no electric, all looked
vandalised, but none of the boats had been touched, ropes fenders, anchors,
etc, all seemed OK. Gave Mike a hand to run the bike off the roof down a plank
and he went to retrieve the car from Asfeld. When he came back he said there
was an empty péniche waiting to load on the silo quay at Asfeld, so we were pleased
to find that there is still some commercial activity on the canal des Ardennes.
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