Monday 11th October 2010 Pierrefitte to Molinet. 11.2 kms 2 locks.

This is a narrowboat - really!

Another example of bad English

Grey and overcast until late afternoon. Mike went for bread to the UGA superette and the miserable woman in the shop, who was washing down the counter with a bowl of dirty water, pointed to a “Health and Hygiene” notice on the bread basket informing customers that they must not handle the bread as he had just helped himself and put a loaf in our bread bag. He had to respond with “Is the notice there for only you to handle the bread?” He didn’t want her to touch the bread with hands that had been in that filthy water. He told her that he hadn’t seen the notice. We set off at 9.20 a.m. DB Maya from Jersey was moored to the towpath at the edge of the village. A young man in a van was at lock, 3 Odde (2.66m) which was empty with one gate open so I got off and went up the steps with my locking rope to drop down to Mike. On the lock side there were adverts for both grocery stores in Pierrefitte so I took a photo to show what bad English UGA had written. The lad said he would be working the next lock for us. 3.2 kms to lock 2 Talenne (2.51m). Again it was ready with one gate open. This time I stepped off on a wooden landing below the lock and went up with my rope. Our lock keeper asked where we were stopping. Told him Molinet and we’d be there a couple of days if the quay was empty, if not we’d go on above the three locks on the Roanne canal to Croix Rouge.

Just enough room for us on the quay at Molinet

5kms to the quay so I made a cuppa. Pleasant cruising, nothing else moving but us. No one on the quay so we winded to have the side doors on the outside. Sulaskar went past 35 minutes after we tied up. Lunch. Mike said the quay was ideal to do work he wanted to do on the car so I put the laptop on to find the nearest Citröen car parts dealer (we got blue! 3G!) and found it was at Paray. I gave Mike a hand to get the bike off the roof. He went to collect the car and I cleaned the rubber tyre marks off the roof then potted up some new plants. I hadn’t quite finished when Mike returned. Helped put the moped on the roof and finished potting up the shrubs and bulbs. Mike wanted to find a Citröen dealer to get the part to repair the car so we went to Paray-le-Monial. Took a turn too early off the N79 and went through the middle of the town. The dealer’s was by Intermarché. Mike ordered the part and had to pay 190€ for it and 10€ +TVA for the search to find it! Should be here on Wednesday. Back via the N79 (we should have taken our new map with us as we dropped off the fast road not far from Molinet – we could have gone that way!) and back home. An empty péniche called An-Ju went past heading uphill. Mike lit the coal fire as the evening was getting chilly.