Timing is Everything

Call it a coincidence, call it luck, call it a Guardian Angel at work, the fact is that today, on the day we left the Canal des Vosges and entered into the Moselle River, the VNF issued the following advisory:

It states that, due to the insufficiency of water resources on the Canal des Vosges, there is a significant risk that on July 2--one week from today--the canal will be closed to navigation between Lock 24 on the part of the canal that flows toward the Saone River and Lock 14 on the portion of the canal that flows toward the Moselle River. In the blog post of June 13, I discussed our concerns about water depth and our fears about possible canal closures on the Vosges. It seems our concerns were well-founded and, to use a phrase that is probably all too American, we have "dodged a bullet." 

A week should give most boaters (and we didn't see many on the Vosges) time to get to whatever end of the canal they want to be at, but it's not a great time to have to be thinking about long cruising days and lots of locks. A significant heat wave is approaching, and temperatures are forecast to be 90-degrees F. or above from Saturday through next Wednesday. 

We left Charmes around 8 a.m. on Sunday, June 22, because the daytime high was forecast to be in the early 90's F. (low 30's C.) and we were hoping to use the cool of the day to get to our mooring before the heat really hit. As we were moving away from the quay, our bow thruster stopped working. Bow thruster issues seem to be an annual occurrence for us--we just can't seem to get through a boating season without losing the bow thruster at least once. Frustration aside, it has made Lon really accomplished when it comes to maneuvering the boat without a thruster. He didn't want to do any mechanical work at the campsite in Charmes, so we just "carried on carrying on." Thirteen kilometers and 7 locks later, we pulled into our mooring near the village of Roville-devant-Bayon.

A perfect mooring for a hot day: just upstream of
Lock 38, we were under trees and in shade for
most of the day.

Preliminary troubleshooting of the bow thruster wasn't too informative. It wasn't a repeat of an earlier problem with a loose link on the drive chain (which was easily fixed). The motor noise when engaged does not sound healthy, but whether it's a motor issue or a prop issue or something else could not be determined. Lon wanted to be able to snorkel for a quick look into the bow thruster tunnel, but the water wasn't nearly clear enough to make that an option.

We did not get off to an auspicious start on June 23. A cold front had come through overnight, which was great for the air temperature, but it was also accompanied by rather stiff winds. This made it difficult to get CARIB away from the quay. Having finally managed that, Lock 38 decided to malfunction. It filled, but the gates would not open to let us in. Back to the quay we went while I telephoned the vnf and we waited for an employee to show up for the repair. After a delay of approximately an hour, and a slightly "exciting" entry into the lock because of wind gusts, we were through Lock 38 and into a nice and shady passage to Lock 39--which also decided to malfunction. The lock filled and the gates started to open--yay!--and then one of the gates decided it didn't want to open all the way. Cue the double red lights and another call to vnf. 

The recalcitrant gate at Lock 39. It took several tries before the vnf employee could get
that left side door to open all the way.

The delay at Lock 39 was only about 15 minutes. The subsequent lock pound was lovely and green, and Lock 40 worked without any problems. By this point, however, we decided that it might be a good idea to stop for the day, earlier than intended, to regroup and not have to fight strong winds at every lock--especially given that we didn't have a working bow thruster. We gratefully pulled into a decent "middle of nowhere" mooring about a kilometer downstream of Lock 40.

There are a lot of lakes left over from old gravel pits in the area. It made
for scenic cruising.

The water at our mooring was relatively clean, and the sun was shining brightly, so Lon had hopes that if he snorkeled, he might be able to see into the bow thruster tunnel and get some insight into the problem. He encountered a lot of crustacean growth in the tube, and couldn't see much, so he spent some time scraping what growth he could from the tunnel and from the keel cooling tubes on the hull. Given our earlier run-ins with fishermen, he also spent a bit of time with the prop checking for fishing line.

Upper: Lon in the water. It was relatively clear, but the sun wasn't 
in the right spot to illuminate the bow thruster tunnel adequately.
Lower: fishing line removed from the prop. Unfortunately, there is still
more to be removed, but it was a little too murky to work safely with 
a sharp knife.

In mid-afternoon we took a short bike ride to the nearby village of Neuviller-sur-Moselle. It was very quiet, as most of these villages have been. It did have a castle, which was the primary reason it seemed worth cycling to. An 11th century castle had been replaced by a 16th century castle, which had also been dismantled. The current property contains what remains of a mid-18th century castle, as well as outbuildings and fortifications from the 15th and 16th centuries. It is private property and was not open for visits.

Some of the older outbuildings and fortifications.

Upper: the upper story and roof of the 18th C. chateau
were all that we could see from the street.
Lower: the oldest buildings need a lot of restoration.

The Saint-Pierre Church in Neuviller is one of the oldest we've encountered along the canal.
Its various parts range in age from the 12th to the 19th centuries, and it was originally
a monastery church. The square bell tower is Romanesque, and there are a number
of Gothic and Renaissance windows and decorative elements.

The wind died down substantially by June 24, and the 3-hour cruise to a park-like quay near the village of Richardmenil--not far from the city of Nancy--was blissfully shady and pleasant. The water in the canal pounds that we've passed through has been deep compared to our earlier days on the Canal des Vosges, so we've not had any problems with potential grounding. The landscape is quite hilly and substantially wooded. Very pleasant.

The Moselle River crosses under an aqueduct during our approach
to Lock 43 near Flavigny-sur-Moselle.

Richardmenil is up the hill to the left; we're parked on the canal. We were later joined
by two other boats, the first boat traffic we'd seen since we left Charmes. This allowed us to
have "docktails" with Dutch boaters Veem (phonetic spelling) and Helen. They're just starting
to head south on the Canal des Vosges; we hope they hear about the potential closures in time
to make appropriate decisions about their cruising season.

Upper: the view toward the "sandpit" lakes and the canal from the churchyard.
Lower: view toward the village from canalside.

Our biggest disappointment about Richardmenil was that there was supposed to be a hamburger food truck in the center of town during the evening. We were looking forward to a meal away from the boat. Sadly, the truck was a no-show. Our fallback was to purchase a pizza from the vending machine across the street. This was the second time we've purchased pizza that way, and like the first time, the food was surprisingly good.

June 25: another day, another early departure to try to "beat the heat." We left Richardmenil just after 8 a.m. We had to call the vnf to remotely activate Lock 46--that was the first time our telecommande couldn't activate the lock sequence--then continued to the last lock of the Canal des Vosges before entering the Moselle River.

Top: approaching Lock 47.
Below: getting ready to leaving the Canal
des Vosges and enter the Moselle River.

Now that we are on a river, the bridges are higher, so we can raise our bimini to shade us from the sun. There is some commercial traffic in this section of water as well, so the locks are bigger, we can cruise at a faster speed, and we may encounter commercial-size boats. 

There was a working harbor just prior to the first big lock.

We passed through one of the large locks today. They can 
accommodate boats up to 110 meters long and 12 meters
wide. We were alone during our descent and were dwarfed
by the size of the lock. The drop was just over 7 meters
(about 23 feet).

It was a nice change of pace to cruise without a worry for depth or stopping every kilometer for a lock. 

The Sapeur-Pompier first responders were out on the river doing training exercises.

We stopped early again today due to the heat. At this point we are about 10 kilometers from the city of Toul, our destination for tomorrow. It's not an especially large town, but it is a historic one. We had thought to spend three nights at a marina there, but may stretch things out longer if the heat wave comes as expected.

Our visitor to CARIB over lunchtime.