Free at Last

We're happy to report that "plans" can sometimes come to fruition, at least as long as they're short-term in nature. We were able to cast off from T.S.N.I. Marine in Toul on Tuesday morning, May 26--albeit with a brief delay at the first lock--and head downstream on the Moselle.

Lon's expression perfectly captures our relief at finally being on the move.

We had decided over the preceding weekend that we were too intrigued by what we had seen of the Marne au Rhin Est Canal during our brief road trip to pass up the opportunity to cruise on it. Because of our later than expected start to the season we felt that going the entire length of the canal to Strasbourg was a bit too far to cruise, but that Saverne would be manageable. The decision comes with some risk, however. Maintenance work will be taking place on the Moselle Canal/River locks from June 8-18, which will shut down navigation between the Marne au Rhin Est Canal and Toul (which is on the Marne au Rhin Ouest Canal). As the cruise to Saverne is a there-and-back endeavor, these closures mean that the earliest that we will be able to get back to Toul is June 19.  From Toul, our intent is to head west on the Marne au Rhin Ouest Canal and beyond to northwest France, Belgium, and the Netherlands. The dry winter and spring have already had an impact on water depths in various French canals. The Marne au Rhin Ouest has been prone to closures in past cruising seasons due to lack of water, and we are hoping that we will get through that canal before any such closures are announced. The "safest" decision would probably have been to forego cruising the Marne au Rhin Est Canal and simply start going west from Toul last week, but we felt the risk of a near-term closure of the Marne au Rhin Ouest was low. Time will tell if we calculated that risk appropriately.

We arrived in Saverne on Monday, June 1, after 7 straight days of cruising. We don't usually like to cruise so many days in a row, but the fair weather that we'd been blessed with since the 26th was predicted to turn stormy on June 2, and we decided we'd rather be moored in Saverne during bad weather than somewhere in the hinterlands.  Our cruising days ranged from 4 to 6 hours long. The first day was spent on familiar territory on the Moselle and the Marne au Rhin Est Canal as far as Nancy. During the next few days we passed some industrial small towns to the est of Nancy, but otherwise the landscape was primarily agricultural. 

We had a decent ratio of locks to distance travelled on most days, and the landscape between small 
villages was primarily agricultural--crops, not animals. We were really happy with the waterways:
little to no weed, good water depth for the most part, and locks that functioned very reliably.

Top: One of two salt manufactories we passed.
Lower: Part of the huge Solvay chemical factory complex in
Dombasle-sur-Meurthe.

For the most part our days consisted of early departures to try to "beat the heat" in the unseasonably warm weather, and we would typically moor for the day around noon or 1 p.m. We usually try to use our afternoons for sightseeing, but on these days it was too hot to do much walking around. We did one visit by bicycle to an interesting historical site on May 27. We'd stopped for the day at a quay in the small village of Sommerviller. Just a few kilometers back the way we'd come was the industrial town of Saint-Nicolas-de-Port, with an amazing basilica built between 1481 and 1560. We could see the basilica from the water as we were cruising and knew that it was worth a visit.

Left: Our first views of the Basilica of Saint-Nicolas-de-Port as we cruised east of Nancy.
Upper right: Getting a closer, albeit still from the canal.
Lower: A town view of the Basilica as we approached on our bicycles.

The current basilica was built to replace a sanctuary that housed a finger, said to be from St. Nicolas (patron saint of mariners) and brought back from the Holy Land by the Knights of Lorraine to what was then the village of Port. The presence of that particular relic turned the town into a significant pilgrimage site in its earlier years. The basilica suffered substantial damage in the Thirty Years' War of the 1600's, and again, by an accidental "friendly fire" bombing in WWII.

Various pillars in the basilica have some beautiful frescoes that were completed in the
1510-1520 timeframe.

One of the chapels of the basilica was closed off for "investigative reasons."
It looked like an act of vandalism--perhaps a fire--had occurred.

After our visit to the Basilica a small disaster struck--the LCD display unit on my electric bike would not work. Thankfully, the bike could be manually pedaled back to the boat--not necessarily easy, but possible--but all attempts to get it back to full functioning were unsuccessful. This had the immediate impact of preventing us from doing any sightseeing that required going further afield from our mooring spots.

A lovely little rural mooring adjacent to a campsite and the village of Parroy

Upper: Our May 30 approach--by water--to the deep lock at Rechicourt-le-Chateau that we'd visited via rental car the week before. This lock took us up to the summit level of the canal.
Lower left: Lon watches the "guillotine gate" lower behind us after we entered the lock chamber.
Lower right: our view from inside the lock chamber.

The Rechicourt lock was followed by twenty-five kilometers of lock-free cruising. We encountered a few shallow spots in the lock summit and more hire boat traffic the further east we went. The latter was not surprising, as there are several hire boat centers in the mid and eastern sections of the Marne au Rhin Est Canal. We ended our day at Niderviller, positioned to be first in line to start a run the next morning through the Niderviller Tunnel (475 meters long) and the Arzviller Tunnel (2306 meters long). 

Top: Preparing to enter the Niderviller Tunnel.
Bottom left: Staying "within the lines" for 2306 meters (1.4 miles) was a bit strenuous,
so I gave Lon a break from driving after we left the tunnel.
Bottom right: There were at least 4 other boats behind us as we cruised through the tunnels.

Next stop, the Arzviller Inclined Plane boat lift. We were lucky to get there as early in the day as we did, because it enabled us to make the descent before the tourist boat started its daily schedule of rides. CARIB was able to fit in the mobile tank with a small cruiser, but we were much too long to share the space with the tourist boat. Having to wait through multiple down and up cycles of the lift for a cycle without the tourist boat would have made for a very long day.

In the tank and starting our journey downhill.

The counterweights move up as we move down.

At the bottom of the hill and waiting for the gate on the tank to lift so we can leave.

The gate from the tank is almost up.

After adding the Arzviller Inclined Plane to our collection of "memorable nautical lifts and experiences," we moored in the basin below the lift for a quick lunch before continuing our cruise to our destination for the day, the Alsatian village of Lutzelbourg. We were now in the heart of the northern Vosges mountains and the scenery along the canal was stunning.

Cliffs overlook the canal on our departure from the basin below the Inclined Plane.

 

On our approach to Lutzelbourg we could see the ruins of the 12th century
Lutzelbourg Chateau. Because of weather concerns we only stayed one night in the
village, so our climb to the castle will have to wait for our return trip west.

Lutzelbourg had an amazing amount of mooring space.

Central Lutzelbourg is tightly packed.

While on our walk through the village the afternoon of the 31st, we stopped for a cold drink at a small outdoor cafe. One of the other patrons, a native of the area, was happy for the chance to practice her English with us. One thing led to another, and we ultimately invited "Carmen" to join us the next day on our cruise to the city of Saverne.

We didn't have a great distance to travel--only 10 kilometers (6 miles)--but that 10 km included 9 locks, so it was a bit more physically demanding than some cruising days. 

Carmen and Lon. 

The landscape between Lutzelbourg and Saverne was like this the entire way.

Leaving the last lock of the day behind as we enter Saverne and approach the port.

After post-cruise docktails on CARIB, Carmen treated us
to ice cream cones at the port and then bid us farewell.

We are looking forward to our weeklong stay in Saverne and hope to do some things that we didn't have time for during our recent road trip here. We're also hoping to source a new LCD display unit for my bike. It's really a disadvantage to not be able to do those little exploratory side trips that can be so much fun.

The 17th Time's the Charm

After weeks of asking a variety of insurance brokers--in both Europe and North America--to find insurance for our barge, we finally had success last week with our 17th application. On May 13 we spoke to a Dutch boat broker that we knew through the Barge Association and asked him for ideas on what we might try. We applied on May14 to a Dutch insurance broker that he recommended, and from whom we received an insurance quote on May 18. The quote was reviewed, signed, and returned by us within an hour. We spent the remainder of this past week on tenterhooks waiting for a policy to be issued and hoping there wouldn't be any unwelcome surprises to scuttle the deal. Not wanting to be left hanging through yet another holiday weekend (Pentecost Sunday and Whit Monday), Lon telephoned the insurance broker's office for a situational update early Friday afternoon. Just after 4 p.m. on Friday we received the best news ever--an email with insurance policy documents attached.  We're now gearing up to start cruising next week. 

Our insurance saga has been, to quote the Beatles, a "long and winding road." It's too much to describe in writing at the moment, but the experience definitely contained some elements of the absurd that will make for a good story over a glass of wine.

While waiting for something to "break", we tried to keep busy and distract ourselves from the anxiety of waiting. 

We attended a choral/orchestral concert in the Toul Cathedral.

We had a "bon voyage" lunch with Australian boaters Joan and
Paul on the day before they departed the Toul marina for
their summer cruise.

The main event, though, was to get off of the boat for two days this week, rent a car, and do some exploring. We decided to head to areas east of Nancy, in the vicinity of the Marne au Rhin Est Canal. That particular canal was in our proposed cruising itinerary for the summer, but our reasoning was that, if the insurance search dragged out much longer, we simply wouldn't have time to cruise those waters and still get to Rotterdam by season's end. So, better to see a bit of it now then to miss out on all of it. We only made plans for a 2-day trip because if the insurance were to come through in the next few days, we would prefer to be back on CARIB and getting ready to cruise. It was all about trying to find that "sweet spot."

We picked up the car near the Nancy railway station late morning on Wednesday, May 20. Our first stop, a mere 30 minutes later, was the town of Luneville. Like the much larger Nancy, Luneville was important historically with respect to the Duchy of Lorraine, a former monarchy independent of France (although located in mainland France). Up until the early 1700's, the ducal court was in Nancy, but when the French invaded Lorraine, Duke Leopold moved the court to the Chateau de Luneville. He enlarged the castle along the lines of Versailles, and it became known as the "Versailles of Lorraine." It remained the residence of the Dukes of Lorraine until the duchy became part of France in 1766.

The front of the chateau complex. It has been in a rebuilding phase for a couple of decades,
following a fire in 2003.
 

The "backyard" view of the chateau. Behind us stretched expansive French gardens.

The view from the central front portico.

The chateau currently houses a museum, but we didn't have the time to see what that was all about. We stopped for lunch, in part to get out of the grey and cool weather, then did a quick walk through what was a very quiet town on that Wednesday.

The Church of Saint James, a baroque building 
completed in 1747. Sadly, it was locked and we were
unable to see its famous "hidden" organ.

But, onward! Our destination for the day was to be the town of Saverne. In between Luneville and there, we made a few very quick stops.

The small canal side village of Lagarde had a lovely little port on the canal, but was also the location of two WWI cemeteries, one French and one German.

The German cemetery was not large, but was still well maintained after over 100 years.

It was our first viewing of the Marne au Rhin Canal Est east of Nancy, and we were impressed by how well-maintained the locks seemed, and the clarity of the weed-free water.

We don't recall the name of this town that we drove through, but the Alsacian storks had taken possession of the tops of five power poles along the road to build their nests. Most of the nests
had little ones. A baby boom in the making.

Our final stop before Saverne was the canal lock at Rechicourt-le-Chateau. The Great Lock, opened in 1965, is considered to be the highest Freycinet gauge lock in France. It replaced a series of 6 locks and has a drop of approximately 50 feet.

Most of the drop is hidden behind the colorful artwork.

Saverne occupies a beautiful site amidst the Vosges mountains. By this time, we had passed from Lorraine into Alsace. The German history here is obvious in the architecture and in the prevalence of the German language and culinary influences. For our one night here, we stayed in a lovely apartment in the center of town. Before our bow thruster repair delays last year kept us in Toul, we had thought that Saverne might have been our site for parking CARIB for the winter. From what we saw in our few hours here we were sorry that we hadn't been able to do that. The town had more energy than we've found in Toul and would have been a lovely place to stay.

The Alsace Rooster.

The Maison Katz, from 1605, is one of the oldest houses in town. It was built by Henri Katz.
The facade is Renaissance German. The modern artwork at right makes sense when one 
considers that "katz" means "cat" in German.

Standing in the marina of Saverne, and looking at the front of the Rohan Palace across the 
water. The Rohan Palace is a former episcopal palace built in the 18th century. If Luneville Chateau was the "Versailles of Lorraine", then this building is the "Versailles of Alsace." We didn't have enough time to visit the museum it contains.

We stopped for an afternoon drink by the canal and its view of the main street of Saverne.

The Church of Notre-Dame of the Nativity. The tower, 
a Romanesque 12th century construction, is one of the
oldest parts of the building.

The port of Saverne. The hire boat base was gearing up for the summer season.

As Saverne is surrounded by a number of castle ruins on the hilltops, we took advantage of having the car to explore some of them on our Thursday return to Toul. A mere 10-minute drive from the heart of Saverne were the ruins of the Haut-Barr Castle, built atop rocks over 1500 feet above the plain. The ruins of the medieval castle date to the 12th century; the most "recent" ruins date to the late 1500's.

The rocks are the first things one sees when arriving
at the castle parking lot. Ruins are visible at various spots
atop the impressive rock piles. It reminded us of
Meteora in Greece, although on a much smaller scale.

The "Devil's Bridge" connects the ruins on two of the rock summits.

We're glad that we can still climb stairs. I wasn't especially fond of the climb, as I could see
through the stairs down to the ground. Lon's climb shows the staircase from a different perspective.

The view from the top.

Looking down, the arch of the entryway and the medieval chapel just beyond. The building at
left, with the half-timbering, is of newer construction and contains a restaurant where we 
enjoyed an amazing Alsatian flammekueche (like a very thin crust pizza).

Inside the interior of the castle grounds.

A short walk away from Castle Haut-Barr were a couple of additional historic sites. The first was a reconstruction of the Chappe Telegraph Tower. This was the site of one of approximately 50 communication towers--the first aerial telegraphy system--that linked Paris and Strasbourg from 1798 to 1852.

A bit further along were the ruins of two medieval castles, the Grand Geroldseck and the Petit Geroldseck. The Grand Geroldseck is one of the oldest castles in the northern Vosges. We were there on a day when volunteers of an association, whose purpose is to maintain the ruins, were working on the site. We were fortunate enough to be able to talk at some length to one of the volunteers and he explained how work was being done and the limits of what they could do.

A view of the cellars of the Grand Geroldseck.

Repairing the wall and making sure that plant material, which would be destructive to the structure,
 is kept at bay.

The multi-story castle keep in the background.

The entrance to the castle grounds.

Our wonderful "guide" and Lon share a laugh. The volunteer was a retired computer science
professional. Significant works have been ongoing on the site since 2014, and the volunteers can only repair things to the extent of what is actually known about the original structure. Since there are many holes in their knowledge, some things will never be able to be fixed. 

The Petit (small) Geroldseck was another few hundred meters from the larger castle. Not much remains today, and there appeared to be no active work being done on that structure.

Our final stop before Toul was at the Saint-Louis-Arviller inclined plane on the canal. A structure from the 1960's, it replaced a series of 17 locks in a section of the canal that traversed the Vosges mountains.  The mechanism consists of a moving tank that holds the boat and is counterbalanced by weights to which it is connected by cables. A boat drives in at the top, moves down the slope of the hill at a 41-degree angle, and drives out at the bottom of the hill. Going up is simply the reverse process. It's interesting for the boaters that get to use it, and it's a local tourist attraction.

The view of the inclined plane from the lower level as the bucket is descending with two boats.

Left: the bucket, into which a boat would drive. Upper Right: the view of the inclined
tracks from above with the basin below. Lower Right: The bucket approaching the basin level.

The wonderful news on Friday followed our return on Thursday. Even though we will be getting a later-than-planned start to our cruising, we believe that we can include the Marne au Rhin Canal Est in our cruising itinerary. We saw a lot to like about the canal and would be sorry to miss the opportunity to take the boat on its waters. Therefore, at the moment, we intend to leave Toul on Tuesday and cruise the Marne au Rhin Canal Est as far as Saverne, stay there for up to a week (to give us time for sightseeing in the area), and then turn around to head to the west and north.