Are we there yet?

29/11/05 Our first full day in Avignon, it was time for a shower, the last time I had indulged in such a luxury had been 4 days before at Valence, boat showers had not been an option as the weather had been too cold, even with Sara cooking all day the temperature in Dreamcatcher never really rose above 8°C, and the last thing I wanted to do after spending all day helming in bitterly cold temperatures was strip off and get wet. What a distance we have come when the thought of a shower is considered a luxury. Despite the marina being washed away 2 years previously in the floods, the city council had not decided whether to replace it, which would appear to be an oversight, as Avignon is a fascinating place, the showers and laundry were still in service in the former cargo hold of a barge. The laundry had a fascinating stainless steel drum, which I was told was to take the radioactivity out of the water from the Rhone.
Avignon however is a fascinating city, with twisting streets, amazing architecture, little theatres and cinemas, a big multiplex cinema, a main street filled with all major high street shops and little boutiques selling anything from high fashion clothes and jewellery, second hand books stores and a shop selling first editions alongside shops catering for the students at it University, expensive good restaurants and kebab shops. It seemed to be a town for everyone, and due to its unique nature of being completely walled, it was very compact and contained, outside the walls is the train station, big hotels and larger stores, but I only ventured outside the walls when I was lost and couldn’t find my way back. As outside each of the many gates there was a map showing you where you were, enabling you to either plunge back into the town and to once more trying to find your way to the other side, or to walk round the outside of the walls back to Dreamcatcher. I was not the only person who got lost, and Australian family coming through found their way back by the simple expedient of keeping Venus on their right until they came out of a gate then walked round the outside. Most of our time at Avignon was spent just walking round the town looking at the different buildings, Phoebe found an amazing studded door, we visited the Popes Palace and climbed the staircase to the park above the Popes Palace which gave views across Avignon, and the Rhone to Villeneuve-les-Avignon. Despite being less than 400 meters from the famous pont Saint Benezet d’Avignon, we did not go onto the bridge. Instead we visited the Christmas market, took the children skating on a temporary outdoor ice rink set up in front of the market place, and Nick and I had a bash and trying to climb a climbing wall in aid of charity, I got all of 9 inches up, before I had to give up, whereas Nick got up to well above my head height before he decided he wanted to come down. And all the time we were trying to figure out where to go next.

We had started this adventure on the 8 September, with the initial goal of getting down to the Med, now we are at kilometre mark 242 on the Rhone, with Port Saint Louis and access to the Med at 321, 79 km from our first goal, with the river current that was easily only 1 day away. Where to next? Our masts were still at Le Havre and Stefan had said he could get them down to us within three weeks, Michael who had been in our company almost daily since Beaujolais Day in Macon on the 17 November, was going to be heading down to Sete when he left Avignon, although we were initially heading towards Port Saint Louis, we had been told that is equally possible to get our masts stepped in Sete. The children got on with Michael and were always excited to see him on his daily visits, even if those visits were only to give us his newspaper in order for us to discuss the weather forecast. Michael finally left Avignon on the morning of the 03 December, after initially planning to leave on the 01 December, he seemed sorry to be leaving our company, and we all felt a little bit sad as his little yellow boat pulled away from the quay side and turned downriver. The day of Michael and Nokaoi’s departure we woke to a mud coloured river, flowing visibly faster than before, which contained branches and other debris, was this the start of the floods, I hoped not as we had not put any diesel in since Chalon Sur Saonne. I checked with the harbourmaster who assured me that is was not the start of the flood. The next 3 days were spent putting over 100 litres into the tanks, it took this long due to buying it in 20 litre jerry cans, and fitting it round lunch hours, half days and Sundays. I need diesel not only to complete the journey but also to try and cut down on condensation in the tank, with its implications of contaminating the diesel.

During our period at Avignon, we were joined by 2 other boats that were passing through, first Sequel, heading towards Australia with Rob, Hanna and 9 month old Angus, and after they had left by a Dutch boat Linda with Arian, Niek and their daughters Maria and Nina. Both these boats had come through the canals together, and told stories of frozen canals, the ice of which was nearly an inch thick, which they had to smash with hammers each morning in order to break their boats out, and of branches being placed in front of lock gates overnight to prevent the ice freezing them shut, it made our ordeal seem like a mere inconvenience.

It was suggested that the best place to get our masts foot remade would be Sete, as I was bound to get fleeced at Port Saint Louis. So we decided to go have a look at Sete, which although it would involve a detour of nearly 100km, we would be going round to top of the Camargue National Park, and it looked like a good place to go. On the 5 December it was no longer branches floating down the river but small trees, and over night the river had risen by 3 inches, although the Harbour master assured me that we would need 2 weeks of rain before the floods and that he would be able to give us ample warning, it was time to move. Sara agreed with me, not due to worries about the state of the river, but due to the fact that she was sure that she had seen a rat walk past the window one night. This lead to an interesting conversation about where it could be living and how we were to get rid of it, I suggested to the children that I should go buy a gun and shoot it. Despite their fascination about the prospect of having a real gun, the children vetoed this suggestion, as I might miss and then Dreamcatcher would go ‘Glug, glug, glug’ as she sank to the bottom of the river.

07/12/05 Engine on at 09:17, we motored slowly into the current as we ferry glided off from the quay, then we turned with the flow and were carried down past the bridge, the children came out and waved good bye to the harbourmaster, the bridge and to Avignon itself. We were off to Arles, to see the Roman Amphitheatre, which had seen gladiatorial combats and was still in use as a bull-fighting arena. If felt good to be travelling once more. The sun was shining and although the temperature was cold, it was warmer than when we had come down the Rhone. We passed the twin towns of Tarrascon and Beaucaire, built on opposite banks of the river, and both with imposing looking castles, there were no obvious stopping place at either, access to the marina at Beaucaire is via the Canal du Rhone au Sete a detour of about 60kms. The Rhone which was noticeably faster below the last lock, the pillars and supports holding up the bridges over the Rhone had the appearance of doing 4-5 knots through the water. The lower sections of the Rhone feel remote and inhospitable with low scrub bushes and trees, shoals and sandbanks, with the passage through marked by navigation piles and buoys. With the junction with the Petit Rhone in sight I turned Dreamcatcher round to point upstream to see if we could make progress against the flow, if we could not we would have to decide whether to continue on to Sete, or revert back to the original plan of Port Saint Louis. Dreamcatcher slew round, and heeled as I turned her, and the ground track fell from nearly 8 knots to 1 knot then very slowly crept up to 1.5knots as we slowly made way back up river. The campaniles of the churches appeared, backlit against the pale blue sky, then slowly the beige stone walls and red roofs of the rest of the town came into definition. The moorings were tucked onto the right bank just after a right hand bend and as such were sheltered from the worst of the flow, they were full of boats apart from a small space between a big motor cruiser and a small motor boat, we managed to squeeze ourselves in with the help of people on the jetty. The pontoon was wobbly with no shore power, apparently it had been turned off the week before because people were using it to heat their boats! We spent the afternoon doing a quick walking tour of Arles, past the Ancient Roman Theatre, which was in the process of being renovated, and on to the Amphitheatre. We had promised the kids a trip to the amphitheatre where there had been gladiatorial combats and now it is used for bullfighting. I think Nick was a bit disappointed not to see any actual bullfights, but I captured their imaginations by re-enacting bullfights and gladiatorial contests. Nick decided his Dad was a bit funny pretending to be a bull and paw at the dirt, before charging towards him.
We walked back through the town with Nick insisting on going to a café for a drink, he had even seen one serving beer. It had been a good day, I even managed to run a bit, not that Linford Christie has anything to worry about, it was more the Granddad chasing toddlers round a garden run, but hey it was still a run.

08/12/2005 We left Arles early in the morning and headed back upriver to the junction with the Petit Rhone, this river is completely different, more Africa Queenish, with trees and vegetation encroaching onto the river. The guide to this section of river down to the junction with the Saint Giles lock, was full of warnings of obstructions and admonishments not to leave the marked channel. Channel markings were conspicuous in their absence, by staying approximately in the middle of the river and staying clear of the branches of any submerged trees, we made it through to the Saint Giles lock. The latter part of the river
On the approach to the lock was very clearly marked with piles nearly every 100m. This was meant to be the last lock before the Mediterranean Sea. The canal du Rhone au Sete is an uninspiring canal, when compared to the earlier canals we had been through, the vegetation was predominantly coastal scrub land, and the canal gave the impression of neglect. The halts were flimsy rickety affairs with no apparent reason for them being there, no shops or facilities, or simply completely missing. However this appears to be changing a long section round Aiges Mortes has been improved, as is a long section heading from Aiges Mortes towards the Saint Giles lock, Nick was a happy chap, he could sit in the cockpit and get his fill of big earth moving vehicles, articulated dumpers, graders, diggers some on pontoons dredging the bottom, and even a section with divers in the water.
A reason for doing this section is for an opportunity to see the things the Camargue is famous for, its wild White Horses, Black bulls and pink flamingo’s, we were not sure if we would see these but I had told the kids that we might, our first sighting of the Camargues horses was as we came round a corner of the canal to find a group standing at the canal side, I called everyone up from down below, and Sara, with a tear in her eye, took some photos, it was a lovely moment where we began to think that we had made it to the Med at last. Nicholas remained in the cockpit after the others had gone below, he was seriously unimpressed, and when I enquired what was wrong his reply was ‘Where are the flamingo’s? You said white horses and flamingo’s’
Fortunately not much further on we came across the first of the flamingos. We missed the turning to Aiges Mortes, and took the bypass instead, we were no longer using the Navicarts, but the RYA recommended book by Imray Laurie ‘The Inland Waterways of France’, the first time we had to use it, we found it seriously lacking. It had started getting cold as we went down alongside an Etang, and we had a Mistral blowing on the nose, our hunt for shore power was a failure and we ended up with a line, not very securely, thrown over a bollard outside of Pavlos les Flots. While Phoebe cooked supper. Our water pump is experiencing difficulties with less and less water coming from the tap, I will look at this when we get to Sete.

09/12/2005 Woke up at 02:00 to hear the wind picking up in strength, and the lines creaking and then going silent, its is the silent bit which is worrying, has our line come off, by lifting my head off the pillow, I could see the top of a garishly lit tower, provided that was always there we were not moving. 07:00 got woken up by the wash of a speedboat going past which nearly tossed me out of my bunk, I got up put the kettle on and watched the sun rise. Phoebe and Nick were disappointed that they could not go ashore, but we were about 2m from the bank. We set off with the children snuggled under their duvets in the cockpit, watching flamingos on the etang, which were now on either side of us. 09:30 we finally saw the Med, well we actually saw a sport fishing boat, passing along on a strip of water on the horizon, but it created a good buzz of excitement we were there, nearly it was tangible we could see it.
11:00 reached Frontignan where forward progress was stopped by a low railway bridge, we headed towards the quay wall, only to be stopped by mud while still about 1.5 meters out, I called to Sara on the bow to wait as I pivoted the stern into the canal, but she paid no heed, and ended up stood up to the tops of her thighs in clear salty canal water. While 4 passing workers helped her out, I did what I could by calling the children to look at where their Mummy was. The bridge at Frontignan opens, I found out by reading the notice stuck in the window of the control tower, once a day at 13:30 provided you call them by phone before 12:00. I phoned and had a very awkward conversation, with someone who appeared not know what I was on about, finally someone came on the phone who spoke a bit of English, it transpired the person I had been saying ‘Pont Frontignan Overt Si vous Plait’ too was a receptionist at a bank. Once I dialled the right number it all went smoothly. After lunch we completed the last few miles through clear water to the Etang du Thau, the wind had picked up a bit into a good force 4, at the entrance to the etang there is a warning sign instructing you not to enter the etang in winds above 15km/hour, but we were in a well found sea boat and carried on into the short waves of the etang, it was good to feel Dreamcatcher taking waves in her stride and have spray coming back into the cockpit, the children were squealing with delight, in the cockpit, but Nick decided he had enough of getting wet and went down below. I had looked at a chart of the Etang and I was expecting to see a line of markers leading me thought the oyster beds and fishing nets, but I could not see any. We headed out into the etang towards a headland and some cardinal marks in order to check that we were in the right place, and then turned and headed towards the girder bridge which marked the entrance to Sete. The entrance from the etang to the harbour of Sete is through a series of bridges which open twice a day provided that you contact the harbourmaster before a prescribed time, we elected to tie up on the empty waiting quay, and decide from there what to do. I got caught out while coming in to moor, I turned to go head to wind as I approached the quay, to discover that the supposedly tideless Med does in fact have a tide and we were now going with it, the mooring was aborted while I turned round to try with the tide, Sara got annoyed with me as she now had to change all her lines back to where they had just come from.
Phoebe and I went for a walk through round the harbour, with its active fishing fleet, until at last we came to the harbour wall, and we could stare out at the Med, as I pointed out towards the South, I told Phoebe that just over that water lay Africa. To which her wide-eyed response was’ Really!’, she then quickly got her bearings and as I pointed East and West asking her what was there, the answers were correctly given, with a big grin, as Italy & Spain.
The marina office told us their was no spaces available, and they did not know of anyone who could help us with our masts, I went to a yard that had been recommended by a chap at Frontignan, did not inspire me, and a chap from Goole in a barge informed me that the only time he saw the owner was when he turned up at 18:00 for drinks. As I watched the yachts in the marina rock in the wake of the big fishing boats going out and in, I decided that we would stay at the waiting quay for the weekend and then head back to Arles and on to Port Saint Louis.

10-11/12 Spent in Sete, walking to see the Med, and filling up with diesel managing to get about 70 litres into the tank. Sete is a fishing and holiday town, it has some large beaches situated near it, but it was to cold to bother going near them, although it did warm up a bit by 11:00. The fishing is divided between the big trawlers going out to sea, and the small boats on the etang either fishing or oyster farming, with the etang fisherman side having a more Mediterranean feel about it. There was no shore power but it was not as cold as it had been on the Rhone, it was bearable provided we were back on board by about 16:30 and cooking, then into bed soon after supper. Sara moved into the salon at Arles and has stayed there each night. I have to run the engine twice a day to keep the batteries topped up enough to start the cooker. Domestic battery replacement is another job to add to the list, along with the water pump which is giving less and less water.

12/12/2005 Engine on at 09:00 left quay at 10:00, as we were leaving the quay the house next to our moorings being knocked down by a back hoe, by the time we had turned round to head back out into the etang it had been converted into a mound of rubble. As we came into the etang the channel markers were easily seen, and it also easy to see how we had missed them, their top marks had disappeared and they were just a series of poles, which with the sun in our eyes we had been unable to distinguish. We got through Frontignan without any drama this time, we just had an enforced lunch stop of 2.5 hours. We finally entered into the canal to Aiges Mortes in the dark, the throttle was pulled way back and we slowly made our way down into the moorings, which were all full. We looked at mooring alongside a motor boat, but we had a misunderstanding about which boat was been talked about, so we eventually pulled into a jetty in progress with no mooring signs, and tied up to the boat in fronts ground stake, and took the kedge anchor ashore as our stern line, as we were ‘anchored’ I couldn’t work out the scope to which we should lie, 6 times depth or 6 times the drop from cleat to shore, I couldn’t find any guidance in any of the books onboard.

13/12/2005 Sara’s birthday, a no travel day, a day out in Aiges Mortes visiting the tower and walking round the ancient walls which surround the town. Very cold windy day. We had lunch in a lovely restaurant off the square that had a log fire in the open kitchen on which they did the cooking. The smell and warmth were most welcome, and the food was excellent. Nick and Phoebe ordered a pizza each, from a wood fired oven, and a plate of chips, which when it was delivered was enormous, Nick grabbed it saying they were all his, a bit of persuasion was needed to get him to share them. Phoebe went to use the toilet by herself, but seemed to taking rather long, I went upstairs to find her shouting, as she had locked herself in, it was easily solved, she had been pushing on the door and trying to turn the lock. After lunch we watched some men playing boule, and then returned to Dreamcatcher. It is nice being able to visit new places then to have a short walk back to your home. (We have returned to Arles and Aiges Mortes by car, it is difficult to describe but it is not the same, knowing you have to get into a car and then have a journey to get home.)

14/12/2005 Left Aiges Mortes at 09:00 we had a long day ahead of us 90km, if we were to get to Port Saint Louis. As we headed up to the Saint Giles lock we had strong Northerly winds on our port beam, we pulled the cockpit cover up, it was the first time that we had found it necessary to cover the helming position, it certainly at lot more comfortable heading into the wind. The cooker has once more decide to stop working, black smoke inside the boat streams of white smoke outside, and the both overheating on start up and turning themselves off. Sara hit a mud bank trying to avoid a barge. With the strong winds we were experiencing in the relative shelter of the canal, I was expecting the junction with the Petite Rhone with the Rhone to be rather windy, with Arles possibly untenable as a halt if required, we needed to decide upon either going onto Saint Giles or Port Saint Louis, if we did decide on the Port Saint Louis it might be difficult changing our minds if it was to windy, in light of the lack of heating or cooking, we felt we should push on to Port Saint Louis where we knew there would be facilities. The Petite Rhone was sheltered but still there were strongish gusts, as we rounded the last corner we hit the full force of the wind, I got Sara out to bring the mooring warps into the cockpit, as I did not want them going overboard in the wind and tangling with the prop, it was a full life jacket and harness affair, as we headed up against both flow and wind. Once we turned to go with the flow and wind we were driven down river at a rapid rate, as we went past Arles Sara thought it would be a good idea to take advantage of the hot water provided by the engine to wash her hair, I vetoed this as the spray from the waves on generated by the wind was going vertically up into the air, and with concrete training walls on both sides if something did go wrong we would need all hands on deck quickly to avert disaster. We finally arrived at the lock between the Rhone and Port Saint Louis as it was getting dark, we had phoned the marina to be told that the last lock opening was at 16:00, although the almanac said there was an opening at 19:00. Sara phoned the lock keeper and despite her speaking to him in French, he kept saying he did not speak English. We slipped out of the stream and were able to hold station outside the lock on tickover, there was a big yellow ship in the lock, so we turned circles outside the lock for 30 minutes waiting for the ship to vacate the lock, then we approached the lock, whose lights were still against us, we couldn’t contact the lock keeper as our VHF was now flat, and the telephone only got his answer machine, although we knew he was there as the lights went from standby to do not enter, and then the lock gate closed. It was now dark, we were tired and cold, and the wind was still howling, we finally tied up alongside a steel ketch moored outside the lock. Straight to bed exhausted. It turned out the forecast for the day had been a strong Mistral with gusts of 120/130km/h, which is hurricane force. If I had had the forecast we would not have travelled today, it reinforces the need to get accurate weather forecasts before setting off.

15/12/2005 Up at 08:20, exited our last lock at 08:45, tied up with the help of marina staff at 09:30. Tired, hungry, cold, filthy not having been able to shower for 8 days, in need of a cup of coffee or tea, with a boat with a cooker that did not work, not able to get fresh water out of the tanks due to the now knackered water pump, an engine and gearbox that leaked oil, this was not the arrival we had anticipated. While booking in at the Marina office a New Zealander, called Andy who was stood behind me, kindly invited us aboard his boat for a coffee. This was typical of the hospitality and welcome extended to us by the sailing community down here. We had travelled 1622kms down the rivers and canals of France and had racked up 262 engine hours, it was time to rest and plan the next stage.

The rest of December to March
We did not move off Dreamcatcher at all that first day apart from to have hot showers, and to fill the our small 10litre water container. The Dutch family from Avignon were still here and on day 2 their daughters came and found us to invite us to a party, where we met most of the other liveaboards at Port Saint Louis.
The problem with the cooker was that any strong winds on our port side blow straight down the intake pipe blowing it out.
The oil leak has, we think, been sorted by replacing a chafed hose from the oil filter to the sump.
The masts have been restepped, and we were fleeced by the guys who made the mast step, after that experience if either I can’t do the job myself, or none of the other liveaboards can do it, it will have to wait for somewhere else. Our masts which we thought were still at Le Havre were already down here, although not at Navy Services where we had asked them to be, but at the more expensive Port Napoleon. When the masts were eventually stepped I rounded up a number of volunteers to assist with both the preparation and stepping. There were a number of obsolete fittings on the top of the mast, who’s wires were not pulled through the base of the mast, including a VHF connector with no aerial connected, upon opening my chart table 3 days after stepping the first thing I found was a VHF antenna removed six month before, the one we had pulled though was for the stereo.
The fixed after heads wasn’t, we had simply diverted to the holding tank, which then filled up, and needed to be emptied, it still isn’t fixed but the problem is bypassed until we can get round to fixing it.
Guests were received and I made a trip back to the UK.
While I was in the UK, a strong hurricane force storm came in from the South, Sara and the kids stayed in bed for 2 days, two boats got sunk, one of which belonged to Peter, who was on board frantically baling, but was being constantly pooped by 1.5 to 2 meter waves, while in a canal, Peter is very deadpan so when he came round to tell us he could not return our books as they were at the bottom of the canal as his boat had sunk, I thought he was having us on. Extensive damage was caused to a number of others including rubbing away the gel coat and mat on the bows of two boats.
The children have been enrolled in the local school, it was Nick’s first proper school, we still can’t get him to speak to his teacher, who believed for a while that he couldn’t talk. Everyone who has meet Nick and Phoebe on the way down has commented had voluble they are, Nick talks non stop all the way to school and all the way back, but from the moment he enters the class room door until he comes out he doesn’t say a word. We think he is afraid the other children will laugh at his accent. Phoebe loves being at school and at the end of day one she stood in front off her teacher and demanded to know when snack time was, as she had brought snacks with her and she had not had a chance to eat them.
I would like to think that we have brightened up some of the other liveaboards period here as we were the only people with children, until Veliserdi turned up, although Max and Augustine are a lot quieter than our two, who have conducted pirate raids, completed with black spots, on the boats of Julian and Eva & Hoken, who reciprocated with a raid of their own, by tender, after first going into town to buy pirate costumes and bags of sweets to throw at us.
Norman and Anne have been here for 3 years, getting the boat ready, Norman has recently had an accident with a router and nearly lost his finger, we explained to the children that they needed to be gentle with Norman, who is in his seventies as if they hurt his finger it might have to cut off, Nick was most concerned, as this would mean he would only be able to count to nine. Norman new alias ‘Nine Fingers’
Eva and Gunner on Topea have returned and are getting ready to leave, Veliserdi are in a bit of a quandary as Dianne has a job offer in Paris, but needs a work permit, so they are not sure what they are doing, but they have just hauled out and have discovers osmotic blisters, complete with acetic acid.
The party lazy day atmosphere has gone as February ended with people all getting ready waiting for a lull in the low pressure systems and Mistral to head out, most of us are heading towards Corsica and Italy so we may meet them again later on.