Friday 22nd April 2016 Château Regnault to abv Vanne-Alcorps lock. 37.1kms 7 locks

Empty pontoon mooring at Bogny

7.5° C Hazy clouds most of the day, chilly breeze, jackets back on. A loaded péniche went past heading upriver at 7.10am which woke Mike so he got up. Left at 8.50am. There were no boats on the pontoon in Bogny, but five campervans were parked on the opposite bank of the river. Likewise in Monthérme, no boats on the quay, but thirteen parked vans. A new hydraulic weir replaced the needle weir at Monthérme. Into the lock cut, there was a VNF van and a contractor’s van

No boats at Montherme - but 13 campervans

on the towpath – the contractors were a firm that did maintenance of green spaces, about half a dozen men were in the van – they all drove off after we went past. When we arrived at lock 46 Monthérme the lock gates didn’t open fully as a big chunk of tree trunk was behind the left gate and the VNF man in a van had just driven off! We went into the chamber and Mike tried the intercom, it didn’t work, but there was a phone number on the cabin door so he rang that. Reply

Brightly painted buildings in Revin

came in English “Man come!” He did, a few minutes later, from the lock house. He closed the gates and made sure no more debris stopped them from closing properly and re-set the lock. It emptied and we went down 3.4m and out on to the river again. We had no problems at all with lock 47 La Commune even though the river was bringing down loads of debris. 2m drop and back on the river to loop around Laifour. Spotted a tree trunk stuck in the bank that was

Evidence that beaver live here!

completely stripped of bark – when did the French start re-introducing beaver?? The quay at Laifour was empty, no boats. Round the bend under the railway bridge and into the lock cut, bypassing a shallow rocky stretch of the river at the foot of the rocks known as the Dames de Meuse and into the lock of the same name, 48. An old liftbridge over the top end of the chamber remains always in the open position. A man and a wet black dog crossed the bottom gates and went to play

Swallow nesting in lock gate at L'Uf

catch the ball in the weirstream. Down 2m and as the gates opened we saw the second boat of the day coming upriver, a large smart white Belgian cruiser from Ostend. We passed on the wrong side as he was hugging the bank. 4.7kms of river in a big S-bend took us to the outskirts of Revin and lock 49 Orzy. In the lock house garden there was a sheep with the thickest woolly coat I have ever seen, amazed it could walk. A Canada goose was

I can't see you - so you can't see me!

sitting in the grass right next to the lock but went for a walk around while we went down another 1.7m. A short tunnel cuts off a big loop at Revin and then the deep lock 50 Revin dropped us down a little over 4m. Tall top end gates (for times of flooding) make it seem even deeper. A pile of logs had been left on the lockside, among the tree trunks was a broken wooden weir “needle” that looked as if it had been chewed by beaver. A long reach of over 6kms to the next lock so I made some sandwiches for

Moored above Vanne-Alcorps lock

lunch. Mike took photos of some workboats at KP36, maybe we’ll see on the way back what they were building in the middle of nowhere. A VNF van was at lock 51 St Joseph (the lock under a railway bridge) and a medium sized aluminium yacht was coming up (third boat of the day!). As the gates opened the young man got back in his van and sped off downriver. The fourth boat, another small cruiser, made its appearance on the next short reach (2.8kms) heading down to lock 52 L’Uf. There were two VNF men in the fancy lock cabin but we operated the lock ourselves using the rod, dropped down 2.3m and were soon on our way again after taking photos of swallows nesting in the top end lock gate. No tunnel at Fumay so we went almost all the way around the town on the big loop, 4kms later ending up about 400m north of the start of the loop. Again no boats on the extensive moorings at Fumay. Boat number five went past just before we went under the road bridge, another small cruiser. Past the old slate quarry and the wood yard and spotted they were building a new weir to replace the needles above Vanne-Alcorps lock. We went into the short lock cut and went on just beyond a stupid Canada goose nesting on the edge with her head tucked right down so we shouldn’t see her(!) and moored about 300m from the lock, next to the piled edge opposite the towpath. Nice and quiet again. It was 2.30pm. Another boat came up about a half hour later, a smart Dutch cruiser (number six!). Number seven, an ex-Connoisseur cruiser at 5pm.