Wednesday 15th June 2016 Below Fresnes to Iwuy 34.9kms 7 locks

Aftermath of strike. Boats waiting below Fresnes lock

12.5° C Grey skies, rain showers and a cold wind. The automatic weir opposite woke us several times in the night, the rushing water was noisy and made the boat rock. Strike over, boats started moving at 7am. The second lockful went up at 8am, a cruiser, called Atlantis from Wachtebeke, North Belgium, followed them but didn’t get in, so it tied to the piling by the lock mouth. Mike winded the boat so we were bows towards the lock on the pontoon. At 8.40am we set off following

Leaving Fresnes lock. R Escaut

empty 80m Dutchman Willy-N, loaded péniche Melinda from Chenôve and empty péniche Maringo. There was just enough room for us and the cruiser at the back of the lock chamber in Fresnes lock. Up 3.13m lifting ropes up on to mucky bollards recessed into the lock walls as the water rose. There was a long queue of downhill boats slowly advancing down the next 6.3kms long reach of the river, including an 80m boat called Poznan, registered at Bruges with a Polish skipper – it was

In La Folie lock Valenciennes. R Escaut

loaded with containers. A scruffy un-named boat (110m x 10.5m 2200T) was unloading scrap just up from the lock. We passed Willy-N (he’d just come up the lock with us) he'd just winded below the next lock and he was on his way back to one of the quays to load. 80m St Louis was loading scrap. There were no boats at the first of several container bases. Loaded push-towed péniches Bel’R and Nouvel’R came down La Folie lock and we followed the two péniches into the chamber

Derelict factory Anzin on banks of R Escaut

, more space for us now the 80m boat had left us. Up another 2.94m hanging on to ropes on recessed bollards as we ascended. Wenderlien, an 80m empty boat from Zwolle (NL) was heading for the lock as we left it. The lock keeper was trying to talk to the skipper in French on VHF, but he didn’t understand, so, to our amazement, the keeper spoke to him in English! Not very good English, but just to ask him to stay at the back of the chamber on his right as there

Waiting for Folien lock. R Escaut

was a crane doing some work on the lock side. A shorter reach of 2.8kms into Valenciennes. We passed the next container base and noted that the big factory just upstream at Beuvrages on the outskirts of Anzin was now looking derelict. The péniches in front slowed down under the Bleuze Born railway bridge to wait for the next lock, Folien, to empty. It started to rain (which it did on and off all day) as 80m empty Orissa and loaded boat Lakonia left the lock (61.2m x 5.10m 599T - ? a very odd size, possibly a stretched

Ancient fortifications at Bouchain. R.Escaut

péniche? It had a board with “A Vendre” on it - for sale). We followed the péniches into the lock and rose another 3.03m. A stupid duck with a load of ducklings went into the chamber as we went out, the keeper was busy fetching floating lumps of wood out on to the lock side with a boathook. It was unusually quiet as we went past the University at the entrance to the weirstream and the new port-de-plaisance moorings. It was 11.15am as we went through the city of Valenciennes to our left, with Anzin on the opposite bank of the river. Loaded boat Freya

Pont Malin lock. Last big lock on the Escut

from Bleharies (110m x 9.05m 2208T) went past heading for the lock we’d just left. A little further upriver 80m empty Ferijn was moored. It had a big advert for Vankerkovens on its coamings as they had fitted a new Volvo Penta engine for them. Empty péniche Maringo moored next to some dolphins, so now we were three – and nobody was more surprised than us that we were managing to keep up with the loaded péniche without resorting to a huge increase in engine revvs and that the Belgian cruiser had stayed behind us. There was a péniche under the next railway bridge with a crowd of men in dayglow jackets, who were doing visual inspections under the bridge decking using a cherry picker. The péniche went upriver, winded, and then went back to the bridge. Although the area to the north of the city was still very industrialised, the banks were now pleasantly tree lined, 6.7kms to the next lock.  The crew of passing 80m Nautiek were washing their gunwales down as it must have just loaded. Into the next lock, Trith-St-Ledger, after Mare (85.09m 1605T) left it. It was deeper than the previous locks at 3.96m, so it was equipped with floaters (floating bollards for boats to tie to that run up and down the walls in a recessed metal channels in the lock walls). The péniche had two to tie to, but the layout meant that we only had one available, next to the 

Iwuy lock. Canalised Escaut. Un-manned lock cabin
Lock zapper dispenser, operated from Crevecoeur lk

centre lock gate, so we used a centre line. Our bows were closer to the open centre gate than I’d have preferred, our fenders were in danger of getting stuck under projecting bits of the gate as we rose, so I had to keep a close eye on it and Mike had to reverse several times to keep away from it as the water surge pulled the boat forward. A loaded boat called Lucky Way (80.09m x 8.20m 1101T) was waiting above. We had lunch on the move on the next reach of 6.7kms. Denain lock was the deepest on the river at 4.84m. 80m Alexandre was loading scrap below the lock. An empty 80m called Terragona, followed by a loaded péniche called Pelican, came out of the lock then we followed Melinda into the chamber.

Moored above Iwuy lock. Canalised Escaut. Quiet

Hanging on to one floater again with the cruiser doing likewise on the opposite wall, we were soon leaving the lock. Workmen were doing some drilling by the lock cabin. Above the lock empty pusher pair of péniches Winnepegosis and Mustang, plus another empty péniche called Apache were heading for the lock and further up the next 8.7kms reach we passed empty Lapurdensis (70m x 8.7m) followed by 85m Infinity III loaded with scrap metal. The last two were too long to lock together in these 144m long chambers. Another pusher pair of péniches Aqua-Mundo was moored by the entrance to the old lock, with empty 80m Ber-Mel moored on the far side of the wall leading to the old lock. A very smelly reach as we went past a gigantic rubbish tip, where hundreds of gulls were circling, followed by a rotten sewage smell. Two more empty pushtows went past, Eperlan3 and Eperlais, then Bastie2 and Bastie at Pont de Neuville, then another péniche, called Charigny. Took photos of the old fortifications at Bouchain. Loaded 80m Con Dios and two loaded péniches Hudson and NDL II left Pont Malin lock and we went in. Up another 4.32m attached to a floater. The last one. The péniche in front had visitors waiting for them and they chatted as they lock filled. The cruiser went past the péniche in the lock when the gates opened as the crew were still talking to their friends. An empty called Osiva (75m x 8.20m 1000T) plus two loaded péniches, Sejos (just come out from the St Quentin direction) and Euro, were heading for the lock. We followed Melinda out of the lock and watched it carry on up the canal de la Sensée (high tonnage route) following the cruiser and we turned left at 3.10pm into the sublimely peaceful, quiet and weedy river Escaut, which hadn’t been widened and deepened to take 2000 tonne ships, heading towards Cambrai and St Quentin. Nice to be back with the 40m péniches. Several two man kayaks were paddling along the river towards Le Bassin Rond off to our right. We carried on to the first lock, 5 Iwuy. Sensors activated the lock (or called the controller at Crévecoeur to operate it) we had red/green lights as the lock on the left emptied (locks on this navigation are in pairs but usually only one works nowadays). Lifted the blue rod and the lock filled. We rose 2.7m and I went to get the zapper from the old lock cabin. Buzzed the controller on the intercom and he released a zapper into a box with a flap, then I told him the boat name and the number on the zapper (44) so he could record it – then he asked me to press the button that said “montant” (going uphill) and the gates started to open. Merci Monsieur. Back on the boat and we went just as far as the silo quay about 150m above the lock. Grass on the quay was waist high but we found one bollard to tie the stern end to and Mike hammered in some pins. It was 4pm and we were glad to tie up after an arduous day. Around 7.30pm a loaded péniche called Galion arrived and tied in front of us, Mike went out to lend a hand as we were tied to the other bollard. The young skipper didn’t look too pleased to see us, Mike reckoned he was working single handed, but he put two ropes on the one bollard and gave Mike a strange look after he'd said to him that he’d be OK as there would be no more passing traffic now (the locks had closed at 7pm).