The Derrineel -- Day 1

Not an ordinary ham and cheese sandwich;
a French ham and cheese sandwich! 

There's something about beautiful doors,
esp when an old vine grows from inside

Beaune, France -- lugging our luggage on narrow sidewalks

Beaune's Saturday market -- notice the old LV bag?

Beaune's Saturday market

Selection of cheeses at Beaune's Saturday fine foods market

Meat at Beaune's Saturday fine foods market

Indoor food stalls in Beaune

Tien buying foie gras pate from Pascal

Plenty of people shopping

Morels and truffles

Sewing machines for sale?!  At an outdoor market?!

Natural fiber clothing

Part of the Beaune city wall

Ivy covered walls and colorful tiles

Part of the Beaune city wall

Colorful roof tiles

Outline of the walled city of Beaune

An old building that captured my fancy

Waiting for our train at Beaune station going to Decize

Boarding the Derrineel with Ilene standing by

Bicycles on the back of the Derrineel
That's our bathroom window (round)

From the wheelhouse, a short ladder into our cabin
Seats on either side of the doors is where Ilene and I hung out

Ahh, comfy bed; small doors under the window
access the stern gland which we turned once each evening

Tiny bathroom; stand in the same place to use the toilet, sink or shower

Simon at the wheel

Tien preparing to tie up inside a lock

Tien at the wheel

Simon supervising Tien

The madmade Canal du Nivernais with foot/horse path on one side

Charolais cows (Charo-laze!), for meat eaters

Swans

Arvicola amphibius, aka European Water Vole

Baa!

A really bad picture of a beautiful crane

We stayed in this town on the first night

Cercy-la-Tour, from above and Canal du Nivernais in the background

At dusk; the Derrineel is moored just behind the modern craft

A statue of Mary on the hill

This house was probably wonderful
before the ornamentation was removed or fell away

Our parking space

* * * * * * * *

We checked out of our Lyon hotel and rolled our luggage to the tram station, but it was non desservi, or not running.  Instead, we took two metro lines to get to the train station.  Darn local train strike!  Breakfast was a lovely jambon and cheese sandwich, so simple, tasty and delicate, and the bread slightly chewy.  Too bad Tien didn’t share my enthusiasm.  

We were headed to Decize, a small town between Lyon and Paris, to meet Simon, who is our friend and my former boss, to spend a week on his Dutch barge on the Canal du Nivernais.  Construction of the canal began in 1784 and it links to the rivers Loire and L'aron in the Burgundy region.  Timber, wine, grain, building stone and coal were pulled on the canal by horses on a path.  Along the 110 mile canal are 110 locks which lower/raise boats where waterways are not level.  More about locks later.

Our train took us to Beaune, where we would change trains.  Tien was excited to visit Beaune because of its importance to the wine industry.  This tiny walled city, population 21,000, has a Saturday fine foods market – what luck!  There were no lockers at the train station to store our luggage for the short visit, but I was brave and agreed to go, which I found was a terrible idea.  It was a flat and easy roll at first, until we arrived at the walled city.  Here, the sidewalks narrowed and the streets were cobbled, like, old-cobbled.  Like oh-damn-this-was-a-bad-idea-to-come-here-with-my-luggage cobbled.  But I dragged my bag and myself, and I got really frustrated and mad, but it was worthwhile.

The village was beautiful and Castle Beaune was lovely.  Buildings have colorful tiled steeples.  We came to a square with a second-hand market and, OH, how I wanted to peruse!  I saw old glass, old silver, old wooden furniture and beat up Louis Vuitton bags.  There was a large, high-ceilinged indoor market where vendors sold their specialties:  Butter, cheese, charcuterie, mushrooms, truffles, meat, candies and honey.  Outside were more vendors selling clothing, fabric, sewing machines and jewelry.  I wanted to shop!  But I was lugging my luggage, and shifting my bag from my left shoulder to my right shoulder to my luggage, and back again.  I struggled on the cobbles and Tien got frustrated watching out for me.  Tien bought Duo de Canard foie gras pate.  I considered buying dried morels but a very tiny bag about 3" x 3" was 37€.  We visited only a portion of the market, until I became separated from Tien.  I looked up and he was gone – panic!  I texted him and we were standing within 10' of each other, phew, haha.  From the edge of the walled city, we easily returned to the train station.  My arms ached and my left hand tingled from the weight of my luggage.

On our connecting train, still jet-lagged, I fell asleep so deeply that Tien had to wake me so my seatmate could leave.  We detrained at Decize and easily found Simon who was waiting to meet us.  It turned out his girlfriend Ilene had been on the same train!  How fun to arrive together.

Simon has a Dutch barge called the Derrineel, named after a town in Ireland, which we were about to board.  It is 48’ long and almost 11’ wide, with a 48 hp motor.  It is painted a picturesque buttercup yellow and has wood trim, cheerful curtains and two cabins separated by a saloon/kitchen, and a raised wheelhouse where we spent most of our days.  The wheelhouse is open on each left and right sides of the boat.  Tien’s and my cabin is at the stern (back) and access is thru the wheelhouse where Simon drives the boat.  Go down a four-step ladder to a built-in bed, with a small luggage area and an itty-bitty-closet-of-a-bathroom.  In front of the wheelhouse, another four-step ladder goes to the kitchen/living area and Simon's/Ilene's quarters.  Their toilet is separate from their sink and bathtub.  All sewage dumps directly into the canal.  Despite a 25 page handbook which we studied at home, Simon gave us detailed explanations on working the bathroom and turning the stern gland each night.  We also received lessons on lock operations and our part in it.

Today we motored for three hours and went thru three locks.  We saw a grey crane, a black Moorhen and her tiny chicks with red beaks, three water voles, swans, big fat lazy white Charolais beef cows, sheep and lambs, and blue Demoiselle dragonflies.  We saw swifts, much quieter than the screechers/screamers in Lyon.  The scenery was splendid.  It was peaceful and warm and more beautiful than I imagined.  The foie gras pate from Beaune with French bread completed the idyllic scene.

At one lock, we pulled over to wait for the lockskeeper.  To help with the bowline, I leaped from the barge onto what I thought was dried grass and ended up to my thigh in disgusting contaminated canal water.  Simon tried to make me feel better by telling me our colleague Jean Riess liked to say, "Dilution is the solution to pollution."  The saving grace was avoiding injury by the corrugated metal that protected shore erosion.  It could have been worse.

No one offerred to cook, so Simon browned chicken in the fry pan, and boiled potatoes and carrots.  A variety of lovely cheeses became dessert.  I cleaned the kitchen, and then Tien and I went for a walk around Cercy-la-Tour.  Pretty little place at night.  So quiet and deserted, and still a bit of light at this late hour.  We walked to the top where there was an old church and statue of Mary, but we couldn’t get near enough to it.