An Unusual End to The Day

It had been a long day. We were returning to Le Havre, from Paris, down the river Seine. It was a rainy Sunday, so there had been very little traffic on the river, and we had managed three locks and 105 km before we arrived at the small yacht club at Vernonnet. The yacht club’s visitor’s pontoon is situated in a picturesque park near the Vernon Bridge and an old mill. I moored Jomima to the pontoon and noticed a well dressed French family group, standing on the bank, pointing towards the river and looking anxious. As I tiredly went to connect our electricity supply, they approached me and spoke to me in French. I replied, in my best school boy French, by saying, “Parlez-vous anglais?”. They now looked even more anxious and spoke quickly amongst themselves. Mother, dressed in a smart black suit, approached me and said in stilted English, “My father is dead”. Then, after making the internationally recognised sign for sleep by tilting her head onto her two hands placed together, she pointed towards the river. Next she pointed towards my dingy on its davits and said, “You help please?”

I immediately had a vision of her father floating dead in the river but decided that the police would be here, if it was that serious, and called Ann to ask if she could clarify the situation for me. I am always keen to improve Anglo French relations so, after holding up ten fingers and saying, “Dix minutes”, I proceeded to lower the dingy, pump in some more air and prepare the engine for starting. After a few minutes, Ann returned and said that she thought that they wanted to scatter her father’s ashes on the river and wanted me to help them do so. This seemed an unusual request, but not as onerous as looking for his body, so I asked Ann to give three of them life jackets so that they could come with me.

After lowering the dingy, and starting the engine, Ann again approached me but this time with the boat hook in her hand. She then added, “You were nearly right the first time, they have already dropped his ashes in the river and they are now floating slowly downstream in a box. They actually want you to retrieve them so that they can scatter them properly!”
I was joined in the dingy by the lady’s husband, son and daughter. The latter spoke quite good English and explained that one of her grandfather’s last wishes was that his ashes be placed in the river at Vernonnet, which was near where he had been born. The four of us then set off in pursuit of a blue box floating down the river. I managed to retrieve it for them and, with a screw driver they had bought with them for the purpose, they loosened the lid of the box containing grandfather’s ashes. Once we had returned to the chosen site, they tried unsuccessfully to sink the box. As all sailors know, wood floats. It therefore proved impossible to sink the box, complete with the ashes. Various remedies were discussed, including loading the box with stones to make it sink. Finally, the son-in-law unceremoniously removed the ashes from the box and dropped them over the side in their black bag. I return to the river bank, at a funereal pace, and solemnly let them step onto the pontoon. They all carefully shook hands with Ann and me before stepping off the pontoon. After a brief discussion we were asked to pose in front of our boat and dingy for a photograph to be taken. However, before leaving, the daughter said, “Thank you for helping us to retrieve my grandfather. We would not have wanted to leave him floating around like that.” He is probably up there laughing at what happened.

Leaving Paris

Today we headed north to start the journey back, the way we had come, to the Channel. We both enjoyed the sights of Paris, from the river, on our own boat. You somehow feel privileged to be allowed to cruise through such a major city. By 2:00 pm we were moored up in Rueil Malmaison which left us time to visit La Maison Fournaise. It is a familiar place to all art lovers in the world. From its balcony, overhanging the river, Pierre-Auguste Renoir painted The Luncheon of the Boating Party in 1881, now part of the Phillips Collection in Washington.

The building now contains both a Restaurant and a museum dedicated to the ‘guinguettes’ (open-air cafes and dance-halls) which spread out on the river Seine banks in the 1860s. Maison Fournaise was popular with many artists including: Renoir, Degas and many others, used to meet to paint and relax.

Plan B

We are now back in Paris and, after deciding not to head further south on the French canals, we are trying to decide where to head for next. It will take us about 7 days to get to Le Havre. From there we think that we will head east along the French coast and then cross back to the UK at Dover. It would then be possible for us to head north up the east coast of England to the Norfolk Broads – a place that we have not visited on our own boat. We have fond memories of the Broads from when we had our first experience of boating, in a hired cruiser, when we first got married.

It would then be possible for us to move Jomima, by sea or by truck, to Newark on Trent for the winter.

More Rain

For the past few days it has managed to surpass all previous amounts of rain that we have experienced when travelling with Jomima. We have managed to pass through three locks today and it rained heavily in two of them. So heavily in fact that full wet weather gear was required, including boots and hood. Getting through these enormous locks without scraping the boat, or damaging ourselves, is hard enough without this penetrating rain. Unfortunately Ann is suffering the most because she takes the bow rope, on the exposed ‘sharp end’ while I manage the stern rope and work the engines and bow thruster as necessary. High winds, wet ropes and difficult locks. We will be pleased to get out to sea again soon.

Deciding to Turn Back

Yesterday, we travelled to Saint-Mammes which is a barge town that sits at the junction of the river Seine and the river Loing. We also visited Moret-sur-Loing, a picturesque town on the banks of the river Loing. The river Loing has been canalised and heads in the direction that we planned to go. This was our first experience of France’s narrower canals and this proved to be a problem.

Firstly, we discovered that the speed limit for the canal is 6 km/h, which is 3.2 knots. With the engines at tick-over Jomima ‘speeds’ along at 5.5 knots and, even on one engine, she does 4.5 knots. This, not only meant that we were potentially speeding, it also mean that she was a bit lively when taking her 4 m width into the much narrower (5.2m) locks.

Secondly, the bridges are much lower at 3.5 m. To negotiate these much lower bridges we would have to lower the radar arch and remove the canopy. The weight of the arch is such that this meant leaving it down all day. Both yesterday and today it rained very heavily and there is no sign of this weather pattern changing for some time. Jomima would therefore have to be steered and managed, through anything up to 150 locks, from an exterior helm in the rain. Not a prospect that Ann was looking forward to at all. We therefore made the decision to turn Jomima around and head back to Paris and the English Channel.

The Chateau at Fontainebleau

In the heart of a local forest, the chateau of Fontainebleau started life as a hunting lodge. It then became the summer residence for the kings of France, from Francois I to Napoleon III, each one of which made additions and changes to this magnificent building. With its lovely lakes and gardens it is now recognised as a UNESCO World Heritage site.

When we arrived we discovered that, on the first Sunday each month, entrance is free. This has advantages and disadvantages. The advantage is obvious but it also meant that it was very busy with tourists from all over the world. However, it is a vast building and with many hectares of gardens we were able to explore without other visitors troubling us greatly. Apart from a coffee machine it is not possible to even get a drink in the chateau itself. So we went into the town for lunch and managed to avoid the worst of the rain showers that arrived, yet again, today.

We now needed to return to the marina, which was about 4 or 5 kms away. Taxis were nowhere to be found so we set of walking back to the boat. This was potentially a problem because Sue and Ian needed to catch a train, back to Paris, later that afternoon. The station was about half way back to the boat so we made a diversion and were able to engage a taxi that was already dropping somebody off to catch a train. The driver agreed to return us to the boat and then take Ian & Sue back to catch their train; which saved a great deal of walking.

All Aboard for Fontainebleau

For three days we have been joined by our friends and neighbours, Ian & Sue. The plan was to spend a couple of days cruising up the Seine from Paris, followed by a trip to the Chateau at Fontainebleau. The Seine, upstream of Paris, proved to be the most delightful part of the river that we have seen so far. Once we got past the industrial suburbs, the banks were lined with forests, and small villages with magnificent houses. This is where the wealthy Parisians have their weekend retreats.

Both Ian and Sue were willing to ‘have a go’ at both taking the helm and also helping with the locks. The locks, as usual, were extremely large and we were regularly joined by the vast French barges. These always have priority and, when they weigh up to 300 tons, you willingly let them go first.

At the end of the second day we moored at the Fontainebleau marina. The Captainaire offered to give us a lift to the chateau the following day which, being Sunday, meant that taxis were likely to be in short supply.