Vic-sur-Aisne, Compiegne, L'Isle Adam, Cergy FR 16-15 September 2023 We left Soissons on Saturday morning. Our last cruising guests had left and we would have some time on our own. Cergy Charivari Parade We cruised to Vic-sur-Aisne. We stayed on the boat and did some washing and other jobs, with the plan to look around the town on Sunday. I always like some good flying heron shots. On Sunday morning, we found that there was a major Brocante (trash and treasure) fete going on in the town. We started to have a look around, but I couldn't walk far so I had to head home. Howard managed to pick up a couple of bargains. In the afternoon we tried again, but the stalls were still going strong. We did manage a couple of stops in the town including at the french WWI cemetary, and at the major holiday park just out of town. The park had all sorts of recreational activities and accomodation ranging from camping, glamping, small holiday units to multi-story holiday houses. The chateau in the town was also very impressive. Our next days cruising was to Compiegne, so this was the final leg on the Aisne as Compiegne is on the Oise river. Since starting on the Aisne at Berry-au-Bac we had been using a tele-command to request lock opening. At the last lock we had to return it into a box. No lock-keeper required. We also saw on some of the lock houses marks of previous floods. In Compiegne we had some rain, and then a rainbow and sunset. The next morning I was getting ready to have my shower and the shower water stopped. Luckily I wasn't wet as one of the pipes had split. Howard investigated and did something to dodgy the pipes so that we at least had cold water. We thought we were lucky that this happened when we were on the boat, and also when we were opposite a major chandlery who were able to find us a plumber who came over in the afternoon and fixed the problem. Howard was also able to buy a few things for the boat too. But we lost a day in our schedule because of this. The next day we had a cycle around the town, including through the park behind the chateau. We also had lunch in town which was nice. In the morning we visited the bunker boat to fill up with fuel. The next 2 days were rainy and gray, so we were pleased that we were cruising to towns that we had visited before, Point Saint Maxence and Saint Leu d'Esserent, and we only had 2 locks each day. We didn't even bother to brave the weather to go into town. Our third day of cruising out of Compiegne was to L'Isle d'Adam, and luckily the weather had improved. We got a nice mooring on the town pontoon, and after lunch had a ride around the town, which we thought was very nice. In the evening we went out for a lovely dinner, only a 2 minute walk from the boat. On the way home a couple of night photos. The next morning we delayed our departure so that we could go to the market. It was a large market with plenty of stalls including food, clothes and other specialty stalls, and of course plenty of people about. Our next stop was Cergy, where we had left the boat the winter before. So that completed our "figure of eight" circuit for the year. Although we still have another week before we stop cruising. Our route that day went past Pontoise where we had spent more than a week the year before. At Cergy we were unable to moor immediately on the pontoon outside the harbour so we did a U-turn and went up to the quay a little further north and moored there. After lunch we went into the Village to have a look a Charivari, a back-to-school festival that Cergy put on each year. As well as stalls and entertainment there was a float parade that was supposed to start at 3pm. We got a good table at a bar to watch it go by, but nothing happened. So we headed back along it's route and found that it hadn't even started. But if finally got underway at about 20 past 4, although with plenty f delayed due to technical problems on some of the floats. After the parade, we headed back to the boat. Howard checked that the pontoon was free for us and so we did another U-turn, and headed down, and then another U-turn to moor upstream.
We had arranged to meet our friend Rosie and Steve at a bar to watch the Ausralia v Wales rugby match, but they found that it wasn't being shown, so they came to us and we watched it togetheron the big screen TV in our lounge room. We had a quiet day the next day and then had Rosie and Steve and Claude (the harbour master who had done some work on our boat earlier in the year) over for a BBQ dinner. It was lovely to catch up.
1 Comment
Johanna Hersey
27/9/2023 10:51:00 pm
Merci de partager ces experiences et pour ces magnifiques photos.
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