chilling out in revel

The day starts with breakfast in the hotel room and then another visit to the village. This time more of it is open. Two of the art shops, which also double as studios, have some beautiful jewellery. We have a nutella crepe (oh so yummy) and explored a little bit more. Unfortunately a couple of the other stores weren't open.

Our hotel at Larressingle

Our destination today was Revel, another base to see some more of the Tour de France. It was a couple of hours away and by the time we arrived the tour was on TV so we set up camp in the hotel and watched that. Although the boat was relaxing, it was nice just to have an afternoon to chill out and not have to worry about locks, finding a port or cooking tea (cereal for tea tonight hehe).

At the moment, Kim, Toby and I are watching How I Met You Mother in my hotel room off my harddrive. There aren't any English channels so we've been watching the news, 7th Heaven and Law and Order in French. The radio stations play English songs quite regularly although today the Timberland song The Way I Are had Timberland rapping in English and a French chorus. A show on last night was showing a lot of old singers and all of the song, including by the Rolling Stones and Beatles, were dubbed over in French. Turns out there isn't any French translation for 'do wah diddy diddy dum diddy do'.

farewell saint christophe

We have to have Saint Christophe ready to hand back by 9.30am so it was an early start for us. After packing everything up we had to wait for the office to open so I set out for another run. This time I headed up the hill into town and back out to the Abbey I ran to last night. But instead of coming back the same way I decided to see if the roads would link up, turns out they did - lucky, because the more I ran the less interested I was in having to backtrack.

We had a taxi booked to take a couple of us back to the car, which was at Agen. Mum and I had planned to wait with the luggage. Despite the week on the water, where we started was only a 45 minute drive away. However, the taxi driver had been told there would be five of us and had brought a trailer. He was a bit annoyed we wouldn't all be going too so, decided we might as well go. When we booked our accommodation we didn't know what time we would be finished with the boat so we chose a place not far from where we were, Larressingle. Larressingle isn't far from Condom, which we had to drive through, so we stopped and had another look around now that more was open.


Turns out Larressingle is the smallest fortified village in France. Our hotel was a short walk from the village, which has been restored by the Association of the Friends of Larressingle. The village, built in the 12th and 13th centuries, was very neglected when in 1920, Edouard Mortier, Duke of Trévise, fell in love with it and launched the Boston Committee for Larressingle. The committee raised enough money to buy 14 of the buildings and restore them. Now the village holds a creperie, art studios, museum and other small shops.

We all had a bit of a nap and caught up on some reading before having dinner at the hotel downstairs. After dinner mum, dad and I walked over to the village to explore. Only the crepe place was open. It looked like a beautiful place, even if the crepe place was playing Tracy Chapman as I walked past.

i went to condom, hehehe

Hehe a condom machine at Condom

The forecast had predicted thunderstorms this weekend, which a few days ago seemed incredibly unlikely. However, overnight, it made good on its threat. Dad got up in the night to bring in some towels drying on deck. I was woken a couple of times by the boat moving in the wind and the thunder. There was also a little bit of lightening. It calmed down a bit by the time we surfaced, but it put paid to my idea of a morning run.

Today was our last day on the boat. We have it for another night but we have to have it at he port at Valence-sur-Baise by 9am tomorrow so we spend the night there. We'd found some more English books at Vianne so I spent most of the morning finishing off mine - sort of a Dan Brown Di Vinci Code type thing. The French must think us English speakers like our thrillers. They are the only type of books we've been able to find. We pulled in Condom for lunch. And yes, we all had a chuckle at the name. After lunch, which has been ham salad sandwiches for more than a week now, and a fruit salad to clean out the fridge, we left Dad to snooze while the rest of us explored the town.

It was a Sunday so not much was open - although it always takes us a while to work that out. It's very easy to lose track of what day it is plus most stores close for a couple of hours over lunch. Seems like a very nice way of doing things to me. I'd happily work a couple of extra hours to take a nap in the middle of the day. I've quite become accustomed to a little nanna nap, or two. It's usually quite unintentional. I lay down to read my book and before you know it, I'm being woken when we stop for a lock (although I usually pretend to still be asleep to get out of rope duties).

The only things open in Condom were restaurants and cafes. We stopped to look in some windows and check out some real estate ads. So far I've picked out several places I could live. After checking out the local church and winding through a few narrow streets we head back to the boat, wake the father, and set off again. One of the last locks we meet closes a little bit earlier so we want to make sure we get there in time.

Over the course of the day the sun makes an appearance, but the heat is nothing compared to what we got earlier in the trip. We arrive at Valance to find out that everyone is enjoying the weekend. And we do mean everyone. Kim and Toby went for a ride and the only place open is a restaurant at the port. Luckily, the showers and toilets here are left unlocked as the port office is also closed. That means the first shower in a couple of days for me - and well earned too after I went for a run around the town. Running past paddocks of sunflowers and an abbey certainly makes a change from the Shorewell Creek track with Cassie.

i thoughta saw an otter

We had received a call from the Locoboat woman on Friday, checking where we were as there were problems with the Baise river between Nerac and Moncrabeau. Luckily, yesterday we were only going as far as Lavardac so it didn't worry us, but after coming across some shallow sections of the river on our way to Moncrabeau today, it wasn't hard to understand their concerns.

After a quick trip to the supermarket (and the adjoining cafe which offered wifi) to stock up for the next few days, we set sail again. Nerac is one of the bigger towns on the Baise so we stopped to check it out. As we pulled up a woman with an American accent who is from the Hunter Valley and has property in Tasmania between Cradle Mountain and Mole Creek, told us the weekly Saturday market was due to close soon. Mum and I leave the boys to lock up the boat and follow the people returning with bags to the market.

It starts off with fruit and vegetables, then cheese, meat and well, everything. Clothes, hats, bags, book etc. At every turn it seemed to go on. Mum seemed unable to pass a stall without buying something so it came as great relief to her budget when we spied a hairdressers. Mum had called into a couple of places without much luck but this place had time to fit her in. While I caught up on my gossip in the magazines (I got the gist from the pictures), mum got her message across to the hairdresser and ended up with a haircut she wanted. After a tad more shopping we headed back to the boat and set out for Moncrabeau.

Adding to our river entertainment, today we saw a couple of otters. They'd swim ahead of us but when we got too close, dive under. We wouldn't see them surface again. Mum also got some great photographs of a kingfisher.

The port at Moncrabeau was nothing more than a dock with signs to a nearby camping ground that had showers and toilets. There didn't seem to be much around at all - which a ride later that evening confirmed. There are no bike paths along the river as much of it is private property, so instead our cycling adventures have to wait until we moor. This evening Dad and I set out to explore the village, which unfortunately lies at the top of the hill. We peddled to the top, had just enough time to catch our breath before it was all downhill again. Thanks for visiting Moncrabeau. We headed along one of the outer roads, a bit more hilly than we'd come across previously but the same narrow, winding roads without another soul on them.

We rode for a couple of kilometres but our reward on the way back was a beautiful view over paddocks of sunflowers and straw. Unfortunately I hadn't taken my camera, but then some things you will remember anyway.

a ride to vianne

While the Canal de Garonne offered beautiful scenery and the chance the ride alongside the boat, the river Baise is quite different. With thick vegetation growing on both sides, it's often difficult to see what lies beyond it. But life in the river system is interesting enough. The trees and bushes hang deep, often brushing the boat as we cruise past. Dragonflies zoom along side us, often hitching a ride. There are lots of birds, particularly ducks who must welcome tourists like us who can't resist throwing out some bread.

Enjoying a break after our ride to Vianne

The speed limit drops from 8km in the canal to 6km in the river, one method of protecting the bank. There are less little towns scattered between each port but the places we are arriving at are a bit bigger. We had been warned that Lavardac offered the last big supermarket on the way to Valense-sur-Baise so we decided to stop in here. We had also been told that Vianne was a lovely town but because the port was too busy on our way through, we decided to ride the 4km there from Lavardac. After sussing out the supermarket, which was surprisingly big considering Lavardac appears to be only a small town, we set out for Vianne. There is a Friday evening market, which was being set up as we arrived. After trying in vain to find some wolf carving mentioned on the tourist maps, we sit down for a beer and wait for the market to come alive. From what we have read, Vianne is a very small town so it seemed unlikely the market, which was filling the square, would be very busy. But given a few hours, the place came to life. The market itself was a bit different to what we had thought it would be - not arts or crafts or the like. But it was fun all the same. And a local newsagency produced an English newspaper - the first I've bought while being here.

The market had several food stalls, most expansions of the surrounding restaurants. There was a temporary bar set up at which the locals gathered from quite early on. It seemed we'd jumped the gun with our drink earlier. After dinner we headed home before it got to late. The 4km had us more than ready for bed when we arrived back. There is a port here but we decided to moor up the river a bit, at another spot closer to the supermarket. This means we only have the facilities on the boat for the night.