Grey clouds and rain over the Black Mountains. Up at eight and moving for 8.40 a.m. to get to Lalande two-rise early. The alternator drive belt was slipping a little so Mike sprayed it with a compound called (strangely) “Belt slip”. (This is a sticky substance that stops the belt slipping. It’s only a temporary fix, the belt’s tension will be adjusted before the engine is started again. Ed.) I spotted the first honeysuckle among the jungle on the non towpath side, as well as plums and cherries galore. Warblers and cicadas were already in full song. Peaceful, no one else around. One LeBoat was moored on the stumps at Pezens. A tall thin keep fit enthusiast minced along the towpath at slow jogging speed; long shorts, hat on back to front and checking his pulse meter; tiny dog behind him going almost full pelt to keep up. It was 9.20 a.m. when we arrived. The keeper spotted us and opened the top end gates. Two dead yachts were moored above Lalande. The resident keeper, a young man in his thirties, worked the lock with his ice cream tray controls around his neck. We could see a hire boat coming into the lock below the two-rise which was only about 100m distant. The LeBoat cleared and we dropped down; lock worked by a lady keeper. A Dutch cruiser came into the lock we’d just left. A shortened péniche, converted for use as a hotel boat, was moored close below the lock plus another dead yacht. The wind started picking up. A large aircraft circled Carcassonne. 1.4 kms to La Douce. A very quiet young lady (student) worked the lock for us. Another dead boat was moored below the lock, this time it was a small Dutch Barge, looking a bit sad and neglected. Five minutes after leaving the lock we passed another uphill LeBoat followed by a Nichols hire boat which was trying to water the towpath. A slower LeBoat was a couple of minutes behind that. Where the canal used to continue down the Frequel valley (before the route was changed and went into Carcassonne) there was a mooring to visit a botanical garden. One small cruiser looked permanently moored, as was a trip boat called Helios and another LeBoat had stopped to tour the gardens. We passed two more LeBoats and trip boat Le Soleil by the rocade (ringroad), then another two just before the deep cutting that led into the town. Moorings had been extended from the bridge to the basin, where boats were moored end on, on both sides, leaving a double péniche width down the middle. We hovered as best we could as there was nowhere to moor and wait for the lock, which was empty. The lady keeper with control box around her neck came out to check for boats below before she refilled the lock for us. We chatted to a bloke on what we thought at first glance was a Moissac refugee hire boat, but it was a private boat. He asked how long we’d been here and said did we come over at the same time as the guy who wrote Long Dog to Carcassonne. Nope, he was here around 2000/2002 - we arrived in 1993. A small LeBoat called Ha’penny came in the lock with us. The lady from the tourist office came out to ask if we were stopping, no carrying on to Fresquels. (I nearly said because you charge too much! But we wouldn’t have stopped anyway as there were far too many boats, people, cars, bikes, etc) The keeper asked us to let the cruiser out first, which we would have done anyway as they go lots faster than us. The couple on it barely glanced our way let alone speak, too busy concentrating on ropes, etc. There were more and more boats moored below the lock and signs pinned to each tree to say that moorers must go to the tourist office by the lock to pay. A small Dutch Barge was moored below the lock. A long line of Nautic hire boats occupied the left hand bank. Start of a 2.7 kms pound to St Jean with good views to a very grey looking citadel without the sun shining. When we arrived at the lock the LeBoat was tied to the stumps waiting for two hire boats to come up. The hireboats cleared and the little boat was having trouble getting away from the bank so we sailed past them into the lock and they followed us in. It was only then that we realised they were Americans! Another lot that kept shtum, we wondered why. The lock keeper was the same young man as when we came through last, in 2007. A short pound (780m) lead to Fresquels two rise and single. A VNF van went past and was parked outside one of the houses just above the lock, the driver was chatting to two women. I said to Mike that’s Madame Chopin I’m sure it is. The van left and we waved and shouted bonjour Madame. Mike asked her if she was Madame Chopin and she said yes, she was. We reminded her of one late afternoon in 1994 and she remembered us – long lost relatives! Asked if she was enjoying her retirement and she made a face and said she was living with her daughter. Then two boats came round the bend and we had to go. Au’voir Madame Chopin! She blew us kisses. (In 1994 we arrived at her lock, St Jean, and she wasn’t there so we waited, and waited. Eventually, at nearly closing time, she returned on her moped – at that time the locks were manually operated and keepers very often worked two or three locks – and threw a fit at Mike pointing a finger and stabbing him in the chest! (at five feet nothing she was quite a feisty little lock keeperess) We didn’t understand a word she said but found out next day that the previous keeper had forgotten to tell her that we were coming and she’d gone up into Carcassonne with the youth boat and had stayed there chatting, thinking she had no more traffic! She let us through her lock but we were too late to get up into Carcassonne basin)
We followed the hire boat into the lock. The American guy got in a right mess, throwing ropes to his wife on the lockside and putting the engine in full forward, then full reverse and then he slipped and fell between the steering position and the seat, ending up with legs in the air and his bum on the deck, the boat reversing hard towards our bows! Mike managed to stop and had just started to reverse, when the American managed to get his boat into full forward again. The keeper watched from his tower alongside the bottom chamber. Two Locaboats were coming up in the single lock as we dropped down the two-rise. They moved over to our left hand side and waited in the short pound. We went straight into the bottom lock and down. Told the American we were stopping before the next lock and he said you’re not coming with us to watch the fun? No, we’re stopping to do some shopping. It was 12.30 p.m. lunchtime as we left the bottom.
A Nautic was on the landing below and a little further on there was a Locaboat with a company van alongside it on the towpath. As we went past Mike spotted the boat’s gearbox on the towpath and said that looks like a serious business! We tied to the roots at 1.20 p.m. We had lunch, then we moved the boat as it was sitting on something like rocks on the bottom. Unloaded the moped and Mike went off to get the car. When he returned with the car we went shopping at the Intermarché just up the road by the top of Fresquels locks. Next we went in Bricomarché to buy some wire cable clips and a new plank. It took ages and three requests to get one of the young men to cut the plank. While we were waiting I noticed how dirty the shop was, dust on everything and you could see where whoever had cleaned the floor had left all the dust underneath the display cabinets. The girl at the checkout was flirting with a bloke old enough to be her father and eventually noticed she had customers. Filled a container with diesel for the boat’s tank at 99.5c/litre then went home. The road alongside the boat was about ten feet up from the towpath so I threw stuff down to Mike and he stacked it by the boat then I slid down the steep sloping path (with a useful tree halfway down to grab and slow the descent) and started putting all the groceries away.
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