Grey clouds, heavy showers of rain – edges of thunderstorms. Mike was up at five, saw the rain and went back to bed until seven. My back was still aching from sitting on the stern with the boat constantly rocking. We set off at 8.15 a.m. as a UK yacht went past. The crew of tug Atlas were busy turning the empty pans. A loaded 4,000 tonner overtook. The rain was pouring when we passed Les Roches-de-Condrieu. The small cruiser with scooter was moored on an old quay outside the hotel Bellevue (that’s one to remember). The harbour was, as M and D had said, full to bursting. Took a few photos. A Dutch cruiser set off and went across the river almost right in front of our bows (nothing else was moving) and turned to head downstream! We wondered why he did that with the huge amount of space he had available to him. The only possible answer was car-driver mentality.
As we approached Vaugris, lock 2, a Danish cruiser caught up with us - but didn’t overtake - it stayed behind us. Two cruisers came out of the lock and the UK yacht went in, we followed it and the cruiser came in behind us. We were soon up the 6.7m - shallowest lock on the Rhône - and it started to pour with rain again. Left the top at 10.35 a.m. I hadn’t put my waterproof on so my top was soaked except for the bit where my lifejacket had been. I changed it, put my waterproof on and sat out. The cruiser overtook us soon after we left the lock and followed the yacht up into Vienne. The big barge Fidelity went past, loaded, heading for the lock. Strangely the yacht and cruiser took the left hand side of the navigation upriver, passing the big boat on the “wrong” side.
The hotel ship Rembrandt was moored on the public quay, (where, in 1993, Mike bought fuel in cans from the garage across the busy road and had French lessons from the Chinese pump attendant!) it had winded to point its bows downriver, so it looked like Vienne must be its turn round place. A Sète registered cruiser was moored on the pontoon on the left bank and a bit further upstream a yacht was moored on a long quay with bollards just downstream of a footbridge. Two houseboats, converted péniches, were moored upstream of the Philippe de Valois tower. Under the road bridge and took photos of the castle on the hill on the right hand side. Gas boat Pampero, now empty, came past just as we’d cleared the bridge.
The quay at St-Romain-en-Gal was empty, so we gently eased our way under the motorway, past lots of weed beds and into an old arm of the river. It was midday as we tied up. A noisy mooring due to the road, with no facilities, but good enough for overnight. I made lunch and then we had a doze after having a disturbed night the night before. At least it was cooler. While we were asleep a large cruiser had moored behind us, filling the rest of the quay. Gave Mike a hand to get the bike off and knock out a small dent in the rim of the rear wheel of the moped (must have been some pothole but he didn’t notice it among the many bumps in the roads) and he went to get the car from Chavanay. When Mike returned with the car we went for a drive back to where he’d just been. Up into the hills in the Parc Nationale de Mont Pilat; the view back to Vienne was splendid and so was the view over Lyon. There were big black banks of cloud out towards Grenoble so we couldn’t see the Alps or further south to see Mont Ventoux, but the views were truly magnificent. We dropped back down into Chavanay and came back along the river through Condrieu and Vienne.
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