The Canal Du Nivernais is widely regarded as the most beautiful as well as most challenging of the routes from Paris to the Med. It starts from Auxerre which is the highest point on the ‘free’ river Yonne, crosses the watershed into the Loire Basin at Bray and eventually joins the Canal Lateral Du Loire at Decize.
I have to say that it is truly beautiful – rural, green and peaceful with no commercial traffic. At least so far, we have not seen a great deal to challenge us other than the shallow draft of 1.2M (which isn’t a problem for us at 0.72M) and the low bridges (lowest 2.71M) which would have been a problem if we hadn’t arranged for the Gantry to be hinged). We measured depth ofonly 1M in one section which looked as if it had leaked overnight but presumably the lock keepers filled it later on.
The locks are very small (much less than the Fresinet guage) which makes it advisable to enter and exit slowly - but the small size has the huge advantage that they fill and empty very quickly. They are almost all manually operated and mostly have had ladders that are easy to get up. You never know which side the ladder will be and a few have ladders right up by the up-stream gate so you have to go to the end, drop crew, then reverse back to the downstream end.
Virtually all of the lock keepers have been really nice and helpful. Just one ageing hippy seemed to think it was a great idea to open both paddles full on at the same time and throw us about a bit.
Occasionally we met large hotel barges. They have right of way because they are carrying passengers and also because they are huge and unwieldy. In the event they have been incredibly helpful.
We met Belle Epoque in a wild place by a lock in the middle of nowhere. With our twin sticky-out rudders, I am more than a little chary of mooring close to rock or sloping banks. They allowed us to tie our stern to them and put a line ashore from our bow so we had a safe and comfortable night.
We first saw Art Du Vivre as a huge pair of anchors over the top of a lock gate. We kept well back and well to the side under some trees. As she came through, the captain was concerned that as a sailing boat we were too far in and, giving us a wide berth, called to warn us. He didn’t know about our lifting keel though and we were fine.
There is a river crossing at Basseville. At this point, the canal and the River Yonne cross at the same level so if the River is in flood, you can’t get across. We heard that it had been closed for a couple of days as we approached it. In the event, it was open when we got there. It was very confusing indeed so I’m glad the river was calm. Going upstream, we came through an open ‘stop gate’ then entered a section of ‘left hand navigation’ then hit the crossing. A big weir was to our right, a channel entered from the left under a low bridge and a very decrepit lock was closed opposite. We hung around for a bit but no lock keeper appeared. Looking more closely at the bridge it had two spans – the right hand one had a no-entry sign on it but the left did not. The Navicarte said there was a longish channel up to the lock so I though that (since we were doing left side navigation) maybe we were supposed to go through the left span. I nosed up to it but it was too low. I was just going back to moor and think about lowering our superstructure some more when the lock keeper turned up. It WAS the lock! I had been about to go up the river which would probably have led to disaster as it is generally full of trees and rocks.
There are several manual lifting bridges on the Canal and the Navicarte typically makes no mention of how to deal with them! We came to our first one just below Clamecy. At first we floated around a bit and tooted our horn but nothing happened. There were no obvious notices or instructions. I was just about to try to put L off on the bank for a closer look when a kind passing cyclist went over, puzzled it out and then lifted and closed the bridge for us. At the next one, we did find a notice, visible only from the land, saying that the bridge was to be operated by VNF service personnel and users. We stopped and lifted the other ones we came to. It’s heavy work though and was a bit much for L so she had to drop me, take the boat through the narrow space on her own then pick me up again. All went well in the end but she was more than a little bit twitchy.
Clamecy is lovely. It is a very pretty and active town with loads of shops and facilities. It has an impressive church with a very strange little statue of a bloke showing off his wounded leg. It also has lots of mediaeval back streets and houses. Well worth a visit. It even has a Cafe with internet facilities called “Mon Oncle Benjamin” right in the middle of the town opposite the tourist office. They have a computer and also an excellent wifi connection and they don’t even charge!
We have been amazed by the almost complete lack of facilities. The Navicarte shows lots of places with water, showers, toilets, electricity, bread, produce, restaurants, fuel, etc. Almost all of it is a complete lie. It might reflect the situation 10 years ago – but it certainly doesn’t now. The only place on the upwards leg that was even close was Clamecy which has everything except fuel and all for €5.00. Water was available free at Cravant.
At Chitry Le Mines, there is a small but friendly frittery. They have toilets, showers, water and electricity although only when they are there which is fine in the evening but they don’t roll up till about 11.00 in the morning so crossing legs really isn’t an option. They are paranoid about people washing boats with their expensive metered water so it is also all locked up so fill up in the evening if you want an early start. There is no bread so a 2K uphill cycle ride to Corbigny is needed.
At Bréves, we came across an interesting problem in the locks for the first time. Near the downstream gate there is a large and apparently funcionless cutaway in the concrete sides – on both banks. It makes fendering difficult for a yacht-shaped hull although straight sided barges and canal boats have no real problem. We couldn’t figure out what they were for until Richard worked it out – the locks have been extended in the past and they are where the gates used to be.
We’re now sitting at the bottom of the staircase of 16 locks that leads to the tunnels at the summit. Looks like it could be a challenge.
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