June 30 – Leaving Reims for Sept-Saulx
Our guests jumped ship this morning – a week ahead of schedule – they decided they wanted to spend a few days in Paris so we are on our first adventure of handling the barge “ a deux”. For those of you who are familiar with my addiction to Emily Post and Dorothy Parker – yes, dears, there will be a travel etiquette section to follow, one of these days. I’ve always wanted to write “How To Be Invited Back” – this will only be available to any of you who specifically request it as we wouldn’t want it to fall into the wrong hands. It may be referred to, in the future, as the “Oh My Gawd, I’m Never Going To Visit Those People” chronicles. Any of you who have a summer home, or boat, please feel free to contribute, and thank you, in advance, to Meredith!
The first lock we came to was 2.87m (about 9’) high; luckily a lock keeper intercepted my line toss and placed it on the bollard for me. The next two locks were each less than 1 km apart. The following two were not quite so high – 2.01m and 2.36m – I made each lasso on the second try – bring me a calf – I’m going to be a cowgirl in my next life!
We are traveling south on the Canal de L’Aisne a La Marne. Leaving Reims it is very industrial and there are the occasional fields of sugar beets alongside the canal, there is an important sugar refinery about 10 km south of Reims. Interestingly – there are huge mounds of green glass at some of the factories – the green glass being broken wine bottles! Perhaps they are going to be recycled. I think over the past ten days we may have contributed significantly to that pile!
Despite my having been as nervous as a cat about handling the barge by ourselves, it is quite peaceful and mercifully the first 3 of the locks were right in Reims so I got through that fear early on. As the day wore on, I realized that Annie Oakley I am not, which was apparent when we went through an 11 ½ foot lock – oh well – I finally triumphed.
We left Reims at 10 this morning and arrived at our destination of Sept-Saulx around 3; all in all it was a very peaceful and uneventful (that is good thing) day. We cruised past sugar beet fields and champagne vineyards, one with a huge old fashioned wind mill at the top of a small mountain.
We tied up next to a cereal silo, of which there are many in this area. After a little busy boat work, we went for a walk into “town” which consists of a lovely restaurant/hotel (62E/night for a room with shower and WC). We then went into the walled grounds of the 13th century cathedral which is surrounded by a graveyard. There is a set of graves together there of a WW II Royal Air Force bomber, who were obviously shot down here in April of 1943. The other graves, of local people, were beautifully decorated with photographs, ceramic flower decorations, and plaques set atop from friends, brothers, sisters, aunts and uncles, etc. Obviously the remembrances are safe there, which is quite refreshing as they are lovely tributes to the departed loved ones. There were quite a few of young children; some are quite elaborate and some are very plain.
On our way back, Dave picked for me a bunch of orange wildflowers for my posey, they actually smell like orange. We returned to the boat and opened a bottle of Tattinger Nocturne champagne. What an incredible bottle of champagne – I don’t know if they sell it in the states but if they do it is a MUST. The label is purple, the nose holds a bit of melon and pear (I think). When I popped the cork it went halfway across the canal! Dave said “the bouchon is in the l’eau” – he was right – it took about an hour before it made it’s way to the side of the canal where I could retrieve it.
We prepared a simple dinner (wouldn’t want to compete with the champagne), finished with bread pudding made from leftover breakfast pastries, apricots and pears (my grandmother would be proud). With the amount of bread we buy over here, bread pudding has become a staple dessert/breakfast. ( In Jamaica I had cold, sliced bread pudding every day for breakfast.) My secret for bread pudding is to use any/every kind of leftover bread, layered with whatever leftover fruit is available (or raisins soaked in rum), cook in a bain-marie and caramelize it afterwards with sugar on top under the broiler.
After dinner I decided to perfect my lassoing skills but soon realized that lassoing and Tattingers don’t mix. It is very quiet here compared to the traffic noise of Reims and we are looking forward to a good night’s sleep. Tomorrow we encounter another tunnel.