Douai to Marquion

It is 10 days since my last blog. During that time I went to South Africa (my mother died 2 days after I got there, not a happy time) and Ian got to know Douai very well, he even discovered a laundry just 3 blocks from the boat! 

24 kms, 4 locks

Today we resumed our travels, now very much delayed and impossible to get as far as we had planned, but so be it.   We will now be able to spend some quality time investigating a new shorter route.  Route planning is always fun.

We left Douai at 10.30, after a quick dash to the supermarket to buy fresh bread, cheese, salami and a concertina water hose.  We already have one which has proved to be ideal and when we saw that Lidl was getting them in today we just had to get another (for the many occasions when the water tap is just a bit further than your hose can reach!) .  Meanwhile Ian made a quick dash to Aldi in the opposite direction to buy a new light fitting for the galley.   While I was away and he was catering for himself he came to the conclusion that the lighting in the galley was really not very good (I have been mumbling about it for 2 years!) and it really needs a new light.  Hey presto, today Aldi had 12v strip LED lights, with motion (wave of the hand) on/off and dimmer functions.  It cost just €12.99.  At that price he was rather doubtful about the product so bought just one.  This afternoon he fitted it and now is beating himself up for not buying the whole stock!  It is wonderful, the colour is a warm glow and the dimmer function is fantastic.

Ok, enough of that, back to our travels.  Between Douai and Arleux (“The  Garlic Capital of the World”, I kid you not) there are 3 big locks, measuring 144m x 12m, and they are double locks.  At the first lock we went into the left hand basin with 2 commercial barges going upstream and in the lock alongside there were 4 commercials going downstream.   Traffic control anyone? 

Exiting Douai Lock behind 2 commercials

The locks are equipped with floating bollards, the pleasure cruiser’s best friend.

At Arleux we turned onto the Canal du Nord where the locks are a lot smaller, in the region of 90m x 6m. 

Ecluse de Palluel, with a 5m wide barge almost fitting from side to side, and bollards spaced way to far apart for little pleasure cruisers

At the top of Ecluse de Palluel, 6.3m rise, looking back down the Canal du Nord

We tied up at the floating pontoon in Marquion (downstream of Ecluse2) where there is free water.  Ian filled the water tanks with jerry cans (didn’t want to get our new hose dirty) while I cleaned the hull, deck and fenders which got really messy with mud from the locks.

Every fender had smeared mud all over the hull 

Clean again

The rest of the afternoon we watched the entertainment show from the lock just 300m away.  There is a lot of movement of commercial barges on this canal and at times there was a queue 4 barges long, we timed one rotation – 45 minutes.

Njord and in the background a line of barges waiting for the lock

No wonder they are building a new canal alongside this one with bigger locks. 

Cold tonight with wind from the north, about 10C, but Ian is outside braaiing some sausage.

The water point