Sillery to Condé sur Marne

On Saturday evening the Capitainerie opened for an hour so we duly presented ourselves and paid for 2 nights: €12/day for boats under 10m which includes water, electricity and showers.

Yesterday: yet another stinker.  There was a brief thunderstorm in the morning but it didn’t do much to cut the heat, 30C again.  The weather remained sultry and moody till nightfall, but no more rain.

I did the obligatory laundry run and not much else, apart from sit in front of my trusty little fan (Ian calls it an air-conditioner) and read.   Ian went for a ride to a local aerodrome to watch gliders being towed into the sky. It was quite some distance.

We discovered that we have bought the wrong phone, it is H+ and not 4G which we need to run our Free service provider (it’s called Free but it’s not free, we pay €19.99/month for unlimited phonecalls to 100 countries plus 100 Gb of data – as long as you have a 4G phone).  So now I have a new phone and we still have to buy a new 4G phone to replace Ian’s.

24 kms, 11 locks, 1 tunnel, 4 hours 15 minutes

Today, at last, the heat has broken.  Hooray! 

Ian set off at 8.30 to cycle most of the way to Reims to an Electrodepot shop to buy a new phone and when he got there he discovered that they only open at 10.00!  He had done a fair bit of research last night so he knew what he wanted, or so we thought.  It was after 11.00 when he got back and we set off from the mooring at 11.30. 

It was a lovely day today, rather overcast at times but cool and delightful, the temp peaked at 22 degrees.  We had 3 locks going upstream from Sillery (we marvelled again at the vast fields of cereal - Pat tells me it is wheat - and rape with the vineyards on the slopes of Mont de Reims in the background) then the 2.3km Mont-de-Billy tunnel and a flight of 8 locks going downstream, which are interlinked so as you leave one it triggers the next.

Vast fields of wheat and the vineyard clad slopes of Mont de Reims

Ah, back to a gentle, narrow canal

Approaching the Mont-de-Billy tunnel - you can see all the way through to the other side

The tunnel is well lit, but the lights only come on as you enter.  Fantastic reflections of the tunnel roof.

Exiting the tunnel, and another amazing reflection

Vaudemanges halte nautique - full of live-aboards, no place at the inn.

The flight of 8 locks, as you leave one the next is just 500m ahead

Fields of Gold

We arrived in Condé-sur-Marne at 15.45.  

A little engine that used to pull the barges through the tunnel in days gone by

Approaching the marina at Condé sur Marne

We arrived at the marina at 15.45.  It is a pay marina but closed on Mondays.  Drat, we can't pay! (€7 including water and electricity).
Ian opened up the new phone .  Disaster.  It only takes a nano-SIM card and our Free SIM card is standard/micro but not nano.  There was no mention of this in any of the reviews that he read last night, or on the box.  That means we have to find a Free shop to exchange the SIM card, and where is the closest Free shop?  In Reims, 34kms back the way we have just come.  Oh well, at least it is a pretty and interesting canal except the bit between Sillery and Reims.

What is it with us and smart phones - we must be geriatrics!