Pargny-sur-Saulx to Bar-le-Duc

28 kms, 25 locks and 2 lift bridges, 9 hours

An unintended long day today.  Sure enough the commercial barge set off at 7am when the locks open, but again, he was seconds too late and a barge coming downstream got priority, so he only got through the lock right ahead of us at 7.30.  Not wanting to have the same problem that we had yesterday, we set off at 9.30 together with the German cruiser.  Well, they also slowed us down.  They travel fast enough between locks but take forever to manoeuvre into the lock, tie up - always a bit of a pantomime with wifey running backwards and forwards between the aft and fore decks trying to control both lines while hubby sits with his fingers on the bow thruster.  Very frustrating.  I asked in one lock where they were stopping tonight and the wife had no idea "my husband will decide". Gees, that would lead to mutiny on our boat.  No matter what, we wanted to travel further than them today so that we will not have to spend another frustrating day behind them.  They stopped at the port we were aiming for today so we just kept on going, a whole lot faster on our own, and tied up at Bar le Duc, 9 hours after leaving Pargny.  Oh and it rained most of the day, not too cold though.

The church at Pargny

The halte at Pargny

A very old locomotive that use to haul the barges along the canal, with a steel cut out of a barge on the canalside