A roller coaster of a day

What a day of ups and downs

We woke to find a local market had sprung up around us during the night so of course we had to look. While we were doing that Malcolm and Phillip decided they would take the boat upstream and turn it around. Merde - no forward power. Called the boat office and they said the mechanic would come in a couple of hours. ( some photos from last night first)

So we waited and waited some more. In the meantime we saw more of the market and witnessed a commemorative service to do with the end of French involvement in the Vietnam war.

Eventually the mechanic came and got us moving in the right direction (but not at full power)

Onwards to the next adventure! We neeeded to turn around but it was too narrow so we went on further and chose a spot to turn around. Alas it wasn’t as big as we thought and we got stuck at right angles. While Phillip and Malcolm were trying to pull the boat around with Alison at the helm, some (younger) people came along and offered to help We were apparently very near a temporary camp and after a few whistles reinforcements arrived.

In other circumstances we might have thought about avoiding them however they were great and decided to attach another rope to the back of the boat and haul it around. It worked like a charm.

great jubilation and a couple of bottles of wine were handed over to much acclaim. Unfortunately Phillip slipped when getting back on the boat and has a big bruise on his leg.

Fairly uneventful for the rest of the day if we ignore the lock gates closing on us (not our fault - someone more inept than us took so long to get out of the way that the gates automatically closed before we were clear - luckily there was a man on hand to press the right button and free us) and a couple of minor bumps going through the very narrow bridges.

On we went to Salleles d’aude for the evening and found a delightful little cave for a wine tasting (and purchase). No restaurants open so Sue concocted a very nice, never to be repeated, “layered leftovers” meal and we caught a delightful sunset.