What is the Boating Community Like? Friends and Visitors on the Canal.

One of the best things about living on this boat:

The great community we've got going here.

It's so easy to wander by someone's boat. 

Get involved in a conversation. 

If they're up for it, a glass of wine.
A cup of coffee. 

Or one of Stan's famous salads. 

And - it's also easy to say no.
Come by later.

It's all so close.
And casual.

Ron came by with a kilo of shrimp.

"They had a 2-for-1 sale at Intermarché.
-Want a kilo of shrimp?"

Patrick brought us a sack of freshly picked green beans.

Luc brought sweet onions from his garden.

And then invited us to a paella party.
On the towpath.

So many of them are talented musicians. 
Artists. 
Writers. 

They aren't all French. 
We have a wide variety of nationalities.

There's always a lively discussion going. 

They aren't all "boat people".
They're also from the village itself. 

Anton and Hugues. In Hugues' wine cellar.

Hugues called down to us from his terrace: 

"Isn't it time for an apéro? 
Yes? 
Okay, I'll bring the wine!"

And he clambers down the canal bank with a chilled bottle of good rosé.

Turns out, he's a wine distributor, who's become a friend. 

Lives in the house where his grandmother grew up. 

A friend with a LOT of good wines. 
Right next to our mooring.

This is very handy.

The owner of the local top restaurant came by. 

Would Stan consider playing guitar for the National Fête de la Musique? 

Bien sûr. 
Of course.

We wound up dancing - again.

There are village festivals.
Celebrations.
Events. 

Plus - people come visit us. 

Which inspires us to explore even further.

Wolfgang and Monica came from their ranch in New Mexico. 

Bob and Sharon visited from Albuquerque.

Oddly enough, we even went to a snail farm (!) during their visit.

And last year, Chris and Tim. 
Charlene. 

All the kids.

It's great.

Yes, some of the people on boats take off.
They throw off their lines and go up the canal for a week or a month.

But eventually - they usually return. 

Each boat needs to have its official mooring spot.
A place where it belongs.

Ron and Fiona pass by us on "The Swan".

I don't think I've had this good a social life since college.
Can that be true? 

Whatever it is, it's fun. 

The connection with people. 
It's one of the very best things about being here. 

-Or maybe - that's true anywhere.

How to Handle Manual Locks? Cruising the Lot River.

Rollin' Down the River ...
Wait, that's not the Canal du Midi!

We're on a river in the middle of France.

There are a LOT of rivers in France. 
This one - is actually called - the LOT.

Rivers are different from canal cruising. 
They have a current. 

They can be big. 
Wide. Unruly. 

Okay, so rivers aren't always terribly wild and woolly. 

The Lot River is beautiful.
But - it doesn't have much boat traffic. 

So all the locks are manual. 

There just aren't enough boats to warrant full time lock keepers.

So we do the locks ourselves.

It's a ridiculously picturesque region.
Dripping with medieval villages, châteaux, caves and castles.

And - as they say - a river runs through it.
(A couple of big rivers, actually.)

Underneath all these cliffs are masses of caves.
Some with prehistoric drawings from 30,000 years ago.

Some with rivers.
But that's another story.

So here's our system while cruising the Lot:

Stan gets to do the locks.

I drop him off, and he cranks the machinery.

Close one side of the lock.
Open the sluices.

It takes about a hundred turns of each crank.

When the water equalizes, open the gates.

One gate at a time.

I drive the boat in slowly. 

Toss the lines up to Stan.

I hold the boat while the water rushes in.
Or out.

Inside the lock, with the waterfall / dam beyond.

He finishes the maneuver.
Opens the exit gates.

Not always easy.
Chunks of logs sometimes get wedged into the gates.

But it works.
No electricity, no engines, no batteries.

Just the weight of the water.
Gravity.

Then, he climbs back down onto the boat with help of ladders built into the lock walls.

And - off we go. 

On the Lot River, you can fit 2 boats max in a lock at a time. 

Normally, there aren't any other boats.
It's pretty quiet.

Driving the boat isn't hard. 

There's plenty of space, and plenty of time to get it right.

If you don't get it the first time, just - try again.

Nobody's waiting. 

Just miles of scenic beauty.

And a few herons.

The Lot River is lined with cool villages, châteaux, caves and castles.

However, unlike the Canal du Midi, the strong river current is a factor in mooring. 

Upriver is easier.
Against the current.

Bring it in close and slow, so Stan can jump off just right. 

Then secure it quickly.
Before it starts drifting downriver.

Pay attention to the signs and buoys.

This small arrow is the only sign that says, "Enter lock here". 

If you miss it, that's a big waterfall to go over. Yikes.

One night, a fellow fell overboard in the dark. (splash!) 

Not from our boat.

He was trying to moor not far from us. He thought there was a pontoon. 

There wasn't. It was just branches. 

It was nearly 10 pm.
Too late for rental boats to be moving.

There might have been some wine involved. 

Someone pulled him out of the water. They cruised off - at night.
Looking for someplace to moor.

Who knows what happened to them after that?

We never saw them again.

Why rent a boat when we live on one? 

Well, you can't get from the Canal du Midi to the Lot River. 

There are waterfalls and dams in between. 

But what an incredible region!

Each town is a medieval gem.
History everywhere.

It's ridiculously beautiful.

The villages we passed were very rural. 

They were amazed when I told them we were American.

 "You came HERE?
From America?

How did you find the Lot?" they asked.

A couple of fishermen came by.
They baked us a camembert cheese in the wild one night.
On an open fire.

With a fresh baguette.
Offered us a wiggling catfish as well.
Just caught.

Talked to a few teens.
Bored on a Sunday afternoon.

Dreaming of the big city, Toulouse.

It's another world here.

This is a small corner of a beautiful country.

Okay by me if it isn't too exciting.

 I like that.

The story of cruising the Yonne - another time - is here.

Life - is amazingly good.

Between the Mediterranean and the Pyrenees: Collioure & Catalonia

Where we live in France is WAY south.

In fact, it's very close to Spain.

Just a couple hours from here to Barcelona.

I never knew that the Pyrenees are SO close to the Mediterranean.

You can see both the Pyrenees AND the Mediterranean.
From a small hilltop in our French village.

We had enough winter.
So we left the boat in the rain.

Headed south.

There's a tiny corner of the world.
In France and Spain.

Between the Pyrenees and the Mediterranean.

Catalonia.

Stan on the hunt for morning coffee.

Catalunya, in Catalan. 

Some say it means "Land of Castles".

I like that.

At one point in history, it was all part of France.

Now, they're seeking change.
Catalan independence?

The issue is still contentious.

But Catalonia is not only part of Spain.

There's French Catalonia, too. 

It stretches across the Pyrenees.

Catalonia - in Spain or in France - is beautiful.

Look at that light - no wonder it attracts artistic types. 

They speak Catalan.
Similar to the old language in our area, Occitan.

Just as unfamiliar.

In Spain, signs and menus are in often in Catalan. 

In France, everything must be in French.
It helps unite the country.
France used to be a fractious assembly of diverse regions and languages.
Not all that long ago.

But - it's still snowing in the Pyrenees.
They're surprisingly serious mountains.

So we head to the coast.

To Collioure, just north of the Spanish border.

Dali lived near here.
(A boating friend of ours, Anton, lived next to him.)

Matisse. Picasso. Braque.
And various writers.

It's a ridiculously artistic place.

Glad to be here in early spring - summer must be VERY crowded.

The capital of Catalonia - on the Spanish side - is Barcelona.

We find an evening Mozart concert in a HUGE cathedral.

Just looking up at the incredible interior!
With the music - so cool. 

HOW did they built these amazing structures?
In the 1300's.

No power tools.

And a sidewalk café.

In the welcome morning sunshine.

Winter in Catalonia.

Winter in the South of France - Quiet Beaches and Sleepy Vineyards

Friends Ron and Fiona sent this of their boat "The Swan" this winter.

I LOVE the way the canal looks in winter! 

This is the top of "The Swan".
A beautiful old Dutch tjalk.

Ron and Fiona have a snuggly free-standing stove in their boat.

It keeps everything cozy and warm inside the boat, despite the layers of snow outside. 

It's winter in the south of France.

Nothing moving on the water.

No bicyclists in fancy day-glo clothing. 

No rental boats.

The nearby beaches - empty. 

Luckily, a few restaurants are still open.

This is from our bedroom cabin window. Cool - even in winter.

Of course, some days look like this.
So it's probably understandable.

To us, from dry New Mexico, rain is pretty wonderful. 

It's a bit - even - exciting.

Hearing the rain pounding on the boat.
While we're safe and dry inside. 

(Rain FILLED a bucket I had on the aft deck - several times over.

-That's way more than we get in a YEAR in New Mexico.)

New Mexico Christmas decorations. Candles in sand-filled paper bags. Doesn't work with rain. 

But: people from New Mexico aren't good at dealing with rain.

Our shoes were soaked right away. 

Puddles! 

I forgot about puddles. 

My boat crocs have HOLES in them. 

So my socks got drenched! 

Well, of course. 

Our dinky little travel umbrellas? 

The wind laughed at them. 

Blew them inside out. 

Pfft. 

Our backpacks and clothes got soaked. 

Rain is a good excuse to visit museums. 

So - we headed south, toward the Spanish border.

Found a rainy castle to stay in. 

Between the mountains and the Mediterranean.

The nearby Pyrenees are spectacularly snow-covered - so much snow! 

That is, when they even appeared between the clouds.

View from the castle window. There ARE mountains there. Big ones. Somewhere.

Winding mountain roads. 

Filled with camper vans in summer. 

Now empty.

It just feels so darn - atmospheric. 

There's something about being in a place - most any place - out of season. 

It reminds me that out of season is often the best time to travel. 

Towns are empty.
Parking is easy.

People have time. 

"Boat People of Poilhes". We don't have to reserve a table in advance.

And the winter vineyards-!

They're just gnarled and bare stumps.

Hard to believe they'll be bursting full - very soon.

No, not snow. Rocky soil, apparently good for holding in heat.

Some vineyards in Languedoc seem to be pure rocks.
Other vineyards are filled with wildflowers between the rows of grapes.

I think it's planned.
There's a lot I don't really know.

Soon, it'll be busy.
It's a popular place in summer.

We'll enjoy that, too.

But - there's something special about being here right now.

And: there's still time for a small glass of rosé.

And one of Stan's famous salads on the aft deck.

Even in winter.