Smooth sailing and few surprises as we retraced our wake back west to Montech along the Canal du Midi after five days in Castelnaudary.
Day One, to Port-Lauragais: First La Planque lock and then La Demergue and the triple lock at Laurenz. At the double lock at Roc, the kind éclusier let us in even though it was past noon and he was supposed to be lunching.
At Mediterrannée, a family picnicking on the other side of the lock allowed their children to play a balancing game on the bollards, around half a metre from the edge, while the boiling water was thundering in. Idiots! Then came Océan, where you start going downhill again, and finally Port-Lauragais.
Day Two, to near Vic: With the arrival of the promised rain and cooler weather, it was an easy run through Embourrel, Encassans (a double lock), Renneville, Gardouche, Laval, Negra, Sanglier (double), Ayguesvives and Montgiscard, where we’d hoped to moor up. There being no room, we moved on to a nice green mooring against a handy bank reinforcement.
From the second lock and through to Ayguesvives, we shared with an impressive Dutch couple, Max and Ineke, on their yacht Hoogtesvrees (fear of heights). They were on the last leg of their journey around the world, now heading for the Canal de Garonne all the way to the city of Bordeaux, the Atlantic Ocean and home from there to Holland.
The beautiful bridge below is at Deymes. It is one of just 20 remaining of those built by Pierre Paul Riquet, who constructed the Canal du Midi in the 17th century. There being no nearby quarries, he had to use the pink bricks that Toulouse is so famous for.
(Confession: Unlikely as it seems, someone left her small Canon camera out on the deck in the rain… again. Luckily, she managed to resuscitate it with: (a) a few hours in front of a hairdryer, (b) a 24-hour confinement in a zip-lock bag full of rice, and (c) fervent prayer.)
Day Three, to Lalande: After passing through Vic and Castanet, we stopped for lunch at Toulouse’s temporarily closed Port Saint-Sauveur. From there, it’s quite a change from the Canal du Midi’s generously wide, olive-shaped locks to the narrowness of the ones at Bayage, Minimes and Bernais. Then we were into the turning basin and rejoining the Canal de Garonne.
Roy had taken note of a couple of useful moorings not far down the canal, in the Toulouse suburb of Lalande; there was a bit of noise from the motorway, true, but an expanse of grass, shady trees and a bench made for a great backyard.
Day Four, to Grisolles: Before we left, big old passenger barge Air de Vacances cruised passed us avalant and we sighed: would we be trailing her all the way down to Grisolles? Happily for us, she used the turning circle just before Lalande lock to return the way she’d come.
We were doing well through Lacourtensourt, Fenouillet and Espinasse – getting used again to the dead-straight Canal de Garonne after the elegant curves of the Canal du Midi, and then came a glitch at Bordeneuve: the lock light flashed orange and then reverted to red.
Did you actually turn the perche?, enquired the hungry young VNF man on the other end of the speakerphone – clearly hoping I hadn’t, as it was 11.45am, and therefore 15 minutes to lunch-time. We agreed that he would be with us by 1pm, and he was.
After St Jory, there was a long stretch of mooring on the left. It consisted of a metal barrier pierced with holes – when we passed, big yellow barge Les Vieux Papillons was moored there with ropes. (We double-banked with her in Buzet last summer, in her owners’ absence.)
Next came L’Hers, Castelnau and Emballens – and we were done for the day. Doing great time, too – up to 9km/h at one point.
Day Five, to Montech: Daughter Wendy arrived at Grisolles station from Marseilles on the 12.50pm train, and we set off down that lovely, long, lock-free stretch of the Canal de Garonne to Montech, with just the one lock near the end: Lavache. Over dinner at Bistro Constant – it must have been our fourth time – we plotted the next day’s cruising up the Canal de Montech to the city of Montauban.
