France by Boat - Waterways Of France

Imagine great romantic journeys of the world and you’ll probably come up with the Orient Express to Venice or the Trans-Siberian across Russia. Both epic voyages through faraway lands where the journey is the destination. Yet there is a journey though France where you can rediscover romance, taking an alternative route that is accessible to all and stepping back in time to discover a side of this country rarely glimpsed from the road.

A cruise by boat along the hundreds of kilometres of tranquil canals that thread through the country, and link up the mighty Seine and Rhône rivers, is definitely a romantic road-trip for all times. A road trip, however, with a difference; no wheels, no fast lanes, no all-night neon-lit roadside bars. You’re unlikely to get a speeding ticket on this journey, perhaps just a gentle ‘tut’ from a lock-keeper if you travel over six kilometres per hour or create a wash which may damage the canal sides. It’s an antidote to speed; a slowing down that opens up a truly magical world—a France that is quite different from the one you might already know and love. To see France by boat is an unforgettable experience that has seen many people trade their homes on land for life on a péniche and a waterway world.

My husband and I decided to enter this world and to navigate it with our own wooden motor cruiser. Taking a break from our hectic London life, we were seeking an adventure—but a relatively safe one as we were taking our two small children. We arrived in Calais in mid-July and reached the southern-most point on the canals, glimpsing the Mediterranean Sea, in December. In those four months we slept under the stars in Paris looking up at the twinkling lights of the Eiffel Tower, we

ate freshly barbecued river fish, woke to morning mists blanketing the water, picked berries from tow-paths for our breakfast, watched the vineyards of the Bourgogne slowly change colour and let the Van Gogh sunflowers paint our memories forever.

MEANDERING

Life certainly took on a different complexion when viewed from the water. We’d been to Paris many times before, but seeing it from the water brought us new images to remember. Meandering under 38 of Paris’s bridges we marvelled at the intricate stonework and gold overlay that couldn’t possibly be seen from where the passers-by stood above us, waving.

Seeing magnificent cities like Avignon, Arles and Auxerre from the water was a privilege. The best view of Auxerre cathedral is from the vibrant quayside where we moored. In Avignon we sailed below the famous pont d’Avignon, and could view the bridge in peace on the water while tourists above us bustled with their headphones. In Arles we contemplated Van Gogh’s Starry Night over the Rhône close to the spot where he had painted it.

Everyday experiences gained a freshness and excitement. It felt like being a child again, in our floating den. Stopping at a waterside market on the banks in Lyon or buying courgettes and eggs from a lock-side farmer were adventures.

Being on a boat you commune with nature every day, your front door opening onto a different view, be it wide open fields of wheat or a classic line of plane trees. In Courlon-sur-Yonne, swans and cygnets gathered round for lunchtime croissants. On the Rhône we awoke to crisp autumn mornings, our solitude shared with the fishermen on the banks; we’d motor gently through the pale, cool air clutching our cups of tea, mesmerised as a cormorant would cross our bow, its wingtip breaking the perfect water.

As well as seeing things differently we also met people purely because we were on the water. When you’re on the deck of a boat, people wave, some shouted ‘Bonjour’ or ‘Très jolie’ and gave us the thumbs-up sign. On the canals it’s more intimate and relaxed as you wait alongside other boaters in a lock for the water level to rise or fall. It’s a much calmer process than one imagines, so you have time to chat or even hop aboard and look around a neighbour’s boat. There’s a camaraderie and openness between people on the water that we haven’t found anywhere else.

MEMORIES

We met people whose lives were forged and shaped by a life on the waterways—like Jean a bargee in Paris. Now 80, he shared his memories of life plying up and down the canals with his wife and three children, all born aboard! When moored in Longueil-Annel alongside some houses, there was a tap on the window and we were invited to go eel fishing with our land-side neighbour. In Montceau-les-Mines we were ‘adopted’ by the swing bridge operator, Phillipe, who had to raise the bridge/road to let us continue to the mooring. He was fascinated by our wooden boat and brought his two daughters and a present of a pichet one evening. Wherever we moored we found genuine hospitality and friendship from the locals and boaters alike.

The wonderful thing about travelling by canal is that you seem to gain extra time in your day. Top speeds of around six kilometres per hour may sound terribly frustrating if you’re used to clocking up the miles on the autoroutes. However, moving slowly on the water means that you rediscover your senses. You have time to watch the herons as they watch you, time to listen to the slap of water as you drift off to sleep and time to smell the wild rosemary on the banks. The pace is slow, and moving anything more than 30 kilometres a day is too much. It’s the perfect pace for sketchbook or camera.

Like any great journey, a voyage on the waterways is made all the more exciting by the endless possibilities. Do you turn right down this arm towards Belgium, or carry on ahead to Paris? Do you take the smaller canal passage to be rewarded by stunning 13th-century Moret-sur-Loing? Or berth in Saint-Mammès, alongside the commercial barges plying their trade? Every night’s stop was an adventure in itself.

Unlike being on the road and journeying from one hotel to another, the waterways provide accommodation at every step, so you don’t need to head to a marina or halte plaisance. It’s free to moor almost anywhere along the banks, so it’s quite possible to have no real plan. This lends an air of free-spiritedness to the journey that is unique on the canals. Aboard you have your food, showers and all you need, so you are quite self-sufficient. And within a few kilometres cycle of wherever we moored we always found a boulangerie.

ECLECTIC MIX

We’d never have eaten the tastiest steak frites in France if we hadn’t got lost and ended up in Watten. If we hadn’t run out of fuel we wouldn’t have stopped for five nights in Compiègne so we’d never have tumbled into the vast inland beach that the town turns into in August. Because we stopped to chat to a lock-keeper upstream we knew we wouldn’t reach the locked basin to enter Paris. So we explored a tiny and shallow arm of Bras-de-Marly and ended up alongside an eclectic mix of renovated barges where many Parisians live. In Bailly, we wouldn’t have walked up the hill or discovered the Crémant de Bourgogne cellars and an evening wine-tasting tour if we hadn’t chatted to James on a hotel-barge. We’d probably have passed by Saint-Léger-sur-Dheune if we hadn’t had engine failure and splashed out in a waterside restaurant, Au P’tit Kir. Run by an English woman with a French chef, it turned out to be our favourite waterside restaurant.

Conversely, at times, not being able to stop lent increased magic to a place. Like the day we cruised past the medieval town of Rochemaure. All we could see as we pottered past were crenellations poking above dense green woodland with a hint of red pantiles. There were no moorings in sight so we left to our imagination the galloping knights and adventures that might have passed there.

In those four months we travelled the length of France, clocking up over 1,700 kilometres and almost 300 locks. We spent 60 nights on free moorings by the canalside, and another 100 in marinas and towns paying for our berths. However it’s not these facts that will remain with us, but the incredible diversity of the country and its people. From the cultural closeness of Rodin’s sculptures in the gardens of the Musée Rodin to the idyllic waterway of the Nivernais canal. From the conversation we had with a lady making stained glass windows in a studio in Auxerre, to our meeting with Jean-Yves who rescued us in Coulange-sur-Yonne. From the vastness of the Camargue skies between Aigues- Mortes and Pavalas-les-Flots, to the intensity of being metres down inside the blackness of the Fontinettes lock.

There’s always the feeling on the canals that there’s more to discover, that around the next corner, or down a willow-strewn branch of a canal, lies some fantastic, hidden gem that no-one from the outside world has been to yet. That’s why we shall return again and again to the canals of France.

Each season changes the view, the activity on the canal-side and the surrounding countryside. No matter how much you plan, spontaneous things seem to happen on the canals. That’s the beauty of this particular journey—what makes it so special and so different from other classic voyages is that each time you do it, it will be different.

WHERE TO EAT

Au P’Tit Kir
Restaurant Bar à Vins
16 rue du Pont
71510 Saint-Léger-sur-Dheune
Tel: (Fr) 3 85 45 46 80
About 70€ per couple including wine.
Overlooking a pretty part of the canal, with seats outside in the summer, this is a little gem of a restaurant, frequented by locals as well as tourists. Serves a selection of local dishes like oeufs meurette. Lots of fresh vegetables, a menu rotating with the seasons and wines sourced locally.

Restaurant de la Maison Fournaise
Île des Impressionistes
3, rue du Bac
78400 Chatou
Tel: (Fr) 1 30 71 41 91
Open every day, 7 days a week.
About 100€ per couple including wine.
Splash out at this atmospheric restaurant on the banks of the Seine where artists and bohemians used to escape from Paris. It’s a step back to the summer of 1880 when Renoir painted the world-famous Lunch of the Boating Party.

Lyon Market
Quai St Antoine
69002
Lyon
www. lyon.fr
Open every day except Monday.
About 15€ for 4 of us.
In the heart of Lyon on the banks of the Saône, this wonderful market is the place to have a coffee, people-watch and then wander down to the river to eat your freshly bought lunch. We dined on freshly roasted quails, ripe tomatoes and bread, finished off with delicious pears.

BOAT HIRE COMPANIES

Locaboat Plaisance Penichette Hire
Port au Bois – B.P. 150
89303 JOIGNY
Tel: (Fr) 3 86 91 72 72
www.locaboat.com
Two weeks in July/August on a Classic Penichette sleeping up to 5 people costs 1,505€ for the boat. 9.5 x 3 metre-boat

Crown Blue Line
Le Grand Bassin
BP 1202, 1
1 492, Castelnaudary
Tel: (Fr) 4 68 94 52 72
www.crownblueline.com
Two weeks in July/August on a Consort, sleeping up to 4 people costs 3,110€ for the boat.

FOR MORE INFORMATION

VNF (Voies Navigables de France)
175 rue Ludovic Boutleux
62400 Bethune
www.vnf.fr
Tel: (Fr) 3 21 63 24 24
For information on the canals, licences, closures etc.

TEN places not to MISS

These are all within easy cycling or walking distance of the canals.

Le Canal du Nivernais
If you only have time for one canal, this is the one, deep in rural France. It’s less frequented than other canals as it’s shallower and it has preserved some magical passages through ancient stone cuttings and unlit tunnels. You can still see some manual lifting bridges, lock-keepers sell their own produce and have plenty of time for travellers.

Cathédrale Saint-Étienne
A magnificent cathedral dominating the town square of Sens in Yonne. It was the first Gothic cathedral in France, inspiring the choir of Canterbury Cathedral. Inside is an outstanding collection of stained glass windows. Make sure you’re there for the annual flower festival held in the cathedral and town square in September.

Clairière de l’Armistice
A few kilometres from the banks of the Aisne, deep in the forêt de Compiègne. This atmospheric clearing in the woods is the place where World War I was brought to an end; and also where Hitler, in World War II, made the French sign their capitulation.

Caves de Bailly
A steep walk up the hill from a hidden mooring just outside Bailly brings you to an incredible network of cellars, originally mined for their stone. One of the best sparkling wine producers in Burgundy, Crémant de Bourgogne is as close to champagne as you can get. Wine tasting and an evening tour of the cellars last two hours and cost10€ per person.

Saint-Quentin Plage
Every July/August the central place de l’Hôtel de Ville in Saint-Quentin in Haute-Picardie, is turned into an enormous ‘beach’ with real sand, fountains, a swimming pool, and lots for children to do. It’s laid on by the town and it’s all free!

Cycle ride from Saint-Léger to Santenay
An easy day-trip along the canal towpath and then inland a little, covering about 20km. Passing through sleepy villages, the odd bar and plenty of fields, cows and picnic spots. Santenay is deep in Burgundy wine country, with many tastings, cellars and restaurants around a pretty square.

L’Isle-Adam
On the banks of the Oise river, this charming town in the département of Val-d’Oise hosts France’s largest riverside beach, with outdoor swimming pools. After a day at the beach you can dine at one of the many riverside restaurants.

Les Rochers du Saussois
These cliffs tower 50 metres above the tranquil Yonne river. Ideal for rock-climbing or for an afternoon’s hike for magnificent views of the surrounding countryside.

Palais des Papes, Avignon The vastness of this palace with its massive stone vaults and battlements is difficult to take in. So well preserved, it still humbles the city around it. A tour includes over 20 rooms and private chambers. Entry and tour approx 10€.

A cycle ride through the Camargue
A bewitching place of salt marshes, expansive horizons, egrets, flamingos and wild, white horses. A place unlike any other in France.