After a delightful southern summer in Australia, we returned to France in April 2018 to start our third season of cruising through France on Eben Haezer. We arrived in Paris to rain and a rail strike, so we delayed our travel to Saint-Florentin by a day and stayed overnight at a lovely little hotel at the airport, the Citizen M. On April 10 we made our connections from Charles de Gaulle to Paris-Bercy and caught the train to Vergigny, where we were met  at the station by the port capitain Vincent. It was wonderful to get back on  board and to reconnect with friends – our lovely group of local residents, as well as our Welsh friends Terry and Linda, on their new boat.

We were so pleased to be back on board and planning our longest season so far. We had plotted a circular route that would take us up the Marne River into the Champagne region, then south towards the Sâone River, before heading eastwards along the Canal du Centre and down the Loire Valley, heading north again up the Canal de Briare and the Canal du Loing, then returning along the Yonne to winter once more at Saint-Florentin.

Unfortunately, we found Eben Haezer in a state that required a significant delay to our plans. Weather and time had taken their toll on her condition; the decks were all filthy and stained from leaves and twigs that had fallen during the autumn and winter, and there were areas where the paint was old and dangerously smooth and slippery, or where small pockets of rust needed treatment. More seriously, we found that sections of the wooden wheelhouse had suffered water damage from rain and snow… not only were there sections of major timber rot but gaps had opened to allow more water to invade. Urgent repairs were called for. So we motored a few hundred metres along the canal to the chantier workshop, moored up and got things ready for scraping and painting, as well as engaging professional help from Nicolas at the chantier to effect the repairs to the wheelhouse. We were to stay here for the next month.

As we worked away on painting the decks – when wind and falling blossoms, or else rain, didn’t slow us down – Nicolas got to work repairing the woodwork in the wheelhouse. The more we peeled back and removed, the more serious it seemed, and all Nicolas’ skills in filling and packing and cutting in new sections of timber were called into play (he even called in another specialist to cut certain sections to size using off-cuts from his personal collection of fine timbers). Then, of course, extra work developed, when for example the big window panes that needed to be removed to allow repairs to the timber were accidentally cracked and needed replacement. It’s only time and money! At least we were able to replace the windows with a heavier gauge glass, so I suppose there was a bright side.

We were absolutely delighted, though, with the job that Nicolas did, and the repaired sections of the wheelhouse looked as good as we had ever seen them. We also were able to congratulate ourselves on the job we did in repainting the decks and the wheelhouse roof; Eben Haezer was starting to shine again. We scraped back dozens of small areas of rust or exposed steel, patched them with undercoat and used a non-slip paint on the decks, and the results were very pleasing.

We also managed to offload some unwanted furniture and bought a smart new stone-topped table for our rear entertaining deck. Very schmick!

We did some other repairs and upgrades, including replacing an aerial for our AIS navigation transponder, and some work on our electrics – installing some lovely big new solar panels and with a smart solar inverter from Victron, as well as finally reconnecting our house battery and engine battery banks with a smart isolator (Victron again).

The time we spent in dock for repairs was also used (and needed) for the process of finally securing my carte de séjours, or long-stay visa, from the prefecture in Auxerre. I had been issued with a temporary one before we left France the year before, and it now required only three more visits (naturellement) to be issued with the shiny new laminated card that allowed me to stay in France for 12 months… well, actually only 6 months, since my original application had been submitted the previous October.

We took the plunge on new bicycles as well… we bought electric bikes from the Decathlon chain of sports stores, figuring they would help us get further, quicker when we wanted to cycle to towns or sites further away from our moorings along the canal or up hills that might have pout us off if we had to rely on our trusty old manual bikes.

Our extended time in the port at Saint-Florentin stretched out to nearly 6 weeks, putting a serious dent in our plans for a leisurely circle route for the 2018 season. It did, however, also allow us the luxury of spending time with friends we had made and whom we might not see again for a while. We enjoyed more than one sociable al fresco dinner party or BBQ in the port’s little park, and we were also able to host our generous English friends John and Sue for dinner, for their company but also to thank them for all the assistance they had given us during our sojourn. They had driven us several times the 30 or 40 kilometres to Auxerre for official business or shopping for equipment – on the condition that they could visit a big-box shop or, more importantly, enjoy lunch at their favourite Auxerre bistro. We were delighted to share a meal on board with them shortly before we left.

Finally the time came when the major tasks were done and the itch to get moving needed to be scratched. We could almost feel Eben Haezer willing us to get moving, and our resident heron waited impatiently to guide us along the canal. On May 22 we finally set off towards the Yonne and the Seine and our 2018 aventures fluviales.