Tuesday 23rd May 2017 L’Isle to Allenjoie 33kms 17 locks

Moorings in L'Isle-sur-le-Doubs

8.8°C Sunny with hazy clouds. Mike moved the car to the parking area by the moorings above lock 26 and bought some bread on his way back. Up 2.2m in lock 26 L’Isle (a crowd of loud for their size little girls on bikes were on the lockside in front of the lockhouse) and past the moored boats on the all-mod-cons pay moorings (using a credit card in a slot). Just 1.6kms through the shady woods, with loads of thick weed

Our VNF lady in a van working the liftbridge at Colombier-Fontaines

floating just before lock 25 Coteau-Lunans (2.9m). There was a huge dead and stinking carp floating in the lock chamber, Mike managed to flush it out with our prop wash before I lifted the rod and the lock filled – no way that we want that next to the boat, perfuming the air! Weed was bad all along the 2.6kms section to the next lock, but OK after that. A VNF van went past us driving up the towpath. At lock 24 Blussans (2.5m) there were three VNF vans on the

Liftbridge at Colombier-Fontaines

lockside. The road followed the canal closely on the 2.5kms pound to lock 23 Colombier-Chatelot (1.4m) which had a very nice lock house. 2.4kms to the next. There was an 80m long mooring made from steel tubes sunk into the canal bed which supported wooden decking. Gunfire in the woods – first we’d heard this year. A bridge had a sign to say it had 3.4m clearance – our mast is 3.38m high, but there was loads of room and the pound was full to overflowing, so they got that one a bit wrong. Round a sharp right hand bend and into 22 St Maurice (2.9m) another deep one. The lock house was empty, shuttered. A little two car train went past, the railway right alongside the canal again. On to a 1.9kms long straight pound. The woods were now at a distance with cows in fields close to the canal on both sides. Up 21 Colombier-Fontaine (2.5m) and 2.5kms to the next. A short distance beyond the lock there was a liftbridge, operated for us from a small cabin by a young VNF lady in a van. Barriers came down on either side of the canal and railway to stop the road traffic. There was a VNF depot just after the liftbridge and we spied a tap with a hose, maybe we might use that on the way back. Noticed the towpath was not

Willow bank edging

tarmacked – so no fast cyclists for a while. 20 Raydans (2.5m) had a lived in lock house and just a bit further on up the canal were the remains of a burnt out factory building, just the walls were left. Some of the buildings had been reused – there was a scrap car dealer in one of them. 1.6kms and the road was very busy. 19 Plaine de Dampierre. (1.5m) No house just a small port-a-cabin for the lock controls. 1.8kms to the next with high stone walls around a Z-bend close to the church as we entered Bavans. 18 Bavans (1.5m) This lock also had no lock house just a

Crossing the Doubs

cabin. Above the lock was a flood run-off weir, but the water in the canal was more than 8” below it. The towpath was tarmacked again, so the cycle piste must have diverted through the last three canalside villages. 2.4kms to lock 17, crossing the Doubs on a level (the river crosses the canal flowing right to left and goes over a weir). The canal had steep grassy banks with ox-eye daisies growing in profusion, it was bordered with willow wickerwork edging, a good eco-idea as the willow sends up new branches which can also be woven in and helps reduce the

Courcelles liftbridge

erosion caused by boats travelling above the 6kph limit and making lots of wash. Through the open flood lock 18b and across the river, virtually no flow today - the deepest channel was marked by buoys.  Lock 17 Voujeaucourt (3.2m) didn’t “see” the boat – so Mike reversed out and paused under the entry sensor, that set the automatics working, all OK after that. Made sandwiches for lunch on the 2.2kms pound through two long narrowed sections with stone walls. 16 Courcelles (1.3m) No lock house. 2.2kms pound and

Moorings in Montbeliard

another liftbridge, this one was a Llangollen type. The young lady in a van worked it for us from a little cabin by the bridge. Lots of cars had to wait, quite a long queue of them. Surprised when a wedge-shaped cruiser suddenly appeared at the beginning of the next narrow bit just beyond the liftbridge (that’s now 14 boats moving). Up 15 Coteau-Jouvent (2.2m) where there was a restaurant boat on the right (and an empty free mooring) opposite the pay moorings – which were practically full, in the short pound (1.1kms) leading to 14 Montbeliard (1.7m) Above lock 14 there was a section of canal that

Entrance to the Belfort arm

had been prepared for the arrival of big boats when they upgraded the canal close to the massive Peugeot car factory. Lock 13 no longer exists, it was eliminated when they built the deepened widened canal which is fed by the river Savoureuse, a tributary of the Doubs. The upgrade never happened as there was too much public outcry that making a ship canal would ruin the Doubs valley. So lock 12 Etupes (4.25m) was a replacement deep one for

Aqueduct over the river Allan and Allenjoie lock

two shallow ones. Up 11 Etupes (2.10m) and 10 Marivées (1.6m) then the canal ahead had been closed and, around a sharp left hand bend a new deep lock 9 Allenjoie (2.0m) had been built to join the river Allan, another little tributary of the Doubs. A sharp turn to the right with the arm to Belfort to the left. We hadn’t intended to go up the five remaining navigable locks of the canal de la Haute-Saône as we’d looked on Google Earth and found that the canal had been surrounded with factory estates and a large shopping complex, plus the A36 followed its bank into Belfort and it

Moored in the jungle near  Allenjoie

looked like there were houseboats moorings occupying a lot of the sections between locks. Now we were surprised to find a no entry sign on a barrier across the arm. Speaking later to a VNF guy he said that there is a problem with lack of water and he thought that boats were allowed to leave or enter the arm a couple of times a year (that must be for the houseboats!). There were no lights on at lock 8 Fontenelle so we assumed contact has to be made with VNF to continue further and we were only going to go as far as we could with the automated locks before turning back to return down the Doubs. We winded- just about – to the amazement of a passing cyclist who stopped to chat. We told him we couldn’t use the shady mooring by the entrance to the Belfort arm as we wouldn’t be able to get satellite TV. He laughed at that and wished us bonne route. We tied up in the jungle on the non-towpath side where there was adequate water depth for us, the towpath side had lots of underwater rocks next to the nicely piled edge along the very well-used cycle path. Set up TV and got lots of channels on French digital TV including TF1 for the best weather forecasting, first time on this trip, well done Belfort.