Bram to Carcassonne

Tuesday, September 18th

The day starts with breakfast by the side of the canal again - who's complaining?

Just as we set off the Canadians also headed off just ahead of us - they would become our
companions for the day just like yesterday afternoon.

The countryside was flatter than earlier, so there were fewer locks and longer stretches between locks. This made for some quite relaxed and peaceful traveling, and some interesting sites - like cyclists with clothes drying attachments:

The vegetation also changed - the never-ending plain trees have become diseased and quite a few are dying or have been cut down.

There were also a lot more other species, especially oak trees along the canal side today.

Although our boat only seems to have two speeds - slow and fast, we managed to stay behind the smaller Canadian boat for most of the day - canal etiquette dictates "no passing" (well, not quite) and "first in to the lock, first out". But hey, who's in a hurry?!

We all thought we'd get to Carcassonne before the 12:30pm French lunch break. Indeed, the second last lock-keeper before Carcassonne even texted the the next lock-keeper, just one kilometre ahead to wait for us. But no, just as we came into view he closed the gates and went inside.

What else to do but stop on the bank and have (yet another) boat picnic.

Right on 1:30pm the gates opened and we traveled the final 5 kilometres into Carcassone. This is by far the largest town we have passed through so far, and has many shops, bars and restaurants. The port is also very well equipped, and well organised.

The one "negative" was that parking was "rear-to-kerb" which meant that the captain had to back the boat into a fairly narrow space. Of course, he nailed it first time!

 The more macho captains that arrived during the afternoon produced all sorts of successful, and unsuccessful attempts at mooring their boats. By evening the little port was "chockers".

Now Carcassonne is very famous for it's "Cite" - a spectacular large fortress, castle and walled town on the outskirts of the modern city.

But more of Le Cite tomorrow. This evening has started with two G&T, free WiFi in the nearby bar (hence this blog post),

and will end with another fine French meal...