Fading Memories

Tuesday, September 17, 2019

Sharing “our” town.
Saturday 17th August - Bruges

There’s been a bit of press lately about over-tourism in the world’s hot spots, and Bruges is not exempt from this influx.

There’s not a lot of point in popping downtown for a quiet coffee on a warm day in the middle of the summer holidays, when a cruise ship and eleventy-thirteen tour buses have disgorged their passengers, but one lives in hope.

While it was good to be out and about for a bit and to whizz past all those little nooks and crannies we love about the town, it was even better to reassure the other of us that she wasn’t missing aa great deal at the moment, and that next week after the holidays will be a far better time to venture out.

We figured there’s no sense hanging around in Gent all alone when we can hang around in Bruges with our mates, so no doubt inspired by last year’s voyage on the Queen Mary, while the Skipper, Steward and Deckhand readied the ship for departure, the other aboard remained in repose.

The fact that she could do that while lying so close to Mr Perkins’ rumbling is a fair indication of just how unwell her body was, despite protestation from her head that she’s possibly feeling a little better.

The few hours resting “at sea” didn’t appear to do her any additional harm, and we were welcomed in the already crowded little port to the news that Dave and Ria had preceded us, and that snuggled up beside the “Max” would be a perfect place from which to witness the weekend’s festivities in the park opposite.

Without spectacles people of a certain age have to resort to reading only the headlines, or in the case of the Kindle, we can enlarge the lettering to school level “year one”, and by tracing each word with an index finger eventually get the gist of what’s going on. Being able to read only the headlines doesn’t necessarily work with signs proclaiming “DANGER” or “ATTENTION” though, as the actual cause of the danger or reason for paying attention is lost in a sea of colourful blur.

For this reason, we thought it prudent that the missing spectacles should be replaced as expeditiously as possible with a pair of those cheap magnifying types that can be found just about anywhere when one has no need for them, but which dissolve into thin air when does,

Having a need for them on the Assumption Day holiday in Belgium turned out to be a bit of mistake as it is one of those serious sorts of holidays when everyone takes the day off, sleeps quite late and goes into town, except for the shopkeepers who apparently simply take the day off.

After not giving him a pass mark at shopping earlier in the week, the one who should know better, and feeling a teensy bit better “in herself” as they once used to say, decided to send him to Ikea, where with the aid of digital video conferencing, he might pick up some things for the boat.

Once again alone in the big outside world, he did manage to find the big blue shop at the end of the tramline easily, but it was then that the troubles began. Who would have thought that doona covers and pillow slips, sold through a giant international chain would vary in size between countries? Therefore, after agreeing via satellite link, on colour, texture and myriad other fine points, it was a little disappointing to discover that if there is any Union in Europe it doesn’t extend to size of pillows and bed covers, which varied considerably from the French-bought ones we have on board. Similarly the hanging shelves in our cupboards are exactly different to the ones currently on sale, so replacements for them were quickly crossed from the list.

The new frypans and plastic squeegee, were some consolation and this remote shopping lark seemed to increase the level of cheer aboard immensely, lessened just a bit when he discovered his spectacles were no doubt still enjoying their journey on the number one tram.

We had planned to see quite a lot of Gent this year, but we’ve had enough practice doing naught to slip back into that mode with barely a whimper. Well fair enough, there was the odd whimper from the aft cabin, but it had nothing to do with wanting to get out and about.

The quiet aboard is punctuated only by that alarm five times a day. Conversation is mostly limited to things involving medication and food, and there’s a distinct aura of stoicism emanating from back there as another day fades quietly by.

Meanwhile, outside the world keeps rushing by and having a good time apparently oblivious to our non-comings and goings.

At least it’s not the plague.
Monday 12th August - Gent

It’s not exactly like a hospital, but it’s so quiet that there’s no need at all for one of us to don his hearing aids. We are both a little spooked by the book we’ve recently read about the spread of the bubonic plague in the middle ages, and take heart from time to time that thus far there is no bleeding from the eyes or nose, so it probably isn’t that.

No-one’s going anywhere any time soon although in between long bouts of sleep, and the odd paracetamol sandwich, one of us quite bizarrely decided she can’t lie around all day and sent the other off with a list of meats and vegetables which she intended to turn into dinner. The other perhaps sensing an opportunity, or perhaps just a little overwhelmed at being allowed to go into a supermarket unsupervised may well have forgotten that list or at least forgotten to read it.

“I’m not in the mood for zucchini or cauliflower”, he thought, and she didn’t specify which kind of onion, which made it all a bit hard really, and besides the only carrots on display had green stuff sprouting from the top of them. The three flavours of grated cheese on the other hand, and the pack of Rochefort, and the cherry tomatoes would go well with those lardons and we already have macaroni on board……

Well there’s no crying over spilt milk, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t berate ourselves for our stupidity, which one of us did pretty much all day as he took the boat to Gent while the other slept somewhat less than blissfully on as the virus began to let itself be known in a more well...virulent way.

We were only too aware of the availability of a vaccine for shingles and had fully intended to do something about it before we left, but in the usual running around it got pushed out of mind, thinking that we’d have plenty of time to take care of it on our return. We were aware of the risks of contracting it too, and while the probability is quite high for anyone over a certain age, perhaps we thought that the probability in our carefree, laid back world it would be somewhat reduced, and perhaps that’s what the anti-vax mob thinks too and like us, they are wrong.

Of course we have become well informed about the herpes zoster virus in the past few days, and now wait with some trepidation as it runs its course. For now, each time our alarm rings as a reminder to take the required medication, and that’s six times each day, we are reminded that all of this could have been avoided quite simply had we not chosen to be “too busy” to arrange for inoculation.

That “insect bite” on her hip was starting to annoy both of us, even though there was no sign of it as far as we could see, but it was her hip and she was sure that something was terribly amiss.

The nice man in the tourist office found a doctor who would see us on a Saturday. The doctor, before agreeing to interrupt his morning cautiously asked about the symptoms and then firmly advised that we should get a taxi to see him immediately. “Gordelroos”, he said almost immediately upon our arrival, and confirmed it by pointing out the beginning of what he said would become a nasty rash although to our untrained eyes looked more like a pair of mosquito bites.

After a good deal of detailed explanation he counselled us to have the prescription filled immediately as the pharmacies would close for the weekend shortly, and we might be even more unhappy if we did not. “Gordelroos” is known as shingles in our language, and responds best if treatment is commenced early. Hopefully, all being well, the reconstruction will be no less successful than it was in the town of Kortrijk post-bombing, and if we are in time with the medication, the damage will be less severe on the way through too.

Time flies when you are having fun, and we’ve had a lot of fun this week. Consoled only with the thought that that we’d had a wonderful time…. and a wonderful breakfast… and we’d brought sandwiches for lunch instead of returning for that dreadful cold Pizza we’d found in Köln on the way over, we managed to board our train to Berlin and ultimately Kortrijk with barely a tear showing.

As that warm glow of time in company with good friends began to mingle with that of the setting sun and we were nearing “home” once more, one of us began to complain again about “that insect bite”, adding that her whole after-region was feeling numb.

The other of us wondered quietly to himself if that was not an unexpected consequence of sitting on a train for a ten hour stretch, but wisely remained silent.

If one closes ones eyes for a bit and tries to imagine a couple of Danes dining with a couple of Australians most recently from Belgium, in a Thai Café on a footpath in a Dutch community in the former East Germany, then one won’t come anywhere near close to unravelling the wonder that is Potsdam.

At first its a bit disconcerting, trying to understand that by most accounts pretty much all of it had been destroyed by bombing in the nineteen forties. Yet, the original historic and very charming Dutch district has been “preserved” apparently exactly as it was. The fantastic castles and Sansoucci gardens, rightly World Heritage listed have also been “preserved” in a state of magnificence which reminded us very much of some of the preserved sites we have seen in other former Soviet states. It’s all very beautiful but what we see does not compute when viewed against post war photos of bombing destruction.

Where did the former German Democratic Republic obtain the resources for this rebuilding, and what was it thinking, reinforcing connections to the Tsarist past? The brick construction, with its thin veneer of sandstone coloured render does not particularly reek of Prussian opulence either, but in our ignorence we are not about to question its authenticity. These are the sort of questions that irritate until they are scratched, just like the insect bite that one of us was mumbling about, so we have yet another reason to return at some time in the future.

Time actually stands still when one has nothing to do and all day to do it, so it was that after a long sleep, a leisurely breakfast, a few lengthy conversations and several cups of coffee we still had more than enough left in our day to have lunch and return to port where we might even get to visit that mysterious Tea House.

We had to earn our tea though. A visit to the Industrial Museum left us with imaginations racing, asking more questions than the display could answer, which is quite possibly the mark of a truly successful museum. It sits in an unrestored, heavily cleaned yet unsanitised state, displaying photographs of the jubilant “gang of three” Churchill, Stalin and Roosevelt dividing the spoils amid what was less than a pile of still smouldering post-war rubble, the archaic machinery still in use until so very recently that we felt discomfort with the working conditions of the time, the joyous concerts and theatre shows produced by workers formed into smiling acrobatic troupes with names like “The glorious people’s steelworks shift number three” all displayed in an almost ad hoc manner that left us more than a bit thankful that by accident of birth we had not been employed there.

We needed our tea after that; a wonderful iced tea in deference to the warmth of the afternoon, served on that terrace by the water, with apple cake and good humour. The teashop, full of curious was a feast for our eyes as well, although the asking prices for them made those same eyes water. This was no relic of former times but a sign of just how far the economy has progressed since the political changes that brought about closure of the steelworks.

There’s no point in staying on a boat if you don’t do nothing for a time, and we have heard it said that the lakes in this part of the world are without peer for that particular occupation.

In truth we found it a little disorienting. The resemblance to some of the cruising grounds of our earlier days half a world away was uncanny, and as we sat at anchor a hundred metres or so from the shore, slowly rotating with the world instead of letting it rush by, we couldn’t shake the feeling that we had turned back the clock to by almost half a century.

The lakes and waterways are everything their reputation holds them to be, and they will remain on our list of places which we must visit again in the event that we live long enough to do so.

We spent last evening inspecting all the nooks and crannies on “Sommerwind” the boat that Jørn and Birgit accidentally bought while on their way to see us last year, and rated it very highly indeed. This morning they thought we might take a little cruise around Brandenburg. After that they said, with a good deal of enthusiasm, we would walk around the town centre and visit a wonderful tea house with a little terrace right on the water, where we could take our afternoon refreshment.

Brandenburg by water is unsurprisingly not like any of the places we had been before, with its eclectic mix of inner city waterfront holiday shacks from “former times” and modern loft conversions and waterfront apartments all on a very splendid and quite busy waterway. Impressive though that little cruise was, the thought of those refreshments ensured that we were back in our dock in time to do some exploring on foot in the vicinity of that teahouse.

Unaccustomed to travelling with us, our Danish friends seemed taken aback when on arriving at said teahouse we were greeted by one of those familiar little signs. This one quietly proclaimed that no one was home and perhaps we should try again after Wednesday. In the meantime, we assuaged our disappointment at one of those particularly Germanic ice cream cafes, where even the smallest serve confirms the country’s unofficial motto: “Too much ice cream is barely enough”.

In train
Sunday 4th August - Kortrijk to Brandenburg

We had to be up so early to catch the first train that we were half way across Belgium before the sun came up.

The leather clad seats and wifi equipped first class carriages that our last minute tickets had bought at a great discount were so comfortable that we would have paid extra for them, as except for the time spent negotiating changes in Brussels, Cologne (although all the signs insisted that we were in Köln), and Berlin we had been sitting in them for far longer than a statutory working day.

Not for the first time in our lives we hopped off a train, (or plane or out of a car), heads spinning, into that wonderful world where conversations that had been in progress more than a year ago, recommenced where they had been left off from four mouths concurrently, each of us unable to believe that it had been more than a few hours since the last time we were together.

We’d been wondering what to do to overcome the incessant urge we've developed of late, to constantly be on move, when we received a note from Jørn and Birgit kindly extending an invitation for us to inspect their new boat.

Since their new boat is moored only a couple of countries and four connecting trains away, immediately set about sorting a few small logistical things, which is shorthand for: “we bought the tickets”.

Then began to think about what we needed to do in order to leave tomorrow, but the more we thought about it the fewer things needed doing, so by the end of the afternoon’s thought everything seemed to be quite ready for us to depart first thing in the morning.

We’re trying to control our itchy feet, so paid for a few night’s stay in Kortrijk in an effort to keep ourselves in one spot for a bit.

There’s no need to visit the tourist office though, we’ve been to the museums and galleries and we enjoy just wandering in a pattern so random that there’s no pattern at all, just to see what we can see around the next corner.

It’s a bit disconcerting though in what should be in the middle of the summer holidays, to find the streets so deserted. Even the waterfront food places were almost devoid of customers today. The main street was only missing some tumbleweed to confirm that we were in a ghost town. Perhaps they have all gone to the coast for a holiday, or perhaps they only come out at night.

Scoot
Thursday 1st August - Kortrijk

They’ve been littering the footpaths of Brisbane for a while, surrounded by an aura of controversy or perhaps debate as to whether they are or aren’t safe or even appropriate means of transport, and just last month, sadly, the first death by electric scooter (although technically it was by double decker bus) occurred in London.

We noticed the first proliferation of the domesticated versions in Amiens, with numbers of middle-aged suit wearing professionals seeming to prefer them to cycling as a quick and convenient means of getting around. In some of the urban areas of France with miles of smooth pavement and bustling cycle ways, they seem to make sense, or at least more sense than those electric uni-wheels that impossibly whisk their riders silently by in an incomrehensible blur.

In Kortrijk the rental ones are like a plague, admittedly in its dormant stage. Just how the company which owns them makes a living is a mystery as they sit in large numbers in every square and on every corner forming a sort of trip hazard for the elderly or the careless (insert roll-eyes emoticon), while potential customers try to figure out how to get their tiny wheels across the ancient cobbles.

We arrived in plenty of time to don the raincoats for the first time in a few months, and thus clad to amble through the centre of town, even lingering over a warm lunch in a heated cafe while wondering why it is that climate change seems to be a daily or even hourly phenomenon.

We like Lille and we thought yesterday we may stay for a while, but by the time we woke unusually early this morning we had both apparently formed the view in our sleep that we’d like to be wandering the streets of Kortrijk instead.

Perhaps it is a result of all the not-moving we’ve been doing all summer, that we’ve suddenly been overwhelmed by a desire to keep going. We’ll either work that out of our systems over the next few days, or we’ll be writing our next episode from Gent!

The first time we travelled on the stretch of water between Douai and Kortrijk we were quite taken by the beauty that was hidden in plain sight, disguised as heavy industry. We have not been disappointed in subsequent visits either, except that this time, our ill advised decision to move once again into the face of a building storm front, left us with no time to properly poke around.

Admittedly some don’t seem to experience the same thrill we do as they wander past the giant recycling yards, the steaming conveyors and the crumbling factories.

Others (like our friend Koos) would admonish us for not allowing ourselves weeks to properly explore every rusted bolt along the way, instead, racing past with one eye on the "road", camera in one hand, wheel in the other hoping to dash off a shot or two to which will leave us wondering what we missed. There’s always a next time.

According to the internet there were strong winds building off the coast and they’d be with us by the end of the day, making conditions rather too difficult to contemplate navigating a boat in small spaces like the old canal at Lille for instance, where we had entertained thoughts of being tonight.

Years of experience tell us that leaving in the face of a forecast like that is one of the few ways one can get oneself into trouble in a boat, including in a narrow canal with limited places to tie should something go wrong. At the same time we looked up at the sky for signs of impending doom and a little voice in the back of our heads shouted “She’ll be right”, so we took off anyway with our toes and fingers crossed.

Thankfully the breeze had only built to a still manageable dull roar by the time we passed through the second and last lock of the day but it did seem to be increasing by the minute. Unwilling to push our luck and with surprisingly little shouting, we called it quits, snugging ourselves safely in the little inlet in Don before the worst of it arrived.

It’s probably a reaction to all the green we’ve been immersed in during the last couple of months, but now we’re back in a town and even the surface of the canal seems to be paved.

It’s curiously pleasant actually, to be appreciating the sounds, smells, textures and dare we say it, movement of a proper urban environment although we have become used to the holidaying families walking and cycling along the river, happily waving to us and sharing their joy in the simple pleasure of being a part of the great outdoors.

Here the mood is quite different as they rush past with determined expressions, their minds in other places, and we feel quite detached. Perhaps we should pick up the pace a bit as well.

Running down the Freeway
Saturday 27th July - Ryalcourt to Douai

Following yesterday’s note, the first ships we saw today were “Freedom” pushing “Freeway” carrying a total of six hundred tons of payload. Sadly, because everyone wants to get in front of the big load, no matter how illogical that might be, their eighty metres total length fitted into a ninety metre long lock without leaving enough room for us even if we’d taken a big run at it.

Having to wait at that first lock of the day sealed our fate, We would be following the ship all day, catching it at each lock and because traffic was quite heavy, we’d have another short wait while the upstream bound ship completed it’s locking process, before starting it all again.

It doesn’t seem much, that twenty minute or so wait, but particularly when it’s windy and the raining, by the tenth lock of the day it takes all of one’s resolve not to find it a teensy bit tedious, which is quite possibly just one extra reason why after that particular lock, we were quite looking forward to stopping for a day or two.

Heading down the highway in too much wind and too little temperature for comfort (I know, I know, we can never be happy) with the sky looking as though it was filled with actual purple rain, the approach of the curiously named “Turquoise” got us all a-thinking about the nature of boat names and particularly those brandished by commercial ships plying the inland waters (which “Turquoise” is not).

You never see a proper ship called “Sea Wind” or “Summer Breeze”. Their owners have bigger dreams.

Their ships are named for heroes, for aspirations and often just for fun, curiously in languages other than those spoken by the crew. Today alone we have crossed paths with two thousand tons of “Stewball” as well as:“Moonraker”, “Athena”, ”Helena”, ”Posiedon”, “Mexico”, ”Mexicali”, “Rottweiler”, ”Pitbull”, ”Largo”,” Touriste”,” Tourisme”,” California”,” Arkansas”,” Capri’ and perhaps the most aspirational of all:

“Queensland”.

This must be how lobsters feel, puzzled as they slowly come to the boil. It all looks cool enough, yet on board the boat things are running well into the forties. We are therefore not on board the boat.

The little supermarket in the village is air conditioned, and we did give a brief thought to painting our fingernails in multi colours to disguise ourselves as a packet of M&Ms in the hope of hiding out there for the day, settling instead to linger while choosing which ice block would last the longest on the walk back.

There we were, lying on our cushions doing not much at all for the fourth successive day of uncomfortable temperature, dreaming of the promise of the cool change, jeans, jumpers and wet weather which apparently the morrow will bring.

Bray-sur-Somme according to our rather old chart book, is hidden a few kilometres up a windy bit of the Somme which is badly silted up and not at all navigable. While mostly we take a good deal of notice of our charts, we were fairly sure we could get there without great risk, and a few careful enquiries did nothing to dissuade us.

Moving made for a pleasant diversion in the heat, and moving through narrow waterways lined with dense forest made it even more pleasurable, slowly of course lest we should come to grief on the shallow bits, which thankfully we did not.

We found a place with shade that we deemed suitable to resume our lolling about and whinging about how hot it was, and after a small orientating stroll, set about doing so for the rest of yet another pleasant albeit too warm for our tastes afternoon.

Yesterday we were so comfortable under our tree with the temperature reaching the upper thirties, that we decided to repeat it exactly.

We had the same shady tree, the same cool towels, the same book,the same man with the dog and the beer and the music, and the same harvester droning away, except that it had finished its work over the hill and had begun on the flats opposite.

This was not a good thing as it was just close enough so that the clouds of dust it was creating could spread and settle on our wet clothing, and find its way into every pore of the boat interior as well. Perhaps tomorrow we won’t try to repeat today after all.

When the forecast tells us to prepare for four days of extreme temperature, we tend to panic, notwithstanding that in the very same temperature at home one of us would be digging holes or building something in humidity at least three times that which we experience here.

But we aren’t at home and we don't have any holes to dig, so we find a shady tree and lie about with only the sounds of harvesting happening on a hill far away (and the old man with the dog who sits at the picnic table drinking beer and listening to his car radio), commiserating with each other, alternately reading and wiping ourselves with cool wet towels, congratulating ourselves at the end of the day that we have made it through without fuss or the benefit of ceiling fans.

With one of us still lamenting the loss of our continuous source of wildflowers, a cheerful pot of purple somethings called out from the “throw out table” in the supermarket today, and found itself transported to a place where it will spend the rest of its natural life.

Naturally, the ugly plastic pot was exactly too large to fit inside one of our ever growing collection of ceramic pots-that-last-year’s-orchid-came-in and exactly the wrong shape to risk a transplant, so we’ll pretend that grey plastic is the next big thing, and enjoy them while they last.

Eugène Poubelle invented refuse collection, a fact which is celebrated in the French language by adopting his name as the descriptive name for “garbage bin” so it always strikes us as odd that in a country which is historically synonymous with waste collection, we often have difficulty finding somewhere to dispose of ours.

There are often fewer bins in public spaces than would be considered adequate in less civilised countries, but it all seems to work because by and large in the absence of bins, people are in the habit of taking their refuse home with them. We, well Grahame actually to be technically correct, had been on a bit of a tidy up around “our bins”, tied the broken bags after picking up the stray stuff and placed them neatly on top of the lids.

It was an unhappy caravan park caretaker and self appointed guardian of the public purse, who on discovering his handiwork, presumed that it was our mess and explained in no uncertain terms that the only bins near our mooring beneath the sign that welcomed us, were not for our use. Unwilling to believe that we were not responsible, she gave us a large bag and directed us to use the facilities provided behind the school, omitting the bit about where exactly we might find the school were we to comply. Oh Mr Poubelle, how simple life must have been before you came along.

Technically we have a three day limit on our stay in any given spot, and (technically) would have been obliged to move yesterday, harvest or not.

Therefore it was a bit of good fortune really that (technically) we could start the clock again after our move, because Grahame and Aileen were on their way and had we not done so we would have been compelled to stay well beyond our welcome while we caught up with each other’s adventures.

Bill and Mandy turned too and before we could say “anyone for duck?” we were among a flock of Kiwis, bracing ourselves for what would inevitably turn into a three day party. There’s no sense in fighting the inevitable after all, and besides, we have just a few days until the onset of another serious heatwave, bigger and badder than the last, so we all needed to seriously enjoy the evening cool while we could.

A Lasting Legacy
Thursday 18th July - Corbie

The tourist office suggested that the Post Office at Villers-Bretonneux would be the nearest place we could obtain change to feed the electricity and water machine at our mooring, which seemed a bit odd given the preponderance of bakeries, supermarkets and other facilities in Corbie, which were apparently not in a position to do so, nor was the Post Office here for that matter.

More than just a place to get change though, here is the place where the relationship with our country runs deep indeed. It is truly astonishing to see the town hall with the usual inscription "liberty, equality, fraternity” framed by a pair of rampant kangaroos, the Australian flag flying in its forecourt. The reconstruction of the school was funded by the state of Victoria and each blackboard apparently still bears the inscription "N'oublions jamais l'Australie" (Let us never forget Australia).

For us though, the most poignant reminder of the past horrors was this modern piece of wall art, so clearly inspired by a number of monuments nearby dedicated to the fallen “war horses”. To feel the gratitude for those who were here so clearly conveyed even a century later is quite overwhelming. Their legacy is a huge burden to carry and we can't help but wonder if as a nation we are still equipped to do so.

We go to the bakery daily when there is one within a shouting distance, but even after a decade we haven’t quite mastered the dark art of carrying baguettes so they don’t arrived damaged in some way.

It’s imprinted on the DNA of the locals. They wander home seemingly without a care, coddling their loaves like the precious commodity they are. For the purpose of the journey at least, bread and man are one. They never suffer the careless breaks and squashes mid-loaf from holding them in one hand (isn’t that what the paper wrap is for?), nor do their loaves arrive with the ends missing from being scraped against doors and shopfittings while leaving the bakery, or flattened and bent from being tucked just a fraction too tightly into the shopping bag.

Perhaps if like them, we got into the habit of carrying a spare, we’d have a chance of getting one of them home intact.

We’d been happily moored in the quiet of the town quay beside the silos for a couple of days. It’s a lot more salubrious than it looks, quiet, and only a few hundred metres from the centre of town, surrounded on three sides by a leafy green backdrop.

Then the rains came, or at least the forecast did, giving notice to every farmer that ever there was that it might be time to get the wheat in. Farmers do this with machinery working from dawn to long after dusk filling great big dusty bins which great big tractors tow to town so that they can be unloaded into great big silos, clanging and roaring and billowing clouds of wheat dust as they go.

Ahh yes. Anyone paying attention would remember that we were moored beside the silos, and would perhaps rightly conclude that all those great big tractors caused our quiet to suffer, and the dust caused suffering of a different kind. Fortunately in this event the town provides a more peaceful alternative mooring just a few hundred metres further away, barely out of earshot, but upwind and in the middle of those leafy green surrounds.

The Australian government is said to have spent more than a hundred million of our dollars in the construction of the Sir John Monash Centre in the Australian cemetery near the village of Villers-Bretonneux, and it has all the attributes one might expect of a museum conceived a century after the actions it commemorates.

It’s a curious place, contemporary with the feeling of being “not from round here” and almost devoid of the usual crusty artefacts dug from the trenches. Instead modern multi media displays with more than five hours of commentary play in three languages via personal devices should one have the fortitude to take it all in.

In one way it’s a fitting tribute for the eyes of a new generation, in another perhaps it’s simply there for the gratification of Australian pilgrims, coming variously to pay homage to the lost or to pat themselves on the back in pride of the sacrifice of their forebears. No matter, for this is the region in which the Australian troops of the first world war left an impression so indelible that a country’s gratitude is still present a century later.

The National Day parade in Corbie was everything one would expect from the sort of small town where everyone is someone else's cousin.

There was no mass display of national defence, no tanks rolling through the streets, in fact there was no seething throng of people being held back by the crowd barriers either. Instead the town’s fire brigade brought up the rear of the rag-tag little parade with both of it’s units. A dozen boy scouts, a few volunteer fire fighters, three gendarmes and a city band which might very well have been inspired by the Keystone Cops enthusiastically provided the marching tunes in such a way that everyone in the parade could be confident of being in step with at least one instrument.

We gathered at the memorial for a wreath laying ceremony which might have been a trailer for a Pink Panther remake. Dignitaries in their tricolour sashes and funny hats watched solemnly, old soldiers formed an honour guard and the band failed to perform one of those marching manoeuvres where columns are supposed to turn back on themselves, instead falling about in little bunches of arms, legs, instruments and giggles, giving us perhaps a more potent symbol of our times than all that had gone before.

The calm that descended last night as the sun gently lowered itself into the river did not last.

It turns out that someone in the band that had caused us so much pain on the night of the Music Festival has another uncle running a cafe, this one just a few hundred metres from our otherwise idyllic spot. In spite of the presumably constant practice since we last heard them, they haven’t improved a bit although fortunately they haven’t learnt any new songs either, so the pain of listening to their entire repertoir was blissfully brief.

Quite understandably from our perspective at least there were no encores, but we decided to move on in the morning just in case they’d been invited back tonight.

Wombat!
Friday 12th July - Lamotte

When a shadow moved in the shrub next to our window last night, at first we thought we’d seen a rat although we certainly hadn’t smelled one.

A few minutes later the shadow climbed a little higher, skilfully pruning branches without the aid of secateurs. Then we noted that its tail was too short and its body too fat to be of that particularly malicious species. The fact that it had a tail meant we could be fairly sure it wasn’t a guinea pig, and not that we’d ever seen a beaver as far as we could recall, we were pretty sure it wasn’t one of them either.

Our attempt at fauna classification was admittedly a bit half-hearted, but we presumed it to be one of the vole family we more usually see swimming near the water’s edge. We were never introduced, and she continued to ignore us into the evening diligently collecting her prunings and dragging them into what we presume was a burrow just out of sight below the landing, either that or she’s building a bonfire and planning to smoke us out of her backyard.

A world without colour
Thursday 11th July - Lamotte

Ever since Sunny bequeathed us her orchid as she left on her homeward journey almost a decade ago, we have bought a new one at the beginning of each cruising year, just so that we can watch its flowers slowly fall off over the months that follow. An annual replacement has become an essential purchase except for one year when in a fit of daring, a bromeliad turned up in its place. This actually turned out to be a lot harder to kill but we still managed to disfigure it significantly over the course of our summer.

This year for a number of reasons that seem too complicated (or shallow) to reiterate, we never quite got around to procuring our plant for the year, so one of us has contented herself by collecting daily doses of wildflowers from the river bank, making them into posies and placing them in vases in such a way that even the other has to begrudgingly admit that a little extra brightness is added to our lives by their presence.

That was until this morning when we discovered, no doubt under the guise of maintenance, but we suspect in a deliberate effort to curtail this illicit poaching, the river banks had been maliciously slashed leaving them devoid of coloured life. It is a little early to tell what the impact on the interior of our little boat will be, but we are attempting to keep our chins up.

We probably walked further today than we travelled by boat, which is not to say that we walked very far.

Had it not been for that one last visit to the supermarket this morning before heading off to the very fringe of civilisation as we have known it for the past week, we may not have left the boat at all.

After all, when one stops in a rest area, one feels a certain obligation.

Somewhere unpronouncable.
Tuesday 9th July - Amiens

They are called floating gardens, but really the only thing that was floating in the Hortillonnages was us, or more correctly the little boat in which we were sitting zoned out completely as the commentary, droning on in a mechanical and expressionless way in a language we barely understand was no doubt taking us through the marvellous history of this complex web of tiny canals and islands.

We’d read much of it before, of the centuries when it was one of the great “food baskets” of the region, of the fights to preserve it in the face of changing agricultural methods, and of the necessity to embrace some change to preserve the essence of the place for future generations.

It is curious and beautiful and there is still a smattering of market gardens among the weekenders and overgrown allotments and a museum which does its best to remind us that once, life here was hard, and the edges weren’t retained with timber, and the boats which are curiously shaped to allow them to be loaded from the banks didn’t always have electric outboard motors, but at the end of the day, it was a lovey hour spent on the water so who could ask for anything more?

Downtown it was as though the city was taking a big deep breath after the weekend, perhaps a little hung over even, but no doubt setting itself for another big week of crowds and music and holiday celebrations, because summer is here and it’s seeping into every corner of the city.

Pop-up playgrounds of astonishing complexity have sprung up, climbing trees and beach volley ball courts have just appeared in places that were only park a day or two ago, accompanied by supervised activities both scheduled and ad hoc for the benefit of holidaying school children, and visiting Australians alike. In odd little corners of the city, deckchairs are appearing as though the seeds were sown in early spring and it’s taken till now for them to germinate.

The contrast between the celebration of summer throughout Europe and the almost non existent effort of our own town which derives its living from tourism, could not be more stark.

Last time we were here on a Sunday and we wondered if we could find a reason stop on the way back. The weather was chilly grey and overcast and the mood of the town seemed to match it as we walked the deserted streets in the middle of the day trying unsuccessfully to find just the merest hint of life.

That impression could not have been more opposite to the one that the city conveys in summer. Now there is a palpable buzz, a vibration if you believe the banners, that seems to bounce off the clear blue skiy, which itself seems to glow as if it’s been custom-built just for the town to enjoy.

Even though the centre of town was effectively closed for business, or perhaps in spite of that, everyone seemed to be out and about, convincing us that perhaps we should stay for a few more days to see if we can discover the cause.

We’ve seen light shows before. Some of them are good, some great and some (and we’re looking at you Nancy,) are really spectacular. We don’t want to sound like jaded travellers when we say that somewhere close to really spectacular, but for the absence of a gigantic square and with “only” the largest Gothic Cathedral in the world to use as a projection screen, lies Amiens’ nightly summer show.

Our lingering memory of it will not be of the thirty minutes or so of brilliantly clever animations which variously deconstructed the building or draped it in a luscious cloak nor any of the other special effects, mesmerising though they were, but of that final static illumination, “painting” the building as historical study suggests it may well have been in the middle ages.

We stayed as long as we dared, walking up, wanting to touch, knowing that the paint wasn’t real but unable to convince our brains otherwise. What happened, we wondered as we walked home around midnight, to our aesthetic sensibilities over the last thousand years or so, which allowed this wonder to turn beige? Perhaps it’s time to give the man from Dulux a call.

When we passed through a month ago, Amiens was asleep under a blanket of cloud and chill that felt as though the dregs of winter were going to hang around forever. Even our mooring in front of the English Pub, notorious for the late night shenanigans of its patrons was if not entirely silent, at least quietly subdued.

When we suggested to Anthony, the ever cheery ever helpful controller of river traffic on the Somme, that we might wait until after the weekend before moving “downtown”, he was very quick to suggest that could well be a bit less peaceful there now that the sun is out than perhaps it was on our last visit, and since there is almost no traffic on the river and our little spot opposite his office was quiet and shady to boot, we would be best to think carefully about not moving at all.

We walked around to the other place in the early afternoon where our decision to stay put was firmly vindicated. We were quite amazed at the difference a bit of blue sky can make. With ten hours or more until evening, the shadows were already seething with bodies intent on not wasting a minute of their weekend, some already no doubt planning new ways of keeping the port awake all night.

Camouflage.
Thursday 4th July - Samara to Amiens

The signs setting out the mooring rules on the Somme are in two languages. Whether by accident or design people who can read the French version are allowed to stay for “3 jours” (three days) while those reading the English translation are limited to “48 hours”.

Naturally there are times when one would like to stay a little longer in one place, and this can be achieved in a number of ways, the most obvious of which is “ask for permission”. Failing that it’s a bit inconvenient but perfectly acceptable to move away for a day or perhaps in the pedantic English version, an hour, and start the calendar (in French) or clock (in English) again.

When all else fails, there’s the “blend in with the background and hope no-one notices” option.

We stood transfixed in the Samara Archaeology Museum yesterday, watching in the semi darkness of a prehistoric hut, as a man patiently explained the ins and outs of making paleo-fire, ostensibly by banging together a couple of rocks. We were in a group of thirty or so eight year olds. We are not sure whether it was his absolutely charming manner with the children, their absolute attention to his questions or the thoroughness of his explanation, but after half an hour and a raging fire burning, we left feeling there was little left to learn on the subject.

Then we moved on to watch the blacksmith, who had obviously been to the same charm school as the “fire and rocks” guy, gently coaxing the children around despite their fear of the roar of the fire as he pumped his bellows. “How will we know when the metal is ready?” he asked, “Will we just wait for the ‘DING’?(of the microwave timer)”.

Having spent the better part of the day in the company of these expert demonstrators (and hundreds of primary school children of exemplary behaviour), we left confident that despite the language barrier, we could start a fire, make a spear, weave a hat and possible even build a pot. About the only mystery remaining, which if it was explained was not understood, nor could we find a demonstration, is “how did iron-age man make the rubber bands needed to keep their cute little man-buns in check?”

A Day of Archaeology
Tuesday 2nd July - Picquigny to Samara

Not very far from Picquigny, there is a shady little mooring bathed in green that happens to be adjacent to “Samara”, a museum of History and Archeology, with a nature park thrown in for good measure. We spent much of the day there, happily crunching through the sands of time, fascinated as always at how the evolution of man has been recorded and interpreted by experts.

Our own archeological endeavours earlier in the morning had almost left the work of those professionals in the shade. To our astonishment, the cafe which featured in yesterday’s photo, the one that appeared to be boarded up with the eclectic miscellany in its window and left to rot, was alive and well as we wandered past in search of a bakery. More horrifying than that, the miscellany appeared to be actual current stock!

In complete fascination and perhaps no small amount of awe, we made a complete catalogue of the cracked and faded items in the window with a view to sending a copy to the nice folk at Samara for their professional interpretation.

six fidget spinners,
a few cigarette packets of the kind that automatically eject cigarettes when opened,
two racks of sunfaded batteries,
twelve imitation leather watchbands in three styles,
three packets of charcoal fire starters,
a torch,
two leather purses,
two tubes of superglue,
one glossy plastic dog turd.

AND they sell postage stamps too!

With many of the shops shuttered, some with signs removed, the last vestiges of stock left sitting faded in the sun, it’s a bit of sport to try to identify the business by it's somewhat eclectic some may say miscellaneous collection of leftovers. If it is diversity that keeps the remaining small businesses afloat then the funeral parlour which sells a comprehensive range of fishing equipment is likely to survive into the next millennium.

A more conventional pathway to economic survival might be to simply open the doors at a time when the customers were not elsewhere.

Today for instance, the baker had sold out of croissants yesterday but did not bake more because they are going to be closed tomorrow. We could have tried the little supermarket if they weren’t closed “exceptionally” for stocktake. Even the castle ruins are only open in the summer holidays (for inspection with burning torches no less) on Fridays by appointment. We do like this little town though even if it gives us the distinct impression that “we should have been here yesterday”.

The never ending story.
Sunday 30th June - Long to Picquigny

Except for the minor and quite reasonable cost of requiring a two Euro coin from time to time to feed the little green boxes which control our water and electricity supply, incredibly there are no other direct costs associated with navigation on the Somme.

Those little boxes are at the cause of a bit of a paradox. Electricity and water are supplied concurrently, so when we insert a coin with the intention of topping up our water, electricity is also available. The thought of that connection is enough to send one of us into a washing frenzy as load after load of slightly soiled or maybe even soon to be soiled items are dealt with by our electro-mechanical marvel. This is all well and good, but it also ensures that by the time our allotted electricity supply has expired, we are about run out of water.

It’s not easy to understand why it is so difficult to find the required coins, but it is one of our greatest challenges. For instance in asking in one town, we were directed to a post office in a village six kilometres away as a possible source. When we arrive somewhere, our first task is to seek out a business that is actually open, the next to find something to buy which is worth preferably a few cents more than five Euros. Then we offer a Ten in payment, ever hopeful that we won’t be handed a fistful of twenty cent pieces in change.

In Picquigny we hit the jackpot, leaving the bakery at the far end of town clutching FIVE of the elusive coins in addition to our bakery treats, which should be sufficient to allow us to hang up our walking shoes for a few days at least.

Sandwiches again.
Saturday 29th June - Long

Several people had recommended or even insisted that we should not miss eating at the little bar in town, the uniquely named “Café Français”.

We’d turned up yesterday afternoon to see if a reservation was necessary for dinner, but they don’t do dinner so thinking on our feet we said “lunch tomorrow then” and were given to understand that no reservations would be necessary.

One thing led to another and it a little after the beginning of lunch o’clock by the time our act was sufficiently together for us to cross the bridge that leads into town. By then every one of the chequered table cloths in the place were covered with drinks and food and arms and paraphernalia that did not belong to us. It seemed that in our absence every cyclist that ever there was had heard about the “Café Français” and had simply turned up from nowhere, getting their luncheon acts together well before ours.

Ahh well, it was an outing, and a lovely walk back to “Café Joyeux”, where every meal is the “plate of the day” and no reservations are necessary at any time.