Bailly to Vincellottes

Sunday 6^th April – Tuesday 8^th April

We liked the mooring so much at Bailly we stayed until Tuesday morning.  It was very quiet there, with a great view of the river, and sound of the birdsong was brilliant. 

We found out that you get the tokens for the electric and water from the Bailly Wine Cave up the hill. So we cycled up there and bought two tokens for 1 euro each.  You have to go right into the tunnel to where they run the wine tasting tours. 1 token gives you either 12 hrs of electric or 30 minutes of water.  

One day we went for a circular bike ride to Champs-sur-Yonne, which was back towards Auxerre and we then crossed the river to take a cycle path to Viincellottes to cross another bridge to then get back to the boat at Bailly.   At Vincellottes we cycled past a lovely looking restaurant by the river and they were busy serving lunch and decided we’d go there later in the week when we planned to moor up near Vincellottes.

We cycled to Champs-sur-Yonne, a very nice village/town with a supermarket
I can't resist taking photos of the wisteria

Champs-sur-Yonne
In the foreground is the river Yonne then there is excess water spilling over from the canalised section
we had travelled a few days before.  We would have loved a photo of us going along this section from this angle

Champs-sur-Yonne
You can see the canal on the left and the river on the right

After our circular bike ride,  a lovely day, shopping bag full of goodies

A beautiful sunset at Bailly

We moved our boat onto Vincellottes on Tuesday morning, only about 2km and 1 lock.  We really are taking it slowly.  We moored up in a short section of canal, there is a bit more activity here as there is a camping/motorhome site on the other side of the canal to our mooring.  We went for a walk around Vincellottes, a really lovely old village, and found out the nice restaurant we had seen  is closed until Thursday.  We spoke to the owner who was outside the restaurant loading something into his car.  He told us he was sorry that he was closed.  He explained it was the first time in 25 years that he had decided to close on Tuesdays and Wednesdays for the off peak season.  He was very chatty.  He told us they had not had much rain this winter, we told him the UK obviously had received it instead!  He was bemoaning the fact that as it hadn’t been very cold this winter so there weren’t many mushrooms around, and that if we found any he would buy them from us.

We came away thinking he was so nice that maybe we should stay until Friday morning so that we could go to his restaurant on Thursday. 

Leaving Bailly

Our mooring at Vincelottes PK160.5 

Wednesday 9^th April

We woke up to a beautiful sunny day, a chilly start but we are not complaining.  We went for a 3km bike ride, some of it up hill to a village called Irancy, a beautiful village with lots of wine caves.  We found one called ‘Chais & Crus’, that was open and we partook in a wine tasting.  The owner of the winery, Olivier, was brilliant at explaining the different wines he produces.  The village of Irancy produce red wines from the pinot noir and César grape, nearby St Bris produces a white wine from the sauvignon grape, and he also has vineyards in Chablis and produces a Premier Cru and a beautiful soft Cremant de Bourgogne (the local ‘champagne’).   We purchased rather too much to take back on our bikes so Olivier kindly offered to drop it off for us in the evening.  Our cycle back to the boat at Vincellottes was very easy, all downhill, albeit a bit wobbly!

Our wine duly arrived as promised in the evening, delivered by Olivier and his grownup grandson.  We all sat on the back deck drinking some Chablis we had chilled in the fridge that we'd bought from a supermarket in Auxerre; he politely said it wasn’t bad! What do you give a quality wine producer to drink?   

Irancy with the vineyards on the hillside

Irancy was a lovely old town to walk around, there were quite a few wine caves.
We chose Chais & Cru in the centre of the town as it seemed the most welcoming (open!).

 Thursday 10^th April

Another amazing day, not a cloud in the sky, but it was cold during the night, it was very cozy in the boat but it looks like there was a frost during the night.  We had a lazy morning, we then went to the restaurant in Vincellottes called ‘Auberge Les Tilleuls’ for a very special lunch.  We sat on the terrace by the river Yonne sitting in the sun.  We had a lovely meal, although drinking at lunchtime isn’t a good idea, we came back and read books for a short time and then fell asleep!  We plan to be up early tomorrow to move on to Mailly-le-Chateau.

A beautiful place for a fantastic lunch at 'Auberge Les Tilleuls"
at Vincelottes over looking the river Yonne