Rangali Adventures: I'Isle-sur-Le-Doubs to Montbéliard/Montbéliard to Dannemarie/Dannemarie to Mulhouse

Monday 30th June

I'Isle-sur-Le-Doubs to Montbéliard

12locks, 2 drawbridges, 24km

5 hours

We left I'Isle-sur-Le-Doubs at 10am after going to the supermarket over the road to do some shopping. We travelled on the canal all day today, no river, and the locks were so much easier. The reason is even though most of the river locks were only rising by 2m, the lock would be 4m deep, making it more difficult to throw the rope up onto the bollard. The river locks must be deeper to allow for when the river is in flood. Most of canal today was wide and with good depth. We only saw one boat going the other way all day.

We had to cross river Doubs at one point, but even though we've had some heavy downpours the past couple of days, the river caused us no problem at all, and if it was in flood we wouldn't have been allowed to cross it, the lock before that section would have been closed.

We had two drawbridges to negotiate, the first one is right next to a VNF office, so it was opened by a young lady just as we arrived. The second bridge we had to wait for about 5 minutes, we were wondering what we should do but a finally man arrived to operate it, so the last lock we came through must have triggered an a alert. The automatic locks have been brilliant, we've only encountered a couple malfunctioning locks so far.

The port at Montbéliard has three floating pontoons with hammerhead ends, which where we moored up. The port is having a facelift and it will look very smart when it's finished, but some of the quayside moorings were not available.

Montbéliard is a very nice town, so seeing as we have had 8 consecutive days travelling we decided to stay here for two nights. When we leave here we have to inform the VNF because we will be going onto manual locks. They have to be informed, by 4pm, the day before you wish to travel.

Tuesday 1st July

Montbéliard

Today we had a lovely walk through the town gardens by the river Allan, (we've now left the river Doubs), we partook in a little retail therapy, and we both had a haircut. It's a lovely sunny day today, so we spent the afternoon on the back deck.

Wednesday 2nd July

Montbéliard to Dannemarie

30km 26 locks, 1 swingbridge

9 hours

We had a terrifically long day today with 5 up locks and 21 down, which included a chain of 15 locks. We left Montbéliard at 7.30am and we arrived very tired at Dannmarie. We were thinking of stopping at Montreaux-Chateaux at the summit, we arrived there at 12.30pm but it looked quite busy, and we were doing so well, we thought we would carry on.

The day started dull and grey and we did have some rain along the way, but just as we reached the summit the weather improved and it ended up being a very pleasant sunny afternoon.

We had to hand back our trusty electronic lock control box at ecluse number 8. This lock and all the subsequent 17 locks, are manually controlled. We had one lock keeper take us to the summit, and for the long chain of locks we had girl students, who obviously had just started, and were a little nervous but were great. They had bikes to ride in between the locks, when they were looking after us it was all down hill, but it will keep them fit when they are going up the other way, especially when its a hot day.

A reason why we are pushing on is that we want to get to Mulhouse to have some time there before taking the Grand Canal d'Alsace to Strasbourg on Sunday. We are thinking, and have been advised, that Sunday is the best day to travel on this commercial highway. The following Sunday is July 13th and it means we wont be anywhere significant for July 14th (Bastille day/Kev's birthday), which would be a shame, so we will go this Sunday instead.

On our way down the chain of locks, an eclusier in a van came to ask us what our plans were for the next day. We said we were going to continue to Mulhouse. He gave us a time of 9.30am start time, but then later on at a lower lock he came back and said we would have to go at 10am. They are obviously busy with boats tomorrow, and are trying to fit suitable sized boats together. We travelled from the summit with a sailing boat, it looked like he had been asked to wait for us because as soon as we arrived at the summit lock, at Montreaux-Chateaux he cast off from his mooring and motored on ahead of us. He went into the first (down) lock ahead of us, but as we slowly approached, he changed his mind, and backed out of the lock and said for us to go first. We fitted in the locks well together, he was single manned, so Kev and the girl eclusiers helped him in each lock with his ropes. He only occasionally nearly hit us by coming in a bit too fast!

We arrived at Dannemarie at 4.30pm. After a cup of tea and a bit of a rest we walked the 15 minutes into Dannemarie. We were really pleasantly surprised at how nice the town is, and I sure we will see some lovely Asacian timbered buildings in Mulhouse but it was lovely to see this style of building in the town. On the Town Hall they have two resident Storks on the roof, they looked fantastic.

The rates for the port at Montbéliard

The port at Montbéliard, work nearly completed

Beautiful Park by the river Allan in Montbéliard

Kev having a French haircut

Leaving Montbéliard on a grey, rainy morning
The hammerhead pontoon was perfect for us

The VNF need to be informed when you are going to go through ecluse 8,
as the locks from 8 onwards are manually operated
i.e. they have to push the buttons to operate the automatic locks

Young students working the chain of locks

Dannaemarie Port

Dannemarie Town Hall and the resident Storks

Dannemarie

Thursday 3^rd July

Dannemarie to Mulhouse

23 Locks, 2 drawbridges and 23km

8 hours including 1hour lunch stop

We set off from our mooring just before 10am, to find we had slightly run aground, the pound that we are in is between two locks, very close together, so the water level must have dropped after we had arrived. I thought it had felt strange on the boat this morning, my balance felt off, and now I know why. Luckily we pushed ourselves free quite easily.

We had a great trip, but we arrived at Mulhouse at 6pm thoroughly exhausted, it has been a hot, long day. The scenery was beautiful; looking over to the Jura Mountains, we also saw quite a few Storks circling high above us, loads of Black Kites, and quite a few Kingfishers.

Yesterday I'd rung the Captinaire at Mulhouse port du plaisance, to reserve space for us at the port. When we arrived at Mulhouse we couldn’t get through to him on the phone to find out where we should moor up as it wasn't obvious to us. Some of the resident boaters suggested we moor along a wall with a NO PARKING sign RESERVED FOR HOTEL BOAT, and I gather they then went to fetch the Captinaire. Luckily he when he arrived he said where we had moored up was fine, and he went to fetch an extension cable for the electric.

We will stay here for two nights. We are just going to have a refreshing shower and then out for something to eat. Tomorrow we plan to go to the Automobile Museum by tram. The tramway and the railway is just by the port, so very handy.