Saying au revoir to our friends in Normandy (thanks again Debbie and Lloyd), we started our long journey over to Burgundy. It took about six hours to drive to Auxerre and then another half an hour to find the port de plaisance since our GPS kept sending us to a rundown skatepark miles away AND on the wrong side of the river. Sigh.

Anyway, we finally turned up and happily saw the boat was indeed in the water as promised. Big tick. The paint job has been half done. The hull looks good and they took the few bits of rust out which was a priority. Unfortunately they weren’t able to take the windows out and complete the job because of all the rain. Still it looks great and we are pleased with what they have done.

The other work we wanted done is still a ‘work in progress’. We are due to have a meeting this afternoon to see where they are at. One issue is we have no fridge door so we can’t really go and do a proper shop without the fridge. We are really hoping that will turn up asap! Where will we chill the rosé, gasp!

The river is still raging. Very fast flowing and very full. The Nivernais upriver is apparently open and today there was a notice from VNF saying the Yonne downriver was opening this morning. However while I was picking up mail I heard that a boat went into the first lock heading in that direction and has been tied up there vainly waiting for the lock to open. So not sure what’s happening there. Everyone is on to plan B. Including us. We were hoping to head up the Seine to Paris this year but it looks unlikely now.

However the silver lining is that we assume the Canal de Borgogne will have plenty of water and as we couldn’t get up there last year (ironically because of a lack of water) now would seem to be the time!

However I doubt we will be going anywhere in a hurry as the mechanics are flat out and we still need a few things done. We did put up the Bimini this morning. It’s a bit like putting a puzzle together and unfortunately we failed miserably the first time and had it on back to front. Hmm. By the time we had taken it off and turned it around the right way the wind had picked up, caught the canvas and sent one of the metal rods crashing down onto my head. So painful. But we kept going and now it’s all up and looking awesome.

And the sun has come out.

As I write this the sun just went away again and the rain clouds are heading this way.

Oh well, C’est la vie!

View from our bedroom port hole this morning. Feeling pretty lucky to be here.