Paray le Monial to Santenay

Paray le Monial

The Canal du Centre passes through some lovely countryside but there's a price to be paid for hills. Locks. Lots of them. The locks on this canal ones are automated but they need to be set by an itinerant lock keeper who will arrange with you each day what time you will set off and will appear from time to time during the day to ask 'continuez?' in the firm hope that you will say, 'non,' so he can go home.

Locks and heatwaves are a bad combination. The mechanisms (according to the keepers) don't like them and shut down randomly meaning a call to the control centre on the emergency intercom. The person responsible for answering the intercom doesn't like them either or is perhaps overwhelmed by calls, because they don't answer. The crew member handling the bow rope doesn't like them because s/he (me) has to stand out in the blazing sunshine for the 15 minutes ( assuming all goes well) that it takes to work through. And the eclusiers (keepers) don't like hem because they have to drive from lock to lock in their little non air conditioned vans checking on the boaters and now and again  have to press a few buttons to reset those locks that have gone into a sulk.

Waiting in a broken down lock

Nice chateau alongside though

All is forgiven, however, when we reach the long stretch of lock free canal through the  vineyards of Santenay - a lovely village in the heart of the cote d'Or where you can visit the caves and taste wine, have a great meal at one of the restaurants or follow the advice of the nice young man in the tourist office and follow one of the walks featured on the map in the main square. 'We have the last working windmill in Bourgogne,' he says showing us a lovely photo. The map says it's a walk suitable for a family and will take about 2 hours so we decide to go.
This will prove to be a mistake.

Toiling in the vineyards during a heatwave - not me I'm grateful to say.

The Crew at Santenay 

Not "Pat the Horse" but cute anyway.