With Chloe in tow, we returned to LJ at the end of July with every intention of going back out to sea and heading south. The plan was sound plus it would give Chloe her first opportunity of a new sailing ground outside of the Solent and hopefully for her to have sight of her first wild dolphins. But then it all went wrong.
Nina’s lower back which has been in a steady state of decline for several years inexplicably gave up and when we arrived at Arzal she literally dragged herself from the car to the forward cabin from where she didn’t emerge for a week. During this time Fischer Panda fiddled with the electrics, delivering and installing yet more batteries whilst Chloe soaked up the sun.
As said in the previous post, the water level in the river was so desperately low that the Arzal Barrage (being the gateway to the sea) was often closed for a week at a time and when it did open it was only for one lift a day. Fortunately, we were already in the river and so it seemed pointless leaving and not being able to return and more importantly with Nina being unable to move around on the boat properly to go to sea would almost invite a tragedy. At last all those sailing skills where put to good use as father and daughter sailed LJ from Arzal to La Roche-Bernard!
Immediately understanding our plight the maria gave us an empty residents mooring for 2 months, at such a ridiculous low price I bit their arm off and it was here that we saw our summer out.
They say that every cloud has a silver lining and had it not been for this chance mooring, we could never have hoped to meet a more generous group of Brits who did everything they could to help us out. Offers of assistance to accompany us to see Doctors, take us to medical centres, collect drugs, translate with officials and shopping trips were endless. Nothing seemed too much trouble for a fellow sailor in need. Hopefully one of them may read this blog and if they do, we’d like to extend a massive thank you to Angela & Simon, George & Debbie and especially to Peter & Carol who insisted we stay at their home near Villedieu-les-Poêles so that we could break our return journey to the Channel Tunnel and to allow Nina time to rest.
The two months at La Roche-Bernard was over all too soon. We had visits from family & friends from home – Katherine and Dimitri, Barry and Dot & Richard and Amanda. We drank chilled wine during long lazy lunches at anchor in the river. We chased kingfishers in the dinghy along abandoned waterways near Redon and visited a very strange museum in Rochefort-en-Terre. We were boarded by Laurent, a real-life, part-time pirate who invited himself for dinner after we rafted against his vintage wooden square rigger ‘Ruth’ circa 1914 and on the passing of Queen Elizabeth II we watched her funeral and celebrated her reign with a full English breakfast and Champagne.
Somewhere during our frequent river trips, we tripped over the 2000 mile mark since our adventure began. This milestone was marked peacefully with our final night aboard all alone at anchor
9th August – 30th September 2022
Trip Mileage 58 miles
Mileage Completed 2049 miles