Continuing north on the Canal du Loing we stopped at the towns of Moret-sur-Loing and St Mammes, which is where the canal joins the Seine River. Here we caught up with some dear boating friends, experienced the giant commercial barges which traverse the Seine and witnessed one of the craziest sports ever – water jousting. We also saw some geese that may have been lost.
What are you doing in France?
One morning we woke to the sound of Canadian geese honking right near our boat. We thought they might have been lost and asking for directions, but apparently not. Whilst they are not native to France they often spend some of their time in Europe. I don’t blame them as Europe is lovely this time of year. Whilst they were a bit noisy, I’d take their wake-up call over an alarm clock any day.
And a few days later we saw some Canadian goslings. Awww!
Moret-sur-Loing
Travelling along the canal we reached the medieval town of Moret-sur-Loing which is delightful. There are ramparts, a huge stone gate and beautiful bridges across the Loing River that were built nearly 900 years ago. There’s a very good port but it’s small with limited spaces, so book ahead if you want to stay on a boat.
We stayed in Moret for a couple of nights and caught up with our Aussie boating friends Michael and Jennifer who we travelled with quite a bit last year. It was great to see them again.
Markets on the Seine River
After a few days in Moret-sur-Loing we travelled just a short distance up the canal until we reached the Seine River. There we pulled into the port of St Mammes which is right next to the weekly market.
The Seine is a really busy river with lots of commercial barges. The barges are a low-emissions way to carry cargo and reduce traffic on the roads. They are loaded up with all sorts of things including grain, building materials and even huge bits of machinery which are too large for trucks. The below video shows the size of these big barges and also the St Mammes market.
Water Jousting
Now this has to be one of the funniest, craziest sports I’ve ever seen. Water jousting (or joute nautique in French) has apparently been practiced in the country for over 800 years. I’d never heard of it before but it was so much fun to watch.
This is how it works. Take two long skinny motorised boats, fill them with people for ballast, accelerate the boats towards each other with one person standing at the end of the boat armed with a long pole. The aim is to stab the pole into the chest of the opponent who is standing on the other boat and knock them into the water. I watched for about an hour and laughed pretty much the whole time.
Here’s a video showing joute nautique in action on the Seine River. I’m sure there were lots of bruised chests the next day but no one appeared to be injured.
Our dear friend Martine
There’s nothing like having a surprise catch up with a lovely friend, which happened one day in St Mammes. I was walking along the Seine when I spotted Martine, a friend we made from last year’s voyage. She’s the lady we stayed with for a night in her home near Bordeaux. We didn’t think we’d see each other for a few months but both of our plans changed and we ended up in the same port on the same day. There was a lot of hugging and excitement and she told us about the recent voyages on her boat.
Martine introduced us to her friends from other boats that she’d been travelling with in convoy. We had a party on her boat and had such a fun night. We all left in different directions the next day with sore heads but great memories.
Heading off down the Seine
When we left St Mammes we travelled about 12km on the Seine River. It was a wonderful experience to be on our own boat on this famous river.
We had to be careful and keep out of the way of the commercial barges as they have right of way and travel at great speeds. As you can imagine, the locks are absolutely enormous to fit the giant boats. But they are a bit lonely when it’s just us.
After the Seine we turned into the Yonne River for the next part of our adventure. Little did we know that it would include a flood which closed the river completely and meant we had to stay put in a town called Sens for three weeks. Oh well, that’s life on the water! Turns out our time in Sens was one of the highlights of our trip.
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