Wednesday 13th June - Ouzouer-sur-Trezee to Rogny

Crew overslept so we didn’t set sail until after 10 a.m. (double figures at last!).  Today we have six locks up to the summit then six down - they are all about 4 metres deep.  We had a very pleasant young man to see us up the first locks, then we stopped for the lunch break for about 45 minutes.  A young lady helped us for the first three when everything was going swimmingly.  However, we had to wait for over half an hour for the next as there was a problem.......and, indeed, as the lock gates didn’t open fully to release us, it was a bit of a squeeze to exit!  Then we had to wait another half an hour, as a hotel boat was coming in the opposite direction - they have priority!  The afternoon was not going as smoothly as we thought it would.....it is 13th I suppose!!
What we thought would be a maximum of three and a half hours’ cruise became  almost five hours, so we arrived in Rogny at 3 p.m.  The quay was practically empty but we moored close to a little French cruiser as we suspected the hotel boat would join us later, even though there were no cones reserving a space for them.
We chatted to a very nice English lone sailor Nick, who kindly invited us for coffee on his boat but we said maybe later as we had not had any lunch yet.  So a quick lunch of quiche and salad, then Skip went for a walk to research restaurants, etc.  He found two but one was favourite, the Auberge les Sept Ecluses, which of course, was closed, so unable to book.  On his way back he saw Nick practising his boules skills and after discussion with Crew went back to invite him for drinks on Aphrodite at 7 p.m.
In the end it turned out that the restaurant was not open for dinner and we ended up with a takeaway pizza!  We had a long chat with Nick, who had also ordered a pizza, and indeed told us that the restaurant was not too good anyway.  It seems that Rogny les Sept Ecluses was not very well served with good dining establishments!
Rogny les Sept Ecluses obtains its’ name from the old flight of seven locks, much like those at Beziers in the south.  These seven were a remarkable feat of engineering built during the reign of Henry IV.  They have now been replaced with the six locks we descended this afternoon which unlike the old flight the locks have gaps between them, allowing boats to pass.
After our pizza feast, we chatted a bit more then by invitation we went to look over Nicks’ old Luxe Motor barge.  Although she was over 20 metres. long, there was only one cabin and one head but the saloon was very spacious, so good for a liveaboard.
We made our way back to the boat for some TV and bed.

11 km. 12 locks. 4 3/4 hours