Clamecy from the marina
There was meant to be a Sunday morning market in Tannay, about 2km up the hill from where we were moored at Flez-Cuzy. We thought it would be fun to look round and the idea was I would set off on my bicycle, whilst Andy and Sue walked up to the village, and get some more fresh supplies. Well that plan was scuppered as Andy had a stomach bug and Sue wasn’t keen on the cycle. The market was non existent but the supermarket was good and I was able to get some gloves to protect my hands from the ropes. I had broken out in hives the previous day – not sure if I had been bitten or it was the allergic reaction to the penicillin working through my system. Think on reflection it was the latter. I also got some deck sandles as we had only bought one pair.
Pictures of Tanny centre
The centre of the town was very pretty especially the war memorial in the church square. I enjoyed the ride back down the hill to the boat. Made much better speed than the long uphill stretch out! Glad as we had agreed to be on our way before 1000 as we had a longer cruise today of 18 km and several locks
It was a relaxing day, we passed numerous pretty lock keeper cottages were kept busy navigating the locks and the canal had plenty of twists and turns to make helming interesting. The weather improved and we enjoyed sitting on the back deck watching the world pass by. This section of the canal does not appear to be that heavily used and there was a lot of weed which gradually impeded the propeller and slowed progress dramatically. We could not get access to the prop hatch as it was screwed down and were glad we were spending the following morning in Clamecy and were able to call out the engineer to sort this out as well as some other minor niggles.
I did enjoy reaching Clamecy and the sight of some large Dutch Barges mored in the quay. We arrived early enough to have a wander round the town before dinner. Nice to stretch our legs. Clamecy was a major hub for floating timber, largely for fuel, to Paris.
Opposite is a picture of Saint Martin’s church. Construction of this gothic church started in 1215 and the distinctive bell tower shown was added between 1497 and the early 16th century. This tower is an exact replica of the tower at Nevers Cathedral.
The town was very difficult to photograph with a phone camera as the streets were narrow with high buildings crowding in. I am glad to have been able to find some photos on the internet to give a feeling of the town as well as a picture of a working model flattage – which we did not see for ourselves
Logs from the extensive oak forests upstream of Clamecy were harvested and thrown into local streams. On reaching Clamecy they were sorted and tied into rafts up to 75m long and 4.5m wide. The flotteurs took about 11 days to navigate these rafts through the rivers and the Canal du Nivernais to Paris before walking back to Clamecy. A tough journey.
We walked along the pier to look at the bronze bust of Jean Rouvert who was instrumental in bringing timber rafting to an industrial scale in the 16th century. One of the key things he did was finance the building of reservoirs in the region to enable flooding of the river when needed and promoted drying of the wood when it reached its destination. This activity lasted for nearly 4 centuries.
Another interesting fact is Tannay got its name from the leather tanning industry where bark from oak trees was utilised in the tanning process.
We were lucky to book a table for dinner at the Logis Poste Hotel. It was excellent and we both really enjoyed the experience. Unfortunately Andy was still poorly and they did not fancy rich traditional French food so he and Sue opted for a simple picnic.
