At around 9am, we heard people moving about outside and found that it was the Babou crew getting another boat ready for departure. Next it was our turn to get our 20 minutes instruction on the boat, and then they pulled away from the dock and handed it over to me. The boat handled like a bathtub (compared to Kanumbra) and I was glad that we had a few hundred metres before reaching the first lock under the old bridge, so that I could get some sort of feeling (not much) for how it responded to the throttle and the rudder. There was no rudder indicator, and none of the other instruments worked, so I really had no idea of where I was going or how fast – I just had to keep watching the water and the shoreline.

On reaching the first lock, we learned that all the locks on the Upper Lot were manual (except the second lock in Cahors) which required manual winding and climbing up and down ladders. At the first lock, we triple-locked with two other small boats, which raced off to the next lock as soon as the gates opened. At this point, our Babou instructor got off and returned to Port St Mary, and we were on our own.

We ambled up the river to the next lock, trying to learn more about the boat’s handling. When we got to the next lock (the only automatic lock on the river) the two small boats were waiting for us while another boat came through from upstream. I tried tieing up to one of the small boats (which had already taken up all the pontoon space), but the lack of rudder control spun me round, so I did a complete turn, went away from the lock and then tried it all again. By the time we returned, the oncoming boat had cleared the lock, and I was advised to go in first. I approached very slowly, but at the last minute the bow drifted to port, I over-corrected to starboard, and ended up running into the right side of the lock entrance (luckily having it in full reverse to minimise some of the impact). At this stage, we were almost ready to give up and go home, but unbeknown to us at this stage, this was essentially the last thing we ran into for the week. We zigzagged into the lock and tied up, and then said goodbye to the two small boats as we exited the lock.

Our morning’s adventures, and Rita’s lingering migraine, convinced us not to go too far today, so we moored at the next place we found at Port Bullier. This turned out to be a lovely mooring, directly under the old town of Cahors.

It turned out to be a wise decision, as the afternoon got cloudier followed by some fairly solid rain – not the right weather to be operating manual locks and climbing up and down lock ladders. Rita cycled up to visit the Resistance Museum, but as it had just started raining, and I had forgotten to bring my rain jacket, I opted to stay on board and start reading “About Face” by Donna Leon. Luckily we had brought two paperback books with us, which was just as well since we wouldn’t be able to re-charge the iPads. By about 6pm, the rain had really set in, so we had dinner on board, and then after the rain cleared we went for a walk though town and across to the Port Valentre Bridge on the other side of town, where we had gone through our first lock in the morning.