After breakfast, we noticed some fisherman out on the river above the barrage, and one of them had his dog with him. The dog kept running along the barrage having a great time, and every time the fisherman cast his line, the dog would gallop madly in that direction.

When the fisherman got his boat level with the stone mooring, the dog decided to get out of the water and stand on the mooring. No amount of persuasion or orders could get him to go back onto the barrage, until eventually he got bored with being on the mooring and just jumped into the canal for a swim.

During the morning, Rita got back to study, while I did some work on this blog. We were surprised to see another young guy arrive by foot on the stone mooring, with two pit bulls. He asked Rita if she had any matches for him to light his smokes, and a while later we realised, from the aroma, that it was not tobacco he was smoking!  He then proceeded to go for a swim, and then played with his dogs, getting them to attack a large branch he had found by the side of the water. His behaviour was starting to concern us a little, so we were very happy when another boat, with a Swiss family aboard, pulled up at the mooring. This gave us the opportunity to go for the bike ride we were wanting to do, without leaving the barge totally unattended. We told them we were going to a village to buy some bread, and they asked if we could buy some for them as well - so this sounded like a fair deal for them keeping an eye on our boat.

So we headed off to return to the village of Osselle, which has the familar rounded spire on top of the church, which is very common in the Doubs valley. But try as we might, we could not find any shop (open or closed) that might sell bread. So we stopped and Rita asked some tradesmen, who were just packing up after a day on the job, whether they knew where we might be able to buy some bread on a Saturday afternoon. They mentioned a couple of shops in nearby villages which would be re-opening at 1600h, but these were several kilometres away (and up hills). One of them must have seen the look on our faces, because he immediately said that he had bought bread this morning, so we could have one of his loaves and he would buy more as he drove home. We were amazed by his generosity, but accepted his offer and paid him a good price for the loaf. Just another example of the kindness of the working class French in rural towns.

We then cycled across the canal to the local swimming lake, but Rita thought the price of admission was too much, especially considering that the place was packed on a hot Staurday afternoon and her chances of swimming "laps" would be very limited.

So, instead we ride to the nearby Osselle Grottes, the oldest cave tourist attraction in France. We didn't go in the caves, since we hadn't brought warm clothes with us, but just had a cool drink.

After leaving the Grottes, Rita headed fro the nearby town on Byam, where the tradesman said there might be a small shop opening at 1600h, where we could buy some bread (we had our loaf of bread from the tradesman, but nothing yet for our Swiss neighbours who were guarding the boat). Since it was uphill to Byam, I cycled slowly back to Osselle, and waited for Rita to catch up.

When we got back to the boat, we gave one of the loaves of bread to our Swiss neighbours. Since it was still warm, Rita went for a evening swim in the river, while I settled down to watch the Polish Speedway GP. At least, I thought I would, but unlike the Pairs Championship which was streamed live on SGP-TV last weekend, the GP event was not streamed live in France. So I just followed the results on the internet, while I did some catch-up on this blog.