Several boats moved out of their moorings this morning, so we moved forward, where we could now connect to services. When we visited Anna and Rob a few days ago, they warned us about the vending machine used to pay for mooring charges, electricity and water. They indicated that it apparenty gave excessively high charges for these services (something like 48euro per day). So when we went up to pay today, we were pre-warned. But even so, the initial screen suggested that this was indeed the case. But this must have been a discounted weekly charge (we assume), because if we simply bypassed that screen and went to the next, we got a daily charge of about 8euro for the same services (much more reasonable).

Thurs 13 July - move, services, ledge, cleaning, Dali Expo, solar panels, drones

As we returned from the vending machine, we noticed that Phillipe was having some trouble at his mooring. We had read in our guide book that at Gray the water level could change suddenly overnight as the upstream lock allowed water to pass downstream, raising the water level in the port. When the water flow was restored to normal in the morning, the water level in the port dropped. We also noticed that along the stone quai there was a ledge (about a metre wide) protruding into the river about a metre below water level. In Kanumbra, with just a 700mm water draft at the centre of the hull, this posed no problem for us, either in the daytime or at night. But when Phillipe moored yesterday in his bigger boat, with a depper draft, he must have butted up against this ledge, hence keeping his boat further out in the water from the quai. When the water level rose overnight, he must have floated up and above the ledge, and then into towards the quai. When the waater level fell this morning, his boat lowered itself onto the ledge; and here he was now stuck! He tried to power off the ledge with his engine, with no success. We all tried to push the boat off the ledge, with no success. But by having us rock his boat side to side, and him keeping the power applied, he was gradually able to edge the boat off the ledge into deeper water. He then tied up again, with his hull alongside the ledge. Now all he had to do was to keep it that way overnight, when the water rose. We noticed that a neighbouring boat, that was more aware of local conditions, had a neat solution of having an old car tyre, filled with styrofoam, which made the tyre float flat on top of the water. He had placed one of these on the water at the front of his boat, and one at the rear, which then kept his boat out from the quai by the diameter of the tyre. Phillip had an alternative solution; he left the port before nightfall, and moored elsewhere!

Today was mostly a day of just dithering around on the boat to pass the time of day. One of my ditherings was cleaning the wheelhouse roof, which had become quite grimy over winter. I did this by standing on the cabin roof and reaching as far back as possible with a "squeegy" broom. This did a good job, but I couldn't clean the back section of the roof because Rita was also doing some laundry today and hanging it out to dry on the rear deck. I didn't think she'd appreciate it if i sprinkled dirty water over her clean laundry. So, I decided to save cleaning the back of the wheelhouse roof for another day.

Rita went up to Intersport in the afternoon to collect her repaired bike, and was quite happy with the job they had done on her "favourite" bike. After that, she used the bike to go up the hill to look at the Salvador Dali Expo being held at the Gray Museum. Meanwhile, I sat onboard looking at neighbouring boats, which got me thinking about installing solar panels on Kanumbra, which would save some money on mooring costs and also extend our ability to wild-moor on the canals and rivers without having to find a mooring spot with electricity at the end of the day. Our major problem would be finding a place to fit the panels. There is plenty of space on the wheelhouse roof, but I don't want to raise of fixed air draft there, especially if we go south again, where there are several low bridges on the Midi which we already have trouble squeezing under. Must invite Pete and Vicky to join us onboard again; I'm sure "sparky" Pete would love a busman's holiday designing a system and installing panels on the boat!

In the evening, we saw the end of a drone display on the far side of the river, followed by half a dozen fireworks shot into the air. W fireworks display until  we reaalised that it was just a rehearsal for tomorrow night!