The Rhine

14th July, 2009 (Tony)

It's Tuesday, Bastille Day, and we're in Colmar. The fireworks went off last night long after I was sound asleep in bed. Sally claims to have seen them. For many it's an extra long weekend for lots of businesses close on Mondays. The town is buzzing with tourists, many like us here in advance of the Tour de France circus which arrives Friday and leaves Saturday. All the shops are having summer sales but there are few shoppers. We expected enthusiastic promotion of the Tour but the funny thing is only half a dozen businesses have taken up the theme. Weird. The old part of town is gorgeous, picture-postcard perfect. Quaint old half-timbered houses authentically restored and decorated with window boxes blooming with geraniums and petunias loom over small squares crowded with inviting restaurants and cafés. German is more widely spoken than French. Back in the 1700's it may have looked similar but with the tiny canal being used by the tanners to wash hides which were then strung out to dry in the open lofts in the houses above, not to mention the markets of fish, horses and animals in the streets, and the dung, it certainly would have smelt different. Today it was lovely. We headed out on the motorbikes to reconnoitre the countryside in preparation for Friday's 13th stage of the Tour. The nearby villages are enchanting, surrounded by vineyards producing Alsace's finest reislings. This evening (5pm)we attended a concert, "A Homage to Sviatoslav Richter" performed by the National Philharmonic Orchestra of Russia. The venue was a fifteenth century church converted into an auditorium. The program featured piano concertos by Rachmaninov and Prokofiev, finely delivered by Denis Matsuev. Simply marvellous...

Strasbourg is a tale of two cities. The old part, like Colmar, is absolutely delightful but is so crowded with visitors, exploring the streets becomes quite exhausting. Occasional pauses for a drink or patisserie seems to be the most effective antidote. The cathedral (I know, I said it would have to be good) is vast. A hundred and fifty years ago it was the highest building in the world. It is still the fourth highest church. The carvings and sculptures on the exterior stonework are exquisite and quite enthralling. The new Strasbourg, however, is very new, very modern, very stark, and not very French. None of it would win an architectural prize, in my opinion. The sheer extravagance of the EU Parliament buildings and all the departmental office buildings that by necessity go with it boggles the mind. There was not a worker to be seen in any of the buildings — the parliament only sits twelve times, for five part-sessions a year in Strasbourg — presumably they are all on holiday; or twiddling their thumbs in Brussels at this time. I fancy Strasbourg would be a wonderful city in which to live. The trams and bikeways are fantastic and the outer suburbs are very attractive — smartly kept germanic-style homes on 500m2 blocks with profuse gardens.

The stretch from Sarreguemines to Strasbourg was really pleasant, if somewhat crowded at times with hire boats. It is great to see the canals being utilised at last. We stopped a night at Mittersheim which has a nice port and then Sarralbe before reaching the expansive summit ponds which were created as part of the Maginot Line and we then turned east into the Canal de la Marne au Rhin. At Xouaxange (don't ask me how to pronounce that) we ventured by motorbike up into the mountains to St Quirin, perportedly the most beautiful village in France but we could nominate a dozen more worthy, and Arbreschviller where we caught a petite train up into the forest. This was interesting as the trees were predominantly a type of fir, tall and spectacular, and still being selectively felled and milled for their good looking timber. We stopped again at Niderviller, famous for its china-ware, and biked into Sarrebourg to admire once more Chagall's stained glass masterpiece.

Now retracing our steps in a hireboat in 1999, we slipped through the two tunnels to emerge at the top of the St Louis-Arzviller Incline Plane. This is an engineering marvel, built only in the 1960's to eliminate seventeen locks. A giant bathtub on rails transports vessels up or down a slope of 42 degrees, through a vertical lift of 44.6 m. Thence to Lutzelbourg, a tiny town but so pretty it looks like it should be part of a model train set, especially as trains roar out of a tunnel very close to the canal as it wends its way through the gorge. The ruins of an ancient chateau perch atop a pinnacle of rock above the town. A walk up there deserved the reward of a well-earned drink afterwards in the town tavern. At Saverne a jaunt to one of the ruined chateaux high in the hills called for the use of the motorbikes. The splendid panorama from there covered almost all of Alsace, to Strasbourg and across to Germany.

Tackling the Rhine to get to Colmar was always going to be a challenge. It is 64 km from Strasbourg lock to the turn off to Colmar and there is nowhere for a boat like ours to stop. There are several yacht clubs along the way on the German side with marinas for runabouts and day cruisers but vessels of Sable's size are not welcome. The Rhine is contained in a man-modified channel at least two hundred metres wide with sloping concrete sides. Giant double locks that rise 12m, each 185m long, one 12m wide the other 24m wide plus a hydro-electric generating plant straddle the river every 15km or so. The locks operate twenty four hours a day for commercial ships. Pleasure boats may use them, when there is room, between 07:00 - 19:30 hours. The water is surprisingly clean, Clutha green and flows at minimum 4kph on a quiet day. We prepared ourselves for a 12-14 hour non-stop journey, setting off at 6:30 am in order to be at the first lock and out into the Rhine by 7:00 am. All our plans were thrown awry at the second lock where the 24m wide lock was closed for repairs. A queue of huge commercial barges was lined up ahead of us, all having to wait for the 12m wide lock. It was our bad luck that three of them were doubles (one pushing another) each 180m long. They take an age to squeeze into a lock; and there were boats waiting to come down so each changeover took more than half an hour. We were obliged to wait through five passes before a 118m minnow's turn arrived and we, along with two other pleasure boats, followed him in. At 6pm with 21km and two locks still to go we were dog-tired and I guess Sable ought to have been too as she had been grinding away at 1900rpm in order to maintain 6kph. Providence provided a small floating pontoon that some small passenger boat must use from time to time and we gratefully moored up to it and called it a day. We slept like logs, occasionally stirred by the churning of passing barges as they growled past us during the night, but we were soon wallowed back to sleep in their wash. Refreshed, we set off again next morning at 6am and made it into the canal to Colmar by 10 o'clock. This canal is restricted to 6kph but it is a very pleasant three hour cruise along a waterway abundant with wildlife and clear enough to see fish despite the weed. By 2:30 pm we were enjoying coffee and cake in downtown Colmar. Scrumptious... Watch out for the Aussie flags as the riders approach Col de Schlucht on Friday.