Angoulême - Jarnac, sur la Charante

Juillet 2007

Navigating the Charente waterways, sparkling moments and distorted reflections.

Wading against the current, a refreshing green flow.

Pilfering plums from laden boughs stooping over the banks.

A lavender grove alive with buzzing bees buzzing, unmistakable scent filling the air (and, we’d hoped, a stolen scent that would pervade the lingering mustiness of below-deck cupboards).

Patchworks of cornfields and vineyards.

23ºC.

Tickling the roach in the clear waters of the Charente’s chasing tributaries.

Fisherman, farmers, lock boys, garçon d’écluses.

Friendly knowing nods; shared.

Pausing to lean and to dream.

Old slate-roofed chateaux, crumbling limestone walls that conceal rambling vegetable patches, terracotta hues of sun bleached tiles, centuries old wrought iron railings, gates, window and shutter fixings.

Swooping swallows swallowing mouthfuls of marauding mosquitoes.

Our favourite mooring; at Graves, overlooked by a sashaying swathe of whispering alders.

Downstream.

Upstream.

The squat, square church and above the doorway a stone face smiles, eternally, flanked by the stone sun and the stone moon, marking lifetime’s passing.

A good pace.

Here we lean stick # 8 and leave.