Anja is ready and we are ready

....but the Yonne River is not ready!

We were supposed to be craned into the river yesterday but the river is still closed, at a high level and with a very fast current. The main problem is the huge amount of water coming from the Armancon River which enters the Yonne just a few hundred metres upstream of where we are in the boatyard. A heavy storm 60 hours ago raised the Armancon level significantly and it is only now back to the level of a few days ago.

The new plan is to go into the river on Monday evening or Tuesday morning.

The week has gone well with paint touchup, provisioning, some varnishing and generally unpacking and cleaning things complete. We have worked very hard and been tired each night, which has been quite good for sleeping and overcoming jet-lag.

After some small hiccups, the rewound stator for the big alternator/welder is installed and working and the second (spare) back of the alternator also modified and tested. So now the big generator-welder alternator should run much cooler giving it a longer life.

The tiles are back in place in the bathroom after the problem with the pipe join freezing in winter and we are having discussions with Simon about the winterising to ensure it does not happen again because the problem created many hours of extra and unnecessary work.

We have the flowers and herbs for 2016 and Penny has potted them. They are sitting under the boat until just before we are launched.We have had our last sleep at "Les Chouettes" and said "Au revoir" for now to our dear friends Chantal and Christian. They have sold Les Chouettes and are retiring from running the Chambre d'hote (B&B). So, this was our 6^th and final stay at their beautiful house in the country. They have bought an apartment in Auxerre and will have a less busy time there.

Penny is travelling to Paris on Monday to collect her sister and return to the boat. This will be a challenge because of the ongoing train strike. About 2/3^rds of the services are cancelled each day. Fortunately, a law passed in 2007 ensures that some essential trains must run each day and we have access to the revised timetables the night before. This makes things somewhat simpler but they will have an interesting time on very crowded trains.

Best Regards,

Dave and Penny