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From page 34

with good loads of happy tourists.

Today Continental Waterways is a big business
with 10 horel barges and another coming into service
carly next year, the roonw 50-passenger Chardonnay,
which will cruise the River Saone between Lyon and
Dijon. His partner Guy Bardet is another barge
enthusiast who also worked as a journalist.

in the meantime TF came back and sampled the lite,
nineties-style, on Chanterelle, starting at Rogny-Sept
Ecluses, where the vessel was convenienty moored
beside the village pub. The 24 passengers were wel-
comed with Cremant, the Burgundy sparkling wine,
shown to their cabins, now featuring good bathrooms
and air-conditioning, then served the first of chef
Thierry’s superb meals.

What followed were six days of moving slowly,
and quietly, through the upper Loire valley, exploring
medieval villages such as Sancerre, going on visits to a
farm producing the famous goat cheese Crottin de
Chavignol, a winery at a handsome chateau, some-
times setting off on one’s own en a bicycle to explore
a hamlet or walk around a Romanesque church,

Thierry’s cooking, not to mention the nwice-daily
bouquets of wines and cheeses, was an incentive to
get off the barge and take exercise wherever possible,
and as Chanterelle travelled at about the same speed
as a London policeman on the beat, there were many
eager walkers every day.

Others preferred to sit on the open deck with a
book reading up on local characters such as the 17th
century La Grande Mademoiselle of St Fargeau, or
simply watch a wonderful world go by, not feast some
glorious flower gardens at the lock- -keepers’ homes,
or wonder at the splendid aqueduct over the Loire,

C SHOLIDATS Ke
Holland@ America

2 seaOIOM OF EXCELLENCE

January, 2000
Day Western Caribbean Cruise™

oe 9Yu

Extraordinary Cruising:
South America 2000

=

morth shore news

Photo David Wishart

THE French barge Chanterelle emerges gingerly from a lock on the upper Loire canal.

built by Monsicur Eiffel in 1896, that Chanterelle
crossed at Briare.

Nevers and the shuttle bus to Paris came all too
quickly, although it was an opportunity for old hands
to recall the early days of the company when passen-
gers were simply told to take a train from Paris and
find the vessel.

The cheerfui panache of Ben, our driver and flaw-
lessly bilingual guide, rather reminded me of Parsons

on that first cruise, and of the young pilot I once met
over the Yukon, who told me “you find a job you like
and you never have to work again.”

And yes, Parsons is still barging for pleasure,
exploring waterways into Eastern Europe that one
day may be part of Continental Waterways’ world.

— British Airways flies daily non-step from
Vancouver to London with frequent connections to Paris
and Lyon.

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