We had heard that Penerf between Le Crouesty and the Vilaine entrance had a new midstream pontoon available for visitors, so we thought we would give it a try. The wind was SW 3 so we had a steady sail to the somewhat narrow and tricky (but well buoyed) entrance to Penerf. We loved Penerf, a quiet spot with not a lot there, but a friendly harbour team who ferry you ashore as part of the service.
The chartplotter had been playing up, freezing and resetting occasionally. The touch screen had failed a few years ago, but it normally worked OK using the remote keypad. Just before we left Penerf for our first trip up the Vilaine I decided to reset the chartplotter to see if it cleared the fault. Doh! The chartplotter booted up but defaulted to touch screen so I couldn't get past the initial screen and press "OK". And I needed to get fufther than that to associate the chartplotter with the remote keypad.
So it was back to paper charts, pencils and compass bearings. I was glad that we were coming out of Penerf rather than going in and that we had done the route the day before as it is quite intricate, the passage not being far off rocks. Fortunately the weather was kind with a Westerly 3 so we had a pleasant sail trying to spot transits and taking fixes for our passage into the Vilaine.
We had registered ou intention to go through the Arzal lock at 1600. However, the website says that this is not a booking, and it is first come first served. We got to the lock at about 1545 to find a lot of boats on the waiting pontoons, and the lock already full. Yachts can normally enter the lock upstream as far as the road bridge to wait. When the road bridge opens they shuffle up to allow more boats in. We decided to hang around outside the lock. At 1600 the road bridge opened the yachts shuffled up and chaos ensued. We were asked not to enter the lock to let the smaller boats go first. There was room for one more line of boats when two French boats came past us and moored up either side of the lock wall, with other boats now streaming in. The lockmaster called a halt and told everyone to go away. We started reversing at which point he shouted "Not you Shadow" and asked us to raft up between the two boats that had passed us. We were in!
We decided to overnight at Arzal. We were given a downwind berth and I mad a bit of a hash of berthing, but no major harm done. The next day we motored up to La Roche Bernard and berthed on the visitors pontoon on Thursday 28th June.
We had a couple of nights on the visitors pontoon to give us chance to get a hire car and sort the boat out. The easiest hire car location was Vannes as there was a bus to there from La Roche Bernard.
We had arranged for the boat to be lifted out and stored ashore two days later. We came back to the boat in the morning to get some things off, to be told it had already been moved. We managed to get the attention of the boatyard staff in their dory, who apologised and took us over to Shadow the other side of the river by the boatyard pontoon. We got the stuff we wanted and they took us back to the other shore and our hire car.
Since leaving Haslar on 30th April we had travelled approximately 580 miles over 31 days sailing with 49 nights in marinas or on pontoons and 3 nights each at anchor or on buoys. And what an enjoyable journey it has been.
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