Montreaux-Chateaux - Dannemarie 1 June

Today we take on a chain of locks, 15 in a row, together with the Swiss gentlemen and the VNF guys. Margaret Dölling referred to them as little VNF guys as elves, running  around in their little white vans and of course dressed in their blue working clothes. A perfect description!

Here they are! The doors would not close in at about the 8th lock so we had to wait about an hour for the little elves to organise themselves and get things working again, all very cheerful. But while Carl was busy fixing things on board, I went off to pick some flowers, when I realised that maybe the repairs were done. I ran back to the boat and asked, or rather indicated, in bad French, if we were on our way. The chief elf answered in a way that I understood to mean " calm down woman, you will soon leave". But I had totally misunderstood him, because the water level started sinking and the boat was about to be left hanging on the side. But we realised in time and rescued it.

The elves zoomed in on Carl and babbled away in French untill we understood that they thought Carl looked like the Swedish actor, Dolf Lundgren! 

Just to prove that we are on Le Canal du Rhone au Rhine, Dolf Lundgren showing his physique.

Arrived after three hours at Dannemarie, had some well deserved  (after that chain of locks) Alsace wine with the Swiss gentleman and getting some washing done. At the moment waiting for the washing with a very friendly and talkative French woman. The conversation is quite one sided with me saying oui and then a few words when I understand. She is waiting for her clothes in tumble dryer and keeps checking and saying, 22 minutes left, 15 minutes left and me saying, oui its  Ok. Now it seems the clothes did not dry and she used 3 gitones, that I understood.

So now she has told me that she another 20 minutes and is asking me if we have children. Fortunately I could ask her the same question has and that kept her busy because she has 4 children, or was it grandchildren? the oldest is 32 and works in education, the second is 26 and is something I did not understand, the third is a butcher and the fourth one is 20 and works in a cheese factory. Imagine that I understood all that!  I wish Carl would come back and talk to her, he can in any case answer, not sure if he is answering the questions, though.

Watching cows while waiting for the washing.

This is our mooring in Dannemarie.

The little port is full of perment barges, mostly from Switzerland.

The people live permanently on these barges. I do not be believe they can go down the Rhone Rhin canal because it is really very narrow in some places. Maybe the next part of the canal to Mullhouse is wider. We will see tomorrow when the elves will join us again to help us along our way.