Cycle Touring in France: The Nivernais canal

For the last two days we have been traveling up the Nivernais canal from Decize to Clamecy via Corbigny. It has been very hot and we suffered yesterday as we had to travel a long way to our destination. Although cycling along the flat is easy on the legs it puts a lot more strain on your hands and backside as there is no chance to freewheel and lift from the saddle and your weight is always on the handlebars. The canal is used only by pleasure boats and there are few towns or villages along the way, so the scenery can get a little monotonous at times. One exception was the run of 16 locks before Corbigny. The canal goes over a hill and is fed by another canal before plunging downhill. the old lock houses appeared to have been purchased by craftspeople and it was very interesting passing by strange sculptures, pottery and woodcarvings at several of the locks. Some were clearly occupied by those with an alternate view of society. The buildings at the other locks are all of the same design, although the owners have renovated them to different degrees and some have quite pretty gardens and verge plantings. Heading out from Decize that morning the fields at the side were mainly wheat, with some Charolais cattle in pasture, and the canal bank was fringed with reeds along both sides. There were plenty of people fishing and most had four or more rods each. As it was a Sunday there were also groups of families that had come out for a picnic and some had pitched tents and were making barbeques. Corbigny, our town for the night, was completely quiet and we had a hard time finding somewhere to eat. In the end we found a small creperie and had a pleasant meal with a pichet of rose wine. Today we only had around 40km to cycle, less than half the distance we covered yesterday, and we took it very easy as it was around 35 degrees. We are now in Clamecy, which is by far the best town we have visited since Decize, and will probably stay another day to see the church and museum, along with resting our legs and avoiding the hot day that is expected before a storm that will bring the temperatures down to the low 20's.

Typical lock house on the canal.