Simon & Andrea spent 2 weeks on Monchique in June. There had been a lots of storms in the weeks prior to their visit and the Saone & Rhone were in flood again.
They arrived at Marseillan on the Etang du Thau with plans of going down to Port St Louis and then back up the Rhone to Lyon as Simon had tickets for the England games at Marseille and St Etienne. So they headed off across the Etang and onto the Canal du Rhone a Sete to the lock at St Gilles. As usual it was lunchtime when they arrived at the lock and nobody appeared to be in the lock tower so Andrea went up to the office to enquire if it was safe to go out onto the Rhone and was told it was ok.
The incoming flow on the Petit Rhone was fairly strong and when they got to the junction at the Rhone there was quite a strong flow but as they were going downstream it was in their favour but it was a different story a few days later when they were coming back up against the flow especially when they got past Arles as it seemed to get stronger and they were doing 4k/hr at 2000 revs so decided not to risk the trip up to Lyon so turned back onto the Petit Rhone and onto the Canal du Rhone a Sete, went back across the Etang du Thau onto the Canal du Midi and moored up in Vias were they swapped barge for motor home and headed up to St Etienne staying on various camp sites en-route, which was a whole new experience for them.
Then England lost to Iceland in Nice the following week and game over!
Well at least Simon got reimbursed for his semi final, quarter final & final tickets.
