Photos from Parey-le-Monial

 

Outdoor chapel

Parey-le-Monial

On our way to dry dock in August, Parey-le-Monial was our first multiple night stop at a full service quay with water and electricity.  The quay is in the heart of the town known for its Romanesque basilica dating back to the 11th and 12th centuries.  In the summer, the town is filled with pilgrims as this is the site where Catholics believe that the sacred heart of Jesus was revealed to a local nun, Marquerite Alacoque, in the 17th century.  The quay is adjacent to the area where the pilgrimages are held on a weekly basis, in big tents, with as many as 5,000 pilgrims a week.

It was a hot day so I had the curtains closed, but I heard a man walking around outside explaining things about the boat to a child.  Daniel and his son were taking a break from the events, and I invited them on board to have a look down below.  Danial it turned out does research in fluid mechanics at a university in Lyon, and he spent a week at the University of Colorado, my alma mater, working on a joint university research project.  Later that day, a lovely nun from Guatemala came on board, and we talked in both Spanish and French.  Somehow we understood each other.  We eventually were joined by a woman and her young son, pilgrims from Paris.  We've really enjoyed giving tours of the boat, especially to kids.  The boys always like touring the wheelhouse and standing behind the big steering wheel pretending to drive.

The night before we planned to leave Parey, we invited Daniel to come back with his children to watch us take the boat through a lock.  He brought his children, and a few of their friends, so we had an entire entourage sending us off down the Canal du Centre.  

We decided to spend more time in Parey on our return trip.  We had a chance to visit the basilica, which recently went through a renovation.  The interior stone walls were cleaned and restored to their original color, a beautiful, warm, honey, and in an unusually bold move, the lighting in the church is now a contemporary design in metal sculpture in the form of doves in flight.

Parey-le-Monial is a beautiful city to explore on foot, with winding streets, a medieval section, large pedestrian malls, lively weekly street market and beautiful gardens.  Next to the town hall, we even found a Sotheby's office for our friend and Sotheby's realtor in Denver, Catherine Carpenter!

We're back in port

We returned to our home port in Roanne, France on October 15th. The weather turned cold and rainy for the last two days of our cruise this year, and as we headed in, it looked like it could snow, but it didn't. Richard, the original owner of the boat, came out to see us through the last few kilometers and snapped some pictures of us underway. I've posted a few of them here. We can't believe that it was just a year ago when we visited Burgundy looking at boats and floating the idea of barging around in our heads. We never would have thought we could sell our house, find a boat and get part of a season cruising in less than one year!

Returning to port