Barge Day 4
Schedule
Brienon à Joigny
8:00 Breakfast
9:00 Litote departs
Enjoy your morning cruise
12:00 Lunch
13:45 We depart on excursion to the historic village of Vezelay.
14:00 Guided tour of the basilica and château terrace followed by free time
to stroll or shop.
Return to the Litote
19:30 Dinner on board
Today we cruised in the morning and had an excursion to historic Vezelay in the afternoon. We went through three locks and then were on the river Yonne. The river is much busier than the canal. There is much more industry and larger towns on the river. The locks seem to be further apart and are larger and more automated
than the locks on the canal. Some people biked, walked, or ran while we were still on the canal. Others took it easy on the barge. The weather was cool but not cold in the am. Because of the change in the route on the river, our excursion was quite a ways away and it took us about an hour to drive to the Basilica at Vezelay. It was raining when we got off the bus so we broke out the umbrellas. After we got in the cathedral the rain stopped. We had a Jerusalem monk as a guide in the Basilica. He was very knowledgeable and had many stories to tell us about the history of the area and the Basilica specifically. The Basilica was huge! It was a combination of the Gothic and Romanesque styles. The Basilica was built on the apex of a hill that sloped
down steeply on three sides and even the fourth side was relatively steep. The town was built on the less steep side and was very picturesque. We stopped for some hot chocolate for people to help warm up and some of the ladies went shopping. We bussed back to the Litote docked in the town of Joigny. We had another delicious dinner and most of the group played the card game called “oh hell.??? (see picture – people are
very noisy when they play) I found a hotel nearby that let me use one of their phones to connect to the internet and I was finally able to upload my journal entries and some of the pictures for the first 3 days of the barge trip. Tomorrow we have our excursion to Auxerre and we cruise to Villeneuve sur Yonne.
kws
John got a small cheese ration due to previous misbehavior
External veiw of Basilica at Vezelay
Monk giving us a history lesson.
View down the hill from the Basilica
Lunch Menu
Déjeuner
Poulet Franc-Comtois
Chicken with Comté cheese topping
Salde de pommes de terre au cerfeuil
Potato salad with chervil
Salade de champignons
Mushroom salad
Salade de concombres au tandoori
Cucumber salad with Indian spices
Salade et plateau de fromages
Salad and cheese platter
Coffee
Bourgogne Aligoté
Merlot