Paris

Lagny at dusk

Well we have reached our winter mooring at Port Cergy, on the outskirts of Paris. After leaving Meaux we travelled down the last stretch of the Marne to Lagny, a really nice little market town where I could have happily stayed for 3 or 4 days. The town had a really nice feel, with the mooring almost in the centre of town and the convenience of a train service into Paris. Unfortunately we needed to get to Cergy quicker than we originally planned so only managed an overnight stay at Lagny.
Our next stop was at Maison Alfort, only one lock away from the Seine. Once again a relatively quiet mooring but, like Lagny, subject to lots of rocking around when the large commercial barges went past.
So onto the Seine. Going around the Ile de la Cite is a one way scenario with 15minute slots each hour, depending on whether you are going upstream or downstream. our slot (downstream)was 35 minutes to 50 minutes past the hour. We arrived at 8:55 so had to wait on the pontoon outside Port Arsenal till 9:30 but then had a dream run through the centre of Paris. Most of the tourist boats hadn't started yet so the water was a lot calmer than the Thames through the middle of London. And we got to see all the major Parisian sites from a different perspective - from our own boat. From the Notre Dame on Ile de la Cite to the replica of the Statue of Liberty with the Eiffel Tower in the background, we managed to capture all the sights. We even saw turtles nestling on the roots of a tree on the banks of the Seine.
After a longish day of 6 hours of cruising our first night on the Seine was spent on an island in the Seine at Rueil-Malmaison. This island became a favourite haunt of many of the impressionists. We also met a couple of Swiss high school students who were painting scenes along the Seine as a school excursion. Sounds like a pretty amazing private school as they also told us they went on overseas excursions every year.