Back on the Canal Bank !

The last time I wrote about the Nantes to Brest canal, we'd gone on a recce ready for our next cycle outing. What I didn't tell you was that we found that this lovely flat'ish' canal path suddenly started to go up rather a steep incline!! Not like the passes through the Alps that the Tour de France cyclists have to face (!) but bad enough for someone like me who's knees still turn to jelly quite easily!!


The canal climbs some 150 metres in 1 kilometre, and the water is controlled with a series of locks and holding ponds - quite an engineering feat back in Napoleonic times!! This is just one of the water 'ladders' that we came across consisting of 13 locks all within metres of each other - couldn't get them all in, but you can understand the theory of it all.







Having found this incline, and being the coward that I am, we (the Royal we that is!!) decided to change direction and head south from Josselin rather than keep to our original northward route !!



The weather has been somewhat kinder to us the last few days, so Friday we set off with our bikes to explore the new route ! Definitely flat (!) , the towpath runs along the river at this stretch rather than along a manmade channel , and is just so pretty!

We even found a working water mill, not very picturesque, as the original stone building has just about been dwarfed by modern additions




Back to the car park in the shadow of the chateau at Josselin

and while DH was putting the bikes back on the carrier, I spotted these on the opposite bank

I was too far away to make out what the creeper covering the conifers was , but don't they look

gorgeous!

A very pleasant afternoon and a really bonus, as within minutes of getting into the car to drive home - this happened !!!!!!

Is that lucky or what !!!!