12th - 21st October. On to Decize on the Canal du Nivernais, then to Beaulon and Pierrefitte, on the Canal Latéral à la Loire, .

The canal du Nivernais is widening out, below Cercy.

At Decize we reach the end of the canal du Nivernais, and are briefly on the River Loire, before rejoining the Canal Latéral à la Loire. In Decize the old citadel greets us, as it lies on the confluence of all three waterways.

The clock tower, which was built here in 1848, is 33 metres high. It is in the main town square, standing proudly in front of the town hall. It also has three bells in the bell tower at the top, one of which weighs 1300kg.

Moving on, our next port was at Beaulon, where we found Nico and Ianne on Liane again, and met Mary and Brian on Kyrenia. All three boats are heading for Roanne for the winter. The others left the next morning, but we stayed at Beaulon for three days.

This street sign in Beaulon is typical of French towns, telling us where to find all the points of interest. If it is near to lunchtime, when all shops close for a couple of hours, at least, this can be very useful, finding them before they close!

Further along the canal, we came to Pierrefitte-sur-Loire, and spotted this woodyard, near to the canal. Our negotiations at the adjoining house found us with two cubic metres of wood promised.

Our man delivered one load later that afternoon. It was a great relief when he offered to cut it up for us, as well as bringing it right to the boat. We had had visions of moving load after load on our small trolley!

It was nearly dark when the second boxful arrived. The woodman had cut it all to our specified length of 25 cm, so that it would fit into our fire.

Philippe and Pierrette were next to us on Dream's Rivers, a lovely cruiser. We spent two enjoyable evenings with them, which was very good for our French, as that was the only language we were using!

On Wednesday we stacked all of the wood both inside, and on top of The Puzzler. With so much wood, it is a question of keeping the weight as low as possible in the boat, and also balancing it, to keep The Puzzler level.

Thursday was spent in recovery time, along with a couple of walks around the nearby lake, where Shannon loved chasing anything that moved, on the beach there. She followed it up with a dip in the water, so was not too gritty when we returned to The Puzzler! Here she is later on, having dried off, with her little friend, another Shih-Tzu.