Grumpy old men?

On the Canal du Midi: photo by Martin Cooper

We had a delightful time yesterday meeting friends for lunch followed by a little boat trip on the canal.  Lunch was OK.  The restaurant served us a familiar menu, but with less than its usual charm and slickness, mistakes in orders and a district tepidness to some of the main courses.  To cap it, I got locked in the chiottes after lunch, just when we were rushing to get the 3:00 pm departure of the pleasure boat.  One of the staff applied a knife to the door lock from the outside, acting with no more urgency than they did in serving our meal.  This was obviously not the first time the lock had misbehaved: when I tried to force the pace, the whole of the sliding door frame shifted, opening up a number of old cracks.  Maybe they've had a long, hard season, and at least the experience fuelled the repartee for the rest of the afternoon.  My Tripadvisor enthusiasm for the place has now cooled a bit.

It's very sad to see so many huge gaps now in the ranks of plane trees that have lined the canal for centuries, their roots stabilising the banks and their canopies cutting the losses through evaporation.  To minimise the spread of the fungus responsible, they are felling each affected tree and its two neighbours on each side, so there are now some radical changes to the landscape, and huge pits have been dug in which to burn the infected trees on site.  (See also under foot and mouth.)  It will probably be necessary to fell the rest of the 42'000 trees, each felling and replacement costing €3'000.  Don't think I can hope to sponsor a whole tree, but I've sent off a cheque that will just about buy a twig or two.  Take a look at the web site.

We're not having much luck with airport restaurants.  Having found Perpignan's closed the other day, Carcassonne's today had a mile-long queue of young people.  We finished off lunching at the good old Buffalo Grill on the N113 as was.  Quick friendly service, good cheap food.  Phew.

And as for the oh-so-clever hire car, it shuts down when you put it in neutral and release the clutch pedal.  Startling until you find that it starts up again when you depress the clutch.  Too clever for its own good, I say.  Still, it can't be persuaded to use more than 5.6l/%km, or return less than 51mpg, so it has its virtues.