adventure – Cantwell's Reef

Crew member Jean Farber looks ahead from the bow of our boat to the village of Laroque-des-Arcs as we begin our voyage up France’s Lot River.

SOMETIMES A DREAM TRIP turns into, well, more of an adventure than a dream.

Adventure ensues when things don’t go quite as planned.

Map of France: Pushpin points to Cahors, our boat’s base on the Lot River

I just returned to Center Island from a major adventure in France. I’m glad I went, but boy, am I glad to be home.

Don’t get me wrong. Adventures can be good. This one was good, in the big picture. Good, sometimes great. With lots of difficulties along the way.

At the core of it was seven days on a chartered 38-foot motor vessel that I skippered with family and friends on the incredibly scenic River Lot — rhymes with “boat” — in Southwest France. Five of us aboard navigated the rocky canyons of the meandering rural waterway that included frequent locks that bypassed cascading weirs first created in the Middle Ages to divert water to grain-grinding mills. In the early 19th century more weirs were added to deepen the river for coal-carrying barges until railways rendered barges obsolete.

All but one of the nine locks we transited up the river and back were do-it-yourself, meaning two of our crew went ashore to work wheels and cranks that opened and closed sluiceways and big iron gates.

Our river boat, the Cubry Les Soing, was named for the town where it was first launched.

That was a fun novelty until an unseasonable heat wave pushed temperatures into the 90s every day. With the intense sun — our base of Cahors was just over 100 miles from Mediterranean shores — the heat was debilitating. Across France, May heat records shattered like an ice cube bouncing off a kitchen floor.

Our dream trip became a week of coping.

There were various complications. Two of our crew arrived with miserable May colds, which kept getting worse. Another discovered his severe intolerance for such heat. Neither a Catholic nor a Christian, he nonetheless spent much of his onshore time cooling off in shady churches lit by stained glass depictions of the Holy Mother. To escape the heat more than once, crew members booked hotel rooms when we arrived in charming villages. Air conditioning was a special lure the boat didn’t offer. Coming and going, our crew dealt with canceled flights and canceled train runs, even a derailment (of someone else’s train) that caused a long delay. (I hope passengers on that train were OK.) “Jinxed” was a term that came to mind more than once on our dream trip.

So it was a tough dozen days. But, hey, as one of my island neighbors noted upon my return: At least it was France!

Daniel and Jean Farber walk a former towpath blasted from a limestone wall along the Lot. A lock can be seen in the background.

Oui. That meant wonderful food everywhere we went, affordably priced compared to the Trumpian U.S.A. On arrival in France, I found that even a run-of-the-mill Monoprix supermarket in Paris offered deli salads worthy of Seattle’s better restaurants. Paul Hollywood would have drooled over the pastries. In the little river town of Vers, where daughter Lillian gifted me a night in a gorgeously modern air-conditioned hotel room in a renovated 14th-century tower, we dined well at an outdoor table near the pool. I enjoyed a dinner of asparagus soup, housemade pâté de foie gras, pan-fried trout, ratatouille and a tasty cheese platter, with a nice local rosé wine. The tab: less than $50.

My friends Daniel and Jean and I enjoyed a 4 1/2-mile roundtrip riverside walk from one of our moorages to the marvelous medieval village of Saint-Cirq-Lapopie, perched 1,200 feet up a rocky promontory above the Lot. We set out at 7:30 to enjoy the cool of the morning. The down side: We arrived too early to enjoy a good French espresso at a sidewalk cafe. Opening time in French villages is around 10.

Crew member Lux, right, offers crew member Daniel a tip on operating a do-it-yourself lock on the Lot River.

Another day we escaped the heat by hiring a taxi to take us to the famous Pech Merle Cave to see cave paintings that carbon dating has confirmed to be 29,000 years old. In a cool and damp setting far underground, the most memorable images were iconic drawings of two leopard-spotted horses rendered by ancient humans using charcoal powder and red ochre. It was stunning to ponder the remarkable images surrounded by the artist’s own handprints among the limestone cave’s stalactites and stalagmites. Three local teenagers discovered the images while exploring the cave in 1922.

Saint-Cirq-Lapopie’s hillside-perching church overlooks a splendid panorama of the Lot River Valley.

The boat voyage was, indeed, an adventure. If typical May temperatures in the 70s had prevailed, it might have been the dream trip we’d envisioned.

Human skulls and femurs are stacked in the Paris Catacombs.

On our return to Paris, before catching a flight home, Lillian and her partner, Lux, accompanied me on another underground tour where we took refuge from the heat. In the Paris Catacombs, far beneath the city’s streets, millions of human skeletons reside. Parisians of every walk of life ended up for centuries in underground limestone mines, starting in the 1600s when the city’s cemeteries filled up. Today it is a sobering tourist attraction. The bones and skulls have been artistically arranged and stacked, in part to help structurally support the city above them. I came away with one clear thought: Pursuant to the foundational national motto of France, “Liberty, Equality, Fraternity,” dating back to the French Revolution, the Catacombs clearly demonstrate how Parisians of past centuries were treated equally in death.

On a lighter note: My final morning in Paris I struck out early to explore the neighborhood around my 13th Arrondissement rental apartment. Wandering at random near Place d’Italie, I discovered and photographed a delightful variety of wall paintings — too sophisticated and elaborate to be called graffiti. I’ll end here with a sampling. It just might inspire me to make some new art on the walls of Nuthatch Cabin. Watch out, Center Island.

Coffeehouse art goes outside on the Street of Five Diamonds.

A gecko rides a parrot on the Street of Quail Hill.

On a back street, Napoleon rides a horse.

What apartment facade isn’t improved by a magic tree you can climb while a ring-tailed lemur looks on?

Some people say cheetahs never prosper. But these two have a sidewalk to themselves.

Our Road Scholar contingent by one of our tour boats at dock in Friday Harbor. Your loyal correspondent is the tall drink of water in the back row below and left of the first “S” in Salish Sea. Tour-goers came from as far away as New York and Florida. Kelley Balcomb-Bartok photo.

I’M JUST BACK FROM ROAD SCHOLAR trip Number One, and I think I’ve found my tribe.

This week-long outing was dubbed “The San Juan Islands by Land and Sea: Hidden Anchorages.” It was my first outing as a guide trainee for Road Scholar, the globe-trotting tour leader that is celebrating its 50th year as an education-oriented not-for-profit organization. Locally, it operates in conjunction with the Friday Harbor outpost of Mount Vernon-based Skagit Valley College.

With 30 travelers from across the United States, we skipped across the San Juans by charter boat for three days, plus two days on land exploring our base around Friday Harbor. Our at-sea days included a day trip to remote Sucia, my favorite of the archipelago and home now to my late wife Barbara’s memorial bench. Stops included the historical town of La Conner, where my neighbor the Mad Birder lives when he’s not on my little rock, and where Barbara was once town librarian. We transited three of my favorite scenic-keyhole water passages: Hole in the Wall on Swinomish Channel; the famed swirling waters of Deception Pass; and squeaky-narrow Pole Pass between Orcas and Crane islands. These were places my family and I had navigated again and again over the years on our own sailboat. Virtually everywhere this tour went, I had a story to share with our visitors. With a sizable contingent of retired teachers and librarians, they were eager listeners.

It was gratifying at trip’s end when one of our group kindly proclaimed, “You’re a great storyteller!”

Our tour vessel, Salish Express, transits Hole in the Wall on Swinomish Channel south of La Conner.

Road Scholar specializes in travel for people 50 and older, but the typical age is early 70s. Our group ranged from early 60s up to one participant who was a fit-as-a-fiddle 86. They came from as far away as Florida and New York, along with Midwest contingents from Minnesota, Kansas, Illinois, etc., plus Californians aplenty. Some were on their first Road Scholar trip. One had been on more than 50.

This group traveled under a lucky star. On our first day on the water, between Bellingham and Friday Harbor, we encountered a sizable group of transient killer whales feeding off the northern tip of Cypress Island. For more than a half hour our 100-foot vessel idled as we watched the whales breach, tail slap and generally cavort to the “oohs” and “ahhs” of our visitors, most of whom were first-timers in these islands. In all my years poking around the Salish Sea, this was one of my best orca sightings.

In a trademark red Road Scholar vest, your correspondent takes to the mike aboard a tour vessel. Cathy Holley photo.

The second day we meandered past Whale Rocks at the southern entry to Cattle Pass to get an eyeful of dozens of Steller sea lions, the largest of sea lions. This band included a handful of mammoth males, which can grow to 11 feet long and weigh almost 2,500 pounds. As we paused, one of the incredible hulks scooted to the top of his rocky islet and reared high in what was clearly an “I’m King of the World” pose atop Pride Rock. (Sea lions don’t know better than to mix their Hollywood metaphors.)

At Sucia, we got an eyeful of eagles, as bald eagles circled and swooped a half-mile into the sky above us at Shallow Bay. All in all, this was a wildlife-blessed journey.

Clearly, Road Scholar is a good fit for me. I needed more human interaction than I get on my little rock. This is a good way to fill that need. And I even get paid.

Meanwhile, I’m remembering lost loved ones this Memorial Day and sending warm thoughts to friends and family. I feel I’ve found new friends to help fill the gaps in my life. Best wishes to any of you seeking the same.