I consider myself lucky to have had such an inexpensive roof and interesting lifestyle to explore (boat life) plus a car to explore the region while repairs were being done on my Paris apartment. The job was supposed to take only two weeks, but it turned in to 10. I tried to entertain myself by spending 10 days with friends in Aix-en-Provence, then two weeks in Crete, but my homelessness kept renewing itself. I took my friends' generous offer to live on their boat moored in Burgundy. Couples who knew my hosts would stop by, curious as to why I was there. Boat people are friendly, a natural product of living a meter or two from each other. After six weeks on the boat in Burgundy, however, the novelty wore off.

I was happy to be back in my Paris apartment where I can actually stand up straight (versus knocking my head on the top of the boat, destroying increasingly important brain cells)....where I can use the adjoining bathroom (versus running to use the port WC. No French law requires toilet “products” to go into a holding tank, so it all gets pumped into the river—thus, the jaunt to use a bona fide sewage system)....and a wifi system that’s fast and doesn’t fade away at inopportune moments. Often to get a signal on the boat, I had to go out on the deck or to a picnic table near the port offices and try to read a computer screen dimmed by the sun, hardly readable.

Toward the end, I thought that if I heard one more cuckoo call I’d go nuts. On the other hand, the birds in the trees on the nearby island provided a magnificent chorus in the morning and at sunset. Though the water in the port is calm, the concentric circles underwater creatures create can be hypnotic. Herons fly by, ducks swoop and swans visit. The latter can be militant.One day a boat from outside was coming down the wrong way on the exit path; a swan actually attacked it. Three parties were in the scuffle—a boat trying to exit properly, the misguided boat and the swan.

Monday mornings fellow boaters and French locals from around the port go for a walk. The one on May Day was supposed to be in search of lillies of the valley; alas, because it had been too dry and too warm, the symbol for this national holiday was already gone for the year. The French couple leading that day’s hike invited us for an aperatif. We sat in their yard drinking their homemade everything. They have a wonderful garden...make their own jelly and preserves...even cassis syrop...eat the fresh vegetables from their garden and can the rest. I told them that “when the end of the world comes, I’ll know where to go...”

Paris friend Barney came for a week of daily forays into the countryside, thanks to the car (I would no sooner take the boat out for a spin than I would attempt to swim the English Channel). Barney researched in guide books and navigated. I drove—refreshing, since unlike a previous travel companion, Barney doesn’t incessantly scream at me while driving. The end result is that we are still intact and have had some nice trips. Unfortunately, as driver, I couldn’t take part in the main activity in Burgundy—wine tasting! PS: Noticing that Barney wasn’t there one morning, I thought, “Oh dear, he’s fallen overboard on a nightly peeing sortie.” Then I remembered I had driven him to the train station the previous day.

Going to and from places of interest, you pass through distinctive villages (there are more than 2000 in Burgundy). Returning around 9:30-10 p.m., there is hardly a light on. That’s one of the drawbacks, including the port city, St. Jean de Losne. There is no night life.

Burgundy outings were:

• the chateau at Pierre de Bresse surrounded by a wonderful forest—with darkness, birds, things that make forests mysterious—as well as its museum on Burgundian country life
• the Citeaux Monastery, the source of what has become some 7000 Trappist/Bernardin/other Cictercians monasteries all over the world
• Besancon, beautiful in its old part. People were better dressed than in Paris, arty and sophisticated. We visited the citadel, time museum and astrological clock from 1860 (made of 30,000 parts, some working by weights, others operate chimes . Sixty-two dials indicate days, seasons, the time in 16 major cities all over the world, tides in eight ports, the length of daylight and darkness, times the sun and moon rise and set, movement of planets around the sun). Too much information...
• Auxonne, full of Napoleon lore; he was a soldier there. The city of Lons is totally forgettable.
• Chateau de Savigny just north of Beaune, a crazy mixture of collections. Besides the chateau itself: exhibits of wine paraphernalia, motorcycles, race cars, vineyard tractors, about 80 intact airplane chassis and 2300 model airplanes. At the end you taste wine in front of a fireplace (the best part). We went on to Beaune for dinner and to walk around, since we had already been to the Hotel Dieu, a standout bit of history, an original hospice.

On my own I went on a longer-than-expected drive to the northwest. The goal was the Bussy Rabutin chateau, but I went wherever providence (and roads) led me. I was frequently lost—for wont of my trusty navigator. First thing I happened onto was the Alesia battlefield where Caesar and the Gauls went at it in 52 BC. Standing on those hills and forested lowlands, imagination goes into overdrive; you picture troops gathering in their strategic places, readying for battle—back in the days when you actually see and touch the enemy. An impressive statue of the Gaul general Vercingeterix looks over the battlefields. Maybe if he hadn't lost, it would have been even bigger. Nearby are archeological digs where Napoleon III and others have tried to prove this is where the aforementioned battle happened. Lots of remnants have been uncovered, but experts are still arguing.

I finally did find the Bussy Rabutin chateau. The count was from a noble family and liked to fight in wars, but also write verse. Some he wrote about court life irked Louis XIV, who sent him to exile in this gilded cage of a chateau. Entire rooms of paintings classify men of war and people from court life he had known. Anybody he didn’t like got put in obscure places. What a character! Sort of the Maureen Dowd of Bushdom.

There was just enough time at the end of the day to visit the third site in the area, the Abbaye de Fontenay, another 11th-century Cictercian monastery (better restored than Citeaux although for “patrimonie” reasons rather than monks actually living there).