We left Iles de Glénans reasonably early and sailed all the way to Benodet, passing the lighthouse on Ile aux Moutons. We picked a spot on the outside end of the visitors pontoon and went alongside at slack water, given the dire warnings in the pilot guides!

We had a very pleasant time at Benodet, including a wonderful meal at Cafe Foutu. We also provisioned at the nearby supermarket. We met Brian and Ruth who invited us on board for a drink and comparing of notes.

Phil and Paulette visited us and it was great to see them after many years. We had a very pleasant time catching up with them on family stories and happenings. We ended up in Le Transat for dinner which had all the hallmarks of a tourist trap, but turned out to be superb. A post-dinner walk around the headland trigger memories of previous trips for Paulette.

We returned to the boat for the night, but at 2am there was a bit of a bang. I woke up and had a look out of my hatch and saw a boat coming alongside. Hey oh, back to sleep. 5 minutes later there was a bigger bang, and blow me, the same boat was hitting us again! I went up on deck to take ropes, but the offending boat decided to go elsewhere. I had a look around in the daylight and couldn't see any damage, but the guy never came to apologise for hitting us. The second hit was definitely not a fender, and Paulette reported him saying (in French) that "it wasn't very obvious, was it?"! No, a boat tied to the visitors pontoon in the river is not at all to be expected! We weren't even as wide as the rafted boats near us!

The next morning we took advantage of Phil's car to grab a butagaz cube as we'd finished our first bottle of gas. We'll chop it in before we leave France to get our deposit back. Hopefully we can find a way to refill our uk bottles as we visit places who have less H&S going on :)

Whilst Phil and I were doing the gas, Mandy and Paulette had got talking to the boat rafted outside of us - Paul and Jane from Griffin of Arne. Talk of sailing plans, living in France, and Paulette's upcoming book.

All too soon, Phil and Paulette had to go, and we said goodbye to both Brian and Ruth (who were headed back to Plymouth) and Paul and Jane who still had some time to explore South Brittany.

We left the river, raised sail and got most of the way to Concarneau before the wind died...