France: Buying a Car for Our Barge

“You’re lucky the police didn’t stop you,” the young man behind the rental car counter in Dijon says to me. “This car has been reported as stolen. You are very lucky.” He shakes his head.

Now, to someone whose only brush with the law was a speeding ticket twenty-two years ago, I receive the news with equanimity. After all, I have righteous indignation on my side. True, we’ve kept the rental car longer than the original contract stated, but I’ve called the Paris airport rental office on three different occasions to postpone the return date. I explain this to the young man after he shows me two faxes from his Paris office stating that for two weeks the car has been on a list of stolen vehicles. He appears to believe me and again shakes his head. “Those people in Paris,” he says. “They don’t know what they’re doing.”

In retrospect, we were lucky. Being language-impaired and trying to explain the situation to the police in our Tonto French would’ve been dicey at best. We’d kept the rental Citroen Saxo since we’d arrived in April, about six weeks, hoping to find another car that we could afford to purchase. Last year my husband Paul and I bought a boat to cruise through Europe for six months every year.

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Our 1906 Dutch steel barge, IMAGINE, was originally designed to haul cargo under sail and has the graceful lines of a klipper. In the 1950’s it was converted to a houseboat and offers us 1000 square feet of living area: three bedrooms, three baths, a galley and a salon, all for a fraction of the cost of a new cabin cruiser. A 1959 Volvo Penta diesel engine now powers us down the rivers and canals of France, at the majestic speed of approximately four miles an hour.

For an entire season, we had lived without a car and walked, rode our bicycles or called a taxicab when absolutely necessary. While this contributed to our weight loss on the “Barge Diet” (lots of exercise to counteract the delicious French food and copious amounts of Cote de Rhone wine), there were locations, like our homeport in St. Symphorien, where shopping was not convenient. this plunge for the first time on a hunch that it would be superior to my past experiences.

The French have a partial solution for people in remote places like this – a bread truck arrives daily, honking its horn and like Pavlov’s dogs, people emerge from their boats to purchase their daily baguettes and croissants. On Fridays, a Pizza Truck, complete with a wood oven, parks within walking distance from the port. But we also hoped that having a vehicle would expand our horizons and allow us to see even more of the French countryside. Besides, we could not live on bread and pizza alone.

Since we established our website at BargeandBreakfast.com, we have been chartering our boat for up to four guests and a six person minivan would be ideal, but très cher, very expensive. We looked in used car lots, scanned the ads for cars, and looked at cars that were for sale by owner. We considered a motor scooter to at least get us over to a store when we were moored at some remote location. This option, while a cheaper alternative, wasn’t without its limitations – rainy weather travel wouldn’t be very comfortable, carrying loads of provisions difficult.

We always have a building or painting project going on with endless amounts of boards and paint to carry, and I was concerned as to how a scooter would solve our dilemma. I envisioned us, two middle-aged people in flashy helmets, balancing packages and lumber like something out of Cirque du Soleil. It was not a pretty picture. We tried to go to the scooter store in Dole, resignedly ready to buy something, and it was unexplainably closed for several days in a row.

Then, driving along in our rental car on the way to Dijon one morning, Paul came to an abrupt halt, right in Saint Jean de Losne, a town near our homeport.

“What?” I said, shaken. Maybe we’d hit something.

“Didn’t you see it? A Mini, A Vendre, a For Sale sign in the back window.”

There it was, a red Mini with a man sitting in it, parked by the side of the road. We backed up and pulled in next to it. We’d narrowed down our list of cars that would work for us if we were able to find them used.

We had carefully measured an indentation in our boat’s foredeck where a car might fit and we would then be able to bring our transportation with us wherever we went. A French Deux Chevaux, a Citron 2 CV, was narrow enough, but too tall and would block Paul’s vision when piloting IMAGINE. We’d surreptitiously measured a Mini we’d found parked on the street. It was the perfect height and width for our boat. We both had a weakness for Minis; Paul has owned British cars all his driving life, I always thought they were cute, like little cartoon cars.

The man inside the car spoke no English, but we communicated that we would like to know the price. I had him write it down in a notebook I now carry, just to be certain. Numbers are my nemesis in English, let alone French. The car was affordable, had low mileage for a 1990 model and would fit nicely on the deck of IMAGINE. In fact, the seller explained, the car has been on his barge, TULIPE, which was also a vendre.

We introduced ourselves and he told us his name was Freddy. Paul test drove the car for a few minutes and felt it was worth pursuing the purchase. Working out the details was difficult with our language problem, but Freddy had an idea. We should follow him to one of the boat ports in town where they speak English and French well and they could act as translators. Unfortunately, it was the port in town where they have been arrogant to us before, but we couldn’t think of a better idea.

A truculent man helped with the translation and the details of buying a car in France. Freddy works for this port and occasionally pilots boats for the yard so you would think they’d want to help him with the sale. One of the English owners made it clear he was doing this for Freddy, but not for us since we are not customers. We explained for the umpteenth time that we tried to find a boat here when we were barge shopping, but they didn’t have anything for us. Silently, I added, “And since you’ve been snotty to us every time we’ve met, I’m glad.” Next encounter, I won’t keep silent. At the time, I wanted the car and could use their help.

We were told that Freddy will be moving a boat and leaving the next day for a week and we would be gone for a week after that. Not wanting to lose the car, we realized that we must do the deal that day. We didn’t yet have a French bank account, or the time to get one established today, so our first challenge was to draw enough cash out of ATMs. We didn’t know exactly what the transaction limits would be, so we spent about a half an hour getting cash from various accounts and machines. I felt like we were playing the slot machines in Las Vegas after a while, counting the bills that spewed out and then recounting them. One account finally cut us off, but the other pulled through and we had just enough cash for the deal.

We went back to St. Symphorien, our homeport, and found out the details from Roger, our harbormaster, of how one goes about purchasing and registering a car here.

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First, the car must be tech inspected at a state-run Contrôle Technique (seller pays) and it may be sold only if it passes the inspection. Then, a corner must be cut off the current title. The title must have two lines drawn across the face of it with the sold date and the signature of the seller. A standard transfer form also needs to be completed. The method of payment must be cash or a check drawn on a French bank account.

There was no such thing as a cashier’s check, Roger explained, as they weren’t necessary. If you wrote a check that was overdrawn, the police came to your house and you went to jail, no questions asked. I made a mental note to self: 1) get a French bank account. 2) Never overdraw it. Never.

Then we must register the car at the Prefecture in Dijon, with all the papers of sale and a letter from Roger establishing our part-time residency here. A new title would then be given to us at the Prefecture (called a Carte Gris – Grey Card). Insurance would be available from the insurance companies in St. Jean. It might help our rate if we had a letter from our United States car insurance agent stating an absence of claims for over five years and we would also need the letter establishing our part time residency.

At five o’clock, we met Freddy outside his house in St. Jean. About five feet tall and probably in his early sixties, long gray sideburns framed his face. He was dressed up for the occasion in a shiny blue tracksuit with white stripes down the legs, a polyester shirt with a nautical print of boats and steering wheels, topsiders and a black captain’s hat perched on his head. He was the most boat-loving Frenchman we’ve met.

We followed him for about ten minutes to Brazey-en-Plaine the closest inspection location. The official tested the car more thoroughly than we expected and the Mini went through a series of gyrations bouncing the suspension around. He tested the brakes, inspected the undercarriage and engine, and finally a hose was stuck up its exhaust pipe.

Freddy stared down at the paperwork given him when all the tests were completed and a great deal of conversation took place between him and the inspector. We were puzzled and trying to figure out if there was a problem, and if so, what it was. Time was running out. Finally, the woman in the office who spoke some English explained to us, “It failed the pollution test.”

Now what? Closing time for the test facility is seven o’clock and it was now six. Undaunted, Freddy told us to follow him to a nearby garage. He spoke with the man there and for half an hour they made adjustments under the hood. Again, another hose was stuck up the Mini’s exhaust pipe. Freddy and the mechanic nodded, money changed hands, and we followed Freddy back for a re-test at the facility. This time, the Mini passed. It was six forty; we’d made it with twenty minutes to spare.

We returned to Freddy’s maison, met his wife, Germaine, and their dog “Shippi” and got a chance to go inside a French person’s house for the first time. Located on the Saone River, the immaculate interior of his home was done entirely in a nautical motif. There were boat paintings, boat models, ship’s wheels; even the hall wallpaper was a nautical print. Freddy went around pointing everything out proudly and we nodded enthusiastically. He showed us the bedroom, done up in a king-size bed with the only non-nautical art in the house, a large barroom nude oil painting – Madame, I wondered?

They explained that they will be selling the house and buying a camper van to live in. We tried to explain that we live in our motor home in the winter. I thought how much Freddy would miss the nautical life once the barge and house along the river sell. Maybe like us he will carry a small boat with him on the camper to satisfy his nautical passion. Money and paperwork were exchanged, we declined the invitation for a drink, and we arrived back in port by seven thirty, with the Mini, our signed papers, and completely cashless.

For more information regarding chartering the water barge IMAGINE, visit the website: BargeandBreakfast.com