écluses de fonsérannes

Wonderful invention that makes one pause and reflect on man's ingenuity. A nice café next to the locks to rest and contemplate the view of the boats going through the locks.

A good fun afternoon or morning visit. A. pretty walk along the canal from the Nine Locks to the Port of Beziers. Its very good fun to watch the hire boats going up or down the locks. The restaurant opposite is a good vantage point. Very good lunch menu at the restaurant, with daily specials, nice wine and good coffee.

Having had an enjoyable visit to Bingley Five Rise Locks in Yorkshire the thought of 9 locks prompted us to seek out this place. We visited in February which is out of season admittedly but...We didn't have a sat nav but had an idea where it was and when we saw a large sign for the Locks at the side of the main road near Beziers we thought (mistakenly) that it would be well signposted. As with most French signage they put one sign up and then expect you to know where to go after that or they put it on the other side of the road and only see it when you've gone past.We found it... eventuallyIt was all a bit of an anti climax. The locks appeared to be in a poor state of repair. We walked up to the top in about five minutes and at the top there were some picnic tables but nothing else. Everything was shut (expected) but even if it had been open it wasn't that pretty or exciting.Might be fun on a boat but as a visitor attraction it doesn't add up to much.

Hmm, I found this distinctly underwhelming. Like another reviewer, I have found other canals and locks far more appealing (the Falkirk Wheel is wonderful). Maybe it didn't help because I saw the escluses in cold and windy January weather, but I doubt it. I can imagine having a picnic in glorious warm weather accompanied by a bottle of vin rouge would greatly improve my opinion......

the trip down the locks (ecluses) was a great experience. The entire Canal du Midi was the best vacation I have ever had and of all the locks, these were the most exciting. We spent the night at the top so were amongst the first down in the morning. Beziers is a great place to tour too.

These are a set of pretty locks above Beziers. Fine views of the city, cathedral and canal du Midi. Take a picnic there. Support the effort to contain the fungal disease of the plane tress (all 45,000) of them that line the Canal from the Atlantic to the Med...

we saw couple of boats going up which allow us to the ecluses opening up and closed. Not done manually any longer. could do with some new tarmac, no friendly at all if you were physically disable. good to see on a sunny day. not much around.

One of the must do things in this life, but sail on through Beziers, they don't want tourists. The Quayside is run down and nowhere close to the town centre, with no maps to guide you there.

Get here on a lovely day and enjoy gawking at all manner of boats bumping and grinding in an attempt to transcend the flight of 8 gates (9 locks). Food, drinks and an excellent Office d'Tourisme sit on site for your convenience as you do so.It is a short walk from the town and well worth a saunter down the canal for. Also what lovely piece of 17thC engineering.

Visited the locks by getting the Dotto tourist train from Beziers. The locks are amazing - such a feat of engineering. It's great to watch the boats go up and down the hill. It's also fun, but somewhat embarrassing and rude to write about, to watch the amateur sailors manoeuvring the boats into the locks. Why do the men steer and the women have to be the ones to jump on and off and moor up?It's a lovely place to visit. There is a small cafe with limited menu, but drinks etc. And access to toilets. A few tourist and craft type shops. Plus you can walk along the towpath back into Beziers or further along the canal. A must for most tourists.

Ok, they are a good set of locks on a lovely canal. But why they considered to be so special I don't understand. There are nicer walks past series of locks on some lovely quite parts of the Leeds Liverpool canal. I wouldn't rate them as 5-star attractions either.It's a very busy spot, but being Beziers' 'best' attraction that is to be expected.Maybe you have to see them from the water to get the full 'experience' .

We really enjoyed the 7 locks. Our le Boat charter made the whole canal trip a great experience, even for a senior-citizen couple.

Worth a trip to the 9 locks - a fascinating place where the two canals meet and it takes 45 minutes to pass through the 9 locks. There is a cafe/restaurant there and an excellent information centre.

Read a lot about this attraction and awaited the experience with great anticipation. Our boat broke down and we had to wait for a new one (we got excellent service from Le Boat regarding this breakdown) to be delivered at Quai du Port Neuf (Beziers), so we cycled to the locks to see what this well known engineering masterpiece looked like up close and personal. Seeing that it was early in the season, not much was going on, but the locks were very impressive never the less. We enjoyed a cold beer at the La Guinguette Bar-Restaurant right next to the locks, before heading back to wait for our new boat.On our new boat, we headed for the Ecluses de Fonserannes. If we thought it was impressive and exciting looking on from the side, we were in for a big surprise. Navigating these locks is something else. It is exciting, exhilarating, testing, impressive, overwhelming and at times even a little scary. if you're going to do a boating holiday in France, make sure you do the Canal du Midi, so you can experience this. This was probably the no 1 highlight of many on our cruise.

You have to see it to believe it. Thoroughly enjoyed watching the boats come up the locks (10am ascending and 1pm descending) especially when you think of the times it was built. Took our children along; three year old was entertained for a while too.