The Journey -
Leaving Germany on Rosy

I left you last time having failed to make it to Wolfsburg because of rain.  Needless to say, we got there the next day, and stopped briefly for a look round.  I strolled over to the huge Visitor Centre at the VW works.  It is for conferences (upstairs), people calling-in to collect their new cars and for people who want to visit the VW Theme Park.  All I wanted to do was to visit the Museum, but to do that I had to buy a ticket to the entire theme park, and, having seen the head of Nefertiti for 6 Euro, I didn't fancy paying 16 or 18 Euro to see some elderly VWs.

So I visited Wolfsburg itself, which, in the early 1930s was a village of some 300 people.  Now it is a bustling, busy town, with an Internet Cafe run by a Syrian gentleman who was kind enough to understand my Arabic, indeed, he was amazed to find a European who could speak a few words of it.  In Oman, I only had to walk into an office and say to the occupant "Good morning" in Arabic, and the occupant would rush out, shouting "Come everyone!  Come and listen!  There is a European in my office who speaks Arabic!!" (I hasten to add that my vocabulary only ran to about 100 words).

Anyway, back to Rosy, who was moored alongside the rather smart, Art Deco-ish railway station, and on with the voyage.  Mostly 6-hour days, plonking along the pretty much dead straight Mittleland Canal at 6 kph, 300 plus km, with only two locks.  Big 1000+ tonne barges overtaking - whilst another whizzes by the other way.  Plenty of moorings, but none off-line.  At night, if one moors properly with good, tight bow and stern lines, and at least one spring, the barges are not a problem.  They move water along in front of them, and then push a lot water out behind them, but they don't create much of a stern or bow wave.  Hence, all they do is to run Rosy back and forwards a touch.  It's the bloody motor cruisers that cause a problem, with bow and stern waves that bounce off the sides of the canal, so that even after the initial big waves have hit one, there is still a whole succession of gradually decreasing waves to come, and they really bounce the moored boats about.  It is notable that lots of the barges slow down as they pass moorings - not so the bloody cruisers.  Anyway, 9 or 10 days of this is enough for anyone.  We celebrated our progress in the evening with a BBQ - only our second of the year.

However, the end of the Mittleland came at last.  We then turned Northish along the Dortmund Ems Kanal - another big waterway, not quite so busy with commercial traffic as the Mittleland.

The highlight was at Lingen, where we moored for free on the town moorings.  Lingen town was quite delightful.  A pedestrianised town centre, with a very pretty town square, and a generally 'café' culture and feel about it.

Then on Northwards down the river Ems to Haren where we turned into the Haren Rutenbrock canal that goes from Haren to (believe it or not) Rutenbrock.  We spent an hour in Haren at the boat museum, a charming little museum, partly in an old canal-side house and partly in three elderly boats moored outside, one of which was a splendid old sailing spitz.  The museum has an eclectic collection of boaty bits - some histories of boating families, lots of model boats, nautical instruments (sextants, quadrants and their fore-runners, Walker logs, compasses etc.), items from the old crafts (sail-making, woodworking, rope-making etc.), some big old engines and some nice photos - in particular one from a sail-making shop.  In one corner of one of the boats there was a wonderfully boaty smell - well seasoned wood, hemp rope and oil.  Mmmmmm.

And so on, to the end of the Haren Rutenbrock Canal and into Ter Apel, the Netherlands, where this is being written.

Only two highlights to report.

One evening, about 1900 hrs, I was playing with my Fanny on the towing path, when an extremely pissed German on a bike, wearing the conventional, blue 'brace and bib' style coveralls, and with a particularly idiotic grin all over his face, stopped to tell me that (I think I've got this right - despite my protests that I speak but a little German, he droned on for some 20 minutes):

- a Polish barge was due to moor near us.

- After mooring, a delivery of Polish Vodka would be made from the barge to a nearby 'house' (wink-wink) where …..

- … after midnight, 'Madame' would be selling it as an 'extra' at 5 Euros a bottle.

- he was off there now to get in the queue and, finally …

- I was welcome to go along with him.

Er … Thanks!!  But "No thanks".

Secondly, one morning, as we were preparing to leave, a bloke on a bike appeared, and spoke to us in pretty flawless German.  We explained that we were English speakers and had no truck with these strange tongues.  He replied in pretty flawless English.  He was, of course Dutch.

For the uninitiated, the Dutch understand that their language is a minority interest, and hence they take the trouble to learn other languages.  Not so the Dutch-speaking Belgians who believe that you should not visit their half of Belgium unless you have learned the language.  I was foolish enough to dispute this in a pub in Gent which (I subsequently learned) is the unofficial HQ of the ultra right wing nationalist party of that part of Belgium.  I'm pleased to report that I escaped - if not unscathed, then at least with my life!!

Anyway, this Dutchman came along and was interested in our boats.  He was the skipper of the BIG jobbie over there.  He was pretty disparaging of the 1000 tonnes plus German barge that was winding in our basin.  Madame was up front giving hand signals to show how close they were getting to the other boats.  He told us that Dutch registered barges are required to have a communication system between skipper and deck crew.  We also learned that the barges are only allowed to travel for 14 hours a day.  Our friend was an early starter (5am) so finished at 7pm.  Oh!  Yes.  And the reason why the German boat was winding is that they had misunderstood their instructions, and had cruised by their unloading point, so were having to wind to go back to it.  This extra 10 kms, plus the winding time, meant that they had missed their unloading slot, so the knock-on effects would be about a day's delay for them - LOST MONEY!!!.

Right!  That's the voyage.

The next topic is wagtails.  As we pootle along, every now and then a bird comes and sits on the roof of the boat for a few minutes.  It then flies off, leaving behind (one cannot help but notice these things) a whoopsie.  Now.  Why is it that 99.9% of these visitors are wagtails?  Pied wagtails, to be precise.  I have never had a yellow wagtail on board, even although there are plenty of them fluttering around on the bank.  Nor have we ever had a reed bunting or a reed warbler on board.  Had a swift once, but only (naturally) for a short time, 'cos he had lots of other things to do and places to go.  But pied wagtails!!

The next topic is gnomes.  I don't think we have touched on this before, but I feel that more people ought to know about the GLS - the Gnome Re-location Service.

It was started a few years ago by a caring section of the population who could not help but notice that once gardeners had placed a gnome in position in the garden - nothing happened.  The poor old gnome had to sit (or stand, as the case may be) there for years and years without any change of view.  Result - for the gnome - boredom, apathy and a generally dismal future.  The GLS sets out to remedy this.

To join the Service, one first needs to go out and purchase a garden gnome, which one pops into the boot of one's car.  One then proceeds about one's normal life, until one sees a gnome in a garden.  One then exchanges the gnome in the garden with the one in the car boot and so, ad infinitum.

One slowly discovers that at certain motorway service stations (and a few selected transport cafes on major highways) that sections are reserved for the GLS, where members can gather to exchange information concerning the whereabouts of prospective replace gnomes.

There is a recognised code of conduct, especially concerning the size and age of the gnomes concerned.  After all, it would not be right to replace a brand new, big, bright 'n' shiny 'in situ' gnome with an small, elderly party with peeling paint.

There are is also a renegade group, which has absolutely no connection with the true GLS (legal action is in the offing to ensure this) whose sole purpose is to ensure that every grouping of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs includes at least one gnome of the mooning/flashing variety.  I understand that they claim to have conquered Essex already.

That's all Folks!!

Toodle pip!!

Bill

(Editor's note: And here is a postcard which Bill sent me of the inclined plane boatlift at Elblag, which was the ostensible purpose of this whole trip - see his account of it on 22nd May 2005)