The Journey -
Rosy Goes Dutch

I finished the last posting at the end of the Haren-Rutenbrock Canal, a waterway which provides the easiest (from a navigational point of view) connection between France/Belgium/Holland and Germany.  The canal is interesting to 'work' through, as it is all controlled from the lock at the German end of the canal.  The lock-keeper there opens and closes all the bridges and locks from his cabin.

At the Dutch end, one arrives in Ter Apel, a pleasant enough town, with all the essential shops AND a post office from which we hoped to collect our mail.  Unfortunately, only one of my packages was there.  So we went up the Ruten Aa canal to Roelagebrug, where there is a convenient mooring.  From there, for nearly a week, we visited Ter Apel by road every other day in the hope that the mail had arrived.  It hadn't.  After 6 days, we got a bit fractious, bored and short of water, so we cruised up the Ruten Aa canal to Veelerveen, where there is a convenient mooring and an excellent water point.  The canal is a d-i-y one.  A key is needed (a 20 Euro deposit is required) which work the locks and bridges (some are swing bridges and some are bascule bridges).  The key fires up bridge/lock, but a certain amount of user effort is also required.  All the locks, and most of the bridge are hydraulically operated from a control panel and these hydraulic systems, plus the key, undoubtedly help to preserve the structures from casual misuse.  The instructions for use are, of course, in Dutch, but we were pleased to see that Dutch folk seemed to have as much of a problem as we did in getting the bloody things to work!!  Amazingly cheerful waterways employees buzz up and down the towing path, calming irate voyagers and fixing that which has mal-functioned.  Anyway, we got our water, and returned to near Roelagebrug the next day.

Some cheery Dutch people tried to persuade us to stay for another week, to wait for the events at the impressive, Napoleonic, earthen, star shaped fort (with a moat) at Bourtange.  Every year, on the anniversary of the battle, there are celebrations but every 5th year (00 and 05 years) special events are staged.  This year there was to be a cavalry charge by 700 horses.  We declined, and finally gave up on the mail.  I'm hoping it will be returned to UK.

Eventually, on Monday 1 August, we boated through Ter Apel and onto the Musselkanal, heading for the town of Stadtkanal.  We travelled beside a road I have been down many a time in a car, but it is SO different at 5 kph!!  There is time to see the fine buildings.  Indeed, for much of the day we had buildings on either side of the canal.  Many houses have their gable ends to the road, with two large windows downstairs and two smaller ones upstairs.  99.9% are extremely neat and tidy, and it seems appropriate that the Dutch word for 'two' is 'twee'!  It was a waving day, as many householders waved at us.  The bridges were nearly all moveable, and a bridge-keeper looks after a series of bridges and maybe a lock as well, so they like to keeps groups of boats together.  All this takes time, so progress is not awfully rapid.  Most of the locks are a bit elderly.  They are paralleled, but the old locks are not used.  I say 'old', perhaps 'older' would be better, as the locks in use are un-modernised.  No balance beams - a long boat-hook is used to open and close the mitre gates - though some of the gates moved horizontally and were winched open and closed.  At the tail of some of the locks was an ageing metal bascule bridge.

At the far side of our last bridge of the day (the Eurobrug) was an artwork - a rather dumpy man, standing by the canal, and spitting jets of water into it.

The problem with the next day is that it started so perfectly that it could only get worse.

Our convoy of three boats (with Rosy at the tail) was approaching a bridge, on the 20 metre wide canal.  Some plastic rowing boats were on our side of the canal (one drives canal boats on the right hand side.  As we approached the bridge, we could see another, larger convoy approaching from the other side, and they would obviously get there first - so we had to wait.  With nowhere convenient to tie up to, we had to practice the ancient art of hanging about.  On the water, this is tricky, as the boat will respond to the slightest current, and to the wind, and to turbulence in the water caused by other boats.  Anyway, we are reasonably proficient in the art, and I foresaw no problems.  Rosy was wholly in my half of the canal, alongside, and about two or three metres off one of the plastic rowing boats.

The first three approaching came by with the usual cheery wave, and my hand was just in the process of going up to wave at skipper number 4, who was in a particularly large and new cruiser - when he started shouting at me in a foreign tongue, identified both from the language and his national flag as German.  He was perfectly livid, though I noticed that his passengers and/or crew remained staring intently at the other bank.  From his gesticulations I gathered that he wanted more of the canal than I had given him.

I gave him an especially cheery wave, and a very friendly "Guten morgen, mein Herr!  Vie gates!!" these last two words are written phonetically.  I think they mean something like 'How goes it, old friend'.  Well!!  That really set him off.  I thought at one point that he was going to leap onto Rosy.  I tried cheery "Have a nice cruise today, old man" but that, too, merely goaded him on.  By that time, of course, we had passed each other, and he had been concentrating so much on his shouting that his steering had gone adrift, and he had to do some nifty helming to avoid the bank.

I'm pleased to report that Fanny-the-Woof joined in the spirit of things, and gave him an exceptionally good woofing.

As I say, things could only get worse.

It was a 45 bridge day - most on the Musselkanal, which turned into the Oosterdiep, which led us to the AG Wildervanckanal, which eventually led us to the Winschoterdiep, and hence to our mooring at Hoogezand (a touch to the east of Gronigen).

The low point of the day was running out of fuel.  We knew we were in for a longish wait at a bridge, so we moored and shut down the engines.  As I was up near the bows, the bridge suddenly opened, so I unmoored, pushed off and started the engine - or, at least, turned the key and the engine turned over, but didn't fire up.  We were on a particularly big bit of water, with no other boats about, so I went below to see what is what.

Fortunately, diesel engines are relatively simple things.  They don't start either because there is no electricity to turn the engine over (not so in this case) or (as in this case) because fuel is not reaching the injectors.  Why not?

It may be recalled that the explosion at Chernoybl occurred because the technicians wanted to practice emergency procedures, and, therefore, had turned off the automatic control systems to do things manually that the control system would have prevented them form doing.  I had done a Chernoybl!!  On the previous Friday evening, to save Rosy's batteries, I had turned off both the day tank filler pump, and the siren that goes off when the day tank is nearly empty - AND … I had forgotten to switch them back on again.  It took ten minutes to bleed the system and get going again.

It was a bit worrying when we finally arrived at our destination - Hoogezand - as the moorings were stuffed full of big old sailing barges.  There had been a big meet in Gronigen the previous week, and this was the overspill.  We found an empty spot that we could just squeeze into, but it had all the hall marks of a private mooring.  It was!!

Enter George.  He appeared two hours later to explain:

• He owned the boat behind us.  His parents owned the house alongside, AND the old church next door which was their stained glass window factory, AND the mooring we were on BUT ….
  
  
• Their boat was away for a while and we were welcome to stay for up to a week AND …
  
  
• Did we want to plug into his electricity?  YES!!!!  AND …
  
  
• His mum would like to see inside a narrow boat.

At about 8pm, many of the barges moved off - some having difficulties in reversing down the narrow channel.  Luckily there was no wind or it would have been REALLY tricky.  Several used the trick of dragging a weight, or small anchor, from the bows, to stop them wandering.

The next day was a 'Visit Gronigen' day, and it is well worth a visit.  It has an airport and a rail station, so is easy to get to and is an ideal 'city break'.  The city has made great efforts to control cars.  It has a ring road and free car parks outside.  Inside, parking is expensive and for a maximum of two hours.  Cars are banned from many places.  Over 50% of Gronigen's regularly cycle.  The city is small enough to walk across in half an hour.  It is also a student city so there are lots of reasonably priced entertainments - eateries, cinemas etc.  As an example, I went to the excellent Ship Museum.  In the entrance hall there are some bookcases with second hand, ship related books for sale.  How sensible.

Gronigen is well endowed with the famous Koffie Huis.  These are banned to people under 18 years of age, because, as well as selling coffee, cakes and soft drinks, they also sell weed/stuff/grass - call it what you will - I can't spell its proper name - mariju-whatnot is as far as I get, and the chell specker is no help.  Anyway, it's 5 Euro a gram upwards, and they won't sell more than 5 grams at a time.  Just in case you wanted to know.

Ahhgts bhmtly af pgklim ect tce cte cet tec etc ……

(Later…)

Then a ghastly afternoon shopping.

The next day (Thursday 4 August for those who are trying to maintain a diary) we set off.  Weather was distinctly overcast, and we had the occasional shower.  We headed westward, along the Winschoterdiep towards Gronigen, with ships being built on either bank.  On the edge of Gronigen we reached a waterways crossroads - we turned right along the Eemskanal.  On the corner was a basin full of assorted houseboats - converted barges and pontoons in the main.  A great hotchpotch, ranging from the overly twee to the breakers yard.

Three or four km along the Eemskanal is a left turn to a lock.  However, a key is needed (20 Euro deposit), so instead of turning into the lock, we carried straight on for two or three hundred metres, and a boatyard on the right supplied the key.  The lock took a while to work, but once through we turned right onto the Damsterdiep, where, after another seven or eight km, we moored just after Ten Boer.

(MUCH LATER - 16 August, to be precise)

Since all the above was written, we have been meandering around some of the smaller back-waters and through-routes.  It has all been quite delightful.  Rosy's mast has been down most of the time, as the bridges are often quite low - many under 2.5 metres.  I don't know that a detailed itinerary will be of any use.  To travel around one needs an up-to-date map - many bridges have been raised to provide a cruising route since Mike's older map was published, and many more moorings have been provided.  With the map - which shows bridge heights etc - one can work out whether a route is boatable.

The moveable bridges come in all modes - from those that one works oneself, to those that are operated by remote control, via those that are automatic once a button is pressed and those that come armed with a bridge keeper (who may look after more than one bridge).  Some bridges one has to pay for - the bridge keeper swings out a little wooden clog on the end of a little fishing rod for the money - usually 1 or 2 Euros, but most are free.  Ah!  And some only open at fixed times.  The times are given in the ANWB Waterways Almanac Part 2, which is published annually, and which is indispensable, even if it is in Dutch.

Anyway, some of the highlights of the past few weeks …….

• Kindly giving a tow to a cruiser with a sick engine.  The tow was for about five km, and slowed us down enough such that when we arrived at the next bridge (a mere hundred metres or so from where we dropped the tow) we had missed the opening by about four minutes, and had to wait for another three hours for the next opening.  I hope that our 'good deed' has stored up a bit of treasure in heaven for us - not that that was why we gave the tow, of course.  Nor, incidentally, was it for money which we would have refused even if it had been offered.
  
  
• However, as we discovered, waiting for bridges to open became an occupational hazard.  In many cases, the timings for a string of bridges bear no relationship to the journey time between each bridge.
  
  
• The little village of Middlestum is a delight.  It is built to a circular pattern around its church, and has a couple of free moorings on offer.  The library opens late on a Friday evening, and has an internet connection.  Its general store opens at 0830 on Mondays (in many villages all shops shut on Monday mornings).
  
  
• Travelling up a very little used waterway - the Meedstermaar  - up to the village of Oldenzijl - its effective terminus for boats of any size as the lift bridge is out of use - unless, as the Dutch owners of a boat demonstrated, you have a work party and a special winch handle.  All the villagers came out to watch this, as they hadn't seen the bridge opened for many a year.  Following this excitement, we were whisked away to a nearby house, and plied with beer, wine and a variety of fishy and meaty nibbles by Janine and Henk Meier.  This welcoming couple are journalists.  Henk was born, I think, just before the war, and it wasn't until after the war that he was told of his Scots ancestry.  He now speaks English with a very strong Scots accent, imbibes decent whiskeys and uses the traditional Scots toast before he swills it down.  He travels a lot (part of his work is to report on golf) and always carries a note book, scissors and glue.  As he moves he sticks into the note book all his travel and entrance tickets, hotel bills, menus, theatre programmes, receipts etc etc.  In his work, he covers (amongst other things) golf, and he has an attic full of golf clubs.  He was fresh out of hospital after problems with his heart, and was recuperating and building up his strength by resting, mowing the lawn, drinking whiskey and puffing on his favourite pipe.
  
  
• Surprisingly, in this small, peaceful, friendly village, someone saw fit to interfere with our mooring lines during the hours of darkness.  This was followed (after breakfast) by a one km reverse back down the cut to find somewhere to wind the boats.
  
  
• Temujin and Rosy parted company for half a day, as Temujin likes to visit dead-ends 'because they are there'.  Rosy went to the village of Warffum and was hailed by another English person, who moved there some years before, to be close to a nearby Zen Buddist centre.  Warffum is a charming little village, with very friendly people in it, and with more dog-shit on its streets than either Fanny-the-Woof or I have ever seen.
  
  
• We had a long meandering day, through tiny cuts and villages.  The highlight was to find a crate of beer (less two bottles) on a public mooring with nobody about.  We moored in the evening at Schouwzijl, where much work has been done to turn a flood gate into a proper lock - which is normally open, but now, in times of flood, the navigation can remain open.
  
  
• We then braced the Slenk.  This used to be a river, but the Dutch shut it off from the sea via a sea lock.  However, we were at the lower end, in what had been the estuary.  That is to say, in a W I D E bit of water, with a stiff breeze blowing.  Wonderfully exhilarating sailing weather, but in a narrow-boat…?  I was relieved to get into the quieter waters of the Dokkumer Grootdiep, and to moor near the village of Ee.  One of the joys of the day was to see so many sailing barges about.  The Dutch enjoy their barges, and many new 'yachts' are built like smaller versions of traditional barges.  I'm not sure why the Brits don't do this?  A small version of a Thames spritsail barge (for example) would make a fine coastal and inland sailing boat.
  
  
• Through the lovely town of Dokkum - a bit too quickly for my liking!  Several bridges (which had to be paid for) with a gaggle of boats waiting to get through, and most wanting to be first, and to overtake on blind exits from the bridge.  I feel a bit invulnerable in my 17 ton boat with its 5 or 6 mm steel hull, so if I'm cut up by a fibre-glass cruiser, its dents will be very much bigger than mine!  Lots of boats were moored in Dokkum, and there are boat yards and at least one chandlery.

Right Folks!!

That's it for now.

Toodle pip!

Bill