This post is out of order - just checking out route from Tournai to Bruges I found that the post from the 23rd May was missing - it had got stuck in "drafts"! so here it is:
75 kms, 2 locks,
5 mobile bridges
Yesterday was a long day in the
rain. At 7.50 we were waiting at the
Oudenaarde Lock;
a big commercial was already on the way down when we arrived
so we had to wait for the lock to fill again to take us down, together with a
canal maintenance barge.
The weather was drizzly, dreary and
decidedly cool – back to thermal underwear again!
The lowering grey skies washed all
the colour out of the landscape.
After 26 kms we left the Bovenschelde
and turned onto the Ringvaart around Ghent, usually a very busy waterway but we
didn’t see many commercials there yesterday.
Then onto the Gent-Oostende Canal to Brugge, where we saw more commercials.
We were lucky to get to the first
mobile bridge, Moerbrugge, before Brugge just before 16.00. The operator at Kruispoortcentrale, which
controls all the opening bridges through the city, opened up promptly for us
and urged us to get to the next bridge, Steenbrugge, as quickly as possible
because it would be opening for a commercial coming from the opposite
direction. If we did not make it in time
we would have to wait till after 17.30. None
of the mobile bridges in Brugge may open between 16.30 to 17.30. We got through those two in time, but we had
to wait out the hour at Katelijnepoort.
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| Katelijnepoort Bridge |
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| Stopping the rush hour traffic at Gentpoort bridge |
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| Unique in all of Europe, the bridge at the entrance to the Coupure, is suspended on wires below two tubes. The bridge lifts up as the tubes revolve,winding the wires around them. |
Tied up at the Coupure Jachthaven
at 18.00 – 10 hours and 15 minutes after leaving the Oudenaarde Jachthaven.
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