Lommel Lock to Ravels

Such a beautiful day today.  We got up early, just before the sun came up.  It was still, warm for early morning, clear and bright, so we left the mooring at 7.40.  The first lock was only just around the corner and I called on the VHF but got no reply so Ian tied up at the waiting area just before the lock and, well, we waited.  

This was our first Belgian lock, very different from the Dutch locks which are operated remotely from some far off central office.  Here there was a lock keeper who came out of this office and walked to each end of the lock to open and close the water sluices.  It was also much smaller than the Dutch locks we have been through.

The next two locks were ready and waiting for us so we passed through all 3 quite quickly and turned onto the Dessel-Turnhout-Schoten Canal.  The first few kms were very pretty, much like the Beverlo Canal, but then we passed a very long section where there is major work going on on the bank.   

Ian had been sanding while I drove and we went through a long stretch where there were no workers so he thought this looked like an ideal place to stop and get a lot of work done that we could not do with other boats around.  We tied up to the unfinished quay and both of us got stuck into the sanding.  It took me back 30 years to the early 1980's when we built our first yacht together. Then Ian painted a primer coat onto the coach roof we had sanded.

The sun was belting down - hot, hot, hot!  I didn't think I would be saying that 2 weeks ago.  Lynn and Shaun had stopped behind us while they also did some maintenance work on their varnished hand rails.  We had tied up to the metal walkway but they had hammered stakes into the ground.  A big commercial barge came by that created such a pull on the water that it pulled their stakes right out of the ground.  Ian, Lynn and I were standing next to the boat so grabbed the lines.  Wow, what a lot of power! We could not do anything except hold onto the lines as the boat surged many metres along the wall.

Off we set again at about 2.00 pm.  There were 3 lift bridges

and a girl riding her horse (beautiful) and walking her dog, a Weimerana (don't know how to spell it, just as beautiful).

and at about 4.30 we stopped in small yacht club called Het ge Vaer near a town called Ravels. 

The club has only 49 permanent boats and a pontoon for just 3 visiting boats.  It cost us €8 per night plus €1.50 for electricity.  Water is free, included in the overnight rate.  There is a shower (unisex), €1 for 8 minutes so Ian and I showered together.  We were both full of dust and sweat from our labours and it was wonderful to use gallons of water to get clean.  It is a lovely little club.  The clubhouse is a barge with a tented area on the land 

and there are flowers everywhere, even on top of the pilings supporting the floating pontoons.

We might stay more than one night.

Beverlo Canal in the opposite direction

Not a great deal to say tonight, except it was such a beautiful day I have forgiven the Belgians for their crap internet and I am ready to stay a bit longer - France can wait.

Ian got up early to buy a bicycle lock to secure the gas bottle to the boat. But the shop was still closed and he had to go back an hour later.   Until now he has taken the gas bottle out each time we have used the barbie and then put it back into the gas locker afterwards.  Way too much PT, so now it is standing on the swim platform, locked on, so it cannot be stolen (we hope). 

It was a beautiful day, bright, clear, a few clouds but very sunny, and hardly any wind.

  

We retraced our route from yesterday from the marina at Leopoldsburg back to the waiting area at the Lommel Lock, intending to carry on through the locks and into the Dessel-Turnhout Canal.

Ian continued with the work he started a few days ago.  You cannot do work like grinding and sanding in marinas or moored close to other boats so he has to do it when we are under way on the canal.  He has been grinding out a lot of rust spots on the coach roof, which entailed taking off the grab rails and anything else that was bolted on.  After the grinding he fills the spots with a 2 part epoxy filler, then sands, then paints on a primer. 

We passed this group of happy campers on the canalside.

When we got to the Lommel lock we decided to take on water.  It is 5 days since we last got water at the bunker ship in Maasbracht.  There is a quay just for boats taking water so we stopped there and Lynn and I walked to the lock master's office to get the key for the tap, expecting to have to pay, but the water is free!  Apart from the tank we filled a 20 litre jerry can, seven 2l coke bottles and every bucket and big receptacle that we have, and I put a load of t-shirts in to soak.

However, when Lynn took the key back and told the lock master that we wanted to go through the locks he informed her that the lock has been stukkend/avariado/broken (take your pick) for a couple of hours, it would soon be fixed but there were a number of commercial barges waiting for passage through and they would take preference.  Maybe it would be about 2 hours before we could go through.  No problem, we had lunch while we waited.

Note the big barges in the background.

The lock did reopen at about 2pm but by that time a couple more barges had joined the queue and by 3 pm we decided to give it a miss for today.  The next stretch has 3 locks in quick succession and there is another 8km after them before we could find a place to stop, minimum 2 hours, so we returned to the moorings we were on 2 nights ago and will try again tomorrow morrow morning.

I finished off the laundry at about 4.30 and it was 90% dry by 6.30, even Ian's thick t-shirts.

Ian continued with his project, painting a second coat of paint onto the filler he had sanded and primed earlier today.

A huge barge came past, heading to the industrial place with the cute bridge.

The speed limit on this canal is 5km, which we adhered to, slow as it is, but this barge was doing 10km!

It was a lovely evening. 

We had a veggie barbie tonight: potatoes, onions, tomatoes, garlic, plus pre-steamed carrots and broccoli that went on to the flames for a few minutes just to give them a char-grilled taste.  Tasty, to be sure, but I do miss a bit of meat!  I'm a carnivore through and through.

I have been working on getting maps to show where we are travelling.  I have finally decided to use a route planning programme that Ian uses and in the next couple of days I will up-load all trips we have done so far, day by day.  In the meantime here is today's route.

Canal Beverlo

We had a short trip today, just 15km from the Lommel Lock down the Beverlo Canal to Leopoldsburg, where it ends in a dead end.  It is a very narrow canal, reminding us of the narrowboat canals in England.  The first section, about 5km, has some industry on each side and as we approached a bend a huge barge came in the opposite direction.  We pulled right into the side with fenders down to let it pass before we got to the bend.  As it passed the suction of the water it drew grounded us to the bottom of the canal and we could only move forward after it had passed.  I was so engrossed in the operation I forgot to take photos.  Sorry!

Then we came to a small lift bridge, less than a metre above water level and barely 6m wide, and I had to phone the company alongside on the shore to ask them to open the bridge.  They were ever so friendly.  Here is Elle following behind us through the bridge.  Isn't it a cute bridge?

After the bridge there was no more industry and the canal just got prettier and prettier

with many houses stretching right down to the water's edge with a boat at the bottom of the garden - Ian's dream!

But this is more like any house we could own in this area!

As we got to the end of the canal we saw more and more boats, still mostly winterised, but lots of people working on their boats.

We are moored at the JKL Jachthaven in Leopoldsburg. 

It is a really nice marina, and even has an electric point for charging bicycles.

I had started soaking some laundry this morning , all smalls, and when we got here I realised I couldn't possibly hang my knickers and bras out on the rails to dry!  Ian came up with a plan (no surpriser there!) and cantilevered a pole through the arms of the driving chair with my laundry acting as the weight on the free end.

This area was involved in the beginning of Operation Market Garden in the Second World War.  There is a war museum here but unfortunately it only opens at 13.00 and we will be gone by then.  Pity, it looks very interesting, but it is a guided tour that lasts 4 hours which would mean we have to stay here another night - not in our budget. 

We went to the bar in the club for a drink.  Beers are not too expensive at €1.90 each but a glass of wine is €2.90 and a bottle of not really fizzy water was €1.90!

We have had another run in with the internet providers.  We are coming to the conclusion that Belgium doesn't have any intention of providing an internet service for tourists.  After already spending €25 for 450 Mb of data, which won't even last a week.  I got a leaflet with instructions when I bought the card but when I actually tried to follow the instructions the options did not exist on their website - and that chewed up a whole lot data as I surfed through their help(less) pages. 

Today I phoned the help line and was told I can only recharge the card at a Proximus (the service provider) store.

Where is the nearest? 

Go to Duty Free(!) 

Or , I  can do it for you now by telephone, would you like €2 per day or€5 per day? 

What does €2 get me. 

20 Mb!

 I can't even send emails for that!

Meanwhile Lynn and Shaun had taken out a contract with Mobistar on Saturday morning.  An expensive way to go but they thought it would be worth it but by Monday afternoon they still had no phone or data.  So Lynn phoned their help number to be told Phone back tomorrow morning after 10.00!

So they went to an Aldi supermarket here, that is also a server provider, to get a temporary card.  They asked what packages Aldi had to offer. The young nitwit behind the counter said only the Starter Package.  They asked what that included and she said  "I'm busy with other customers" and walked off, even though there was no one waiting to be served.  What is it about IT in Belgium?  Not one of the 3 service providers that we have dealt with is in the least bit interested in customer service!  I am rapidly running out of patience with Belgium.  France can't come soon enough.

Bocholt to Lommel Lock

A lovely sunny day!  It started off fairly nippy and as we were travelling a breeze picked up so there was a bit of a chill factor but it was a really pleasant 4 hour trip along the Bocholt-Herentals Canal. 

Being Sunday, there were lots of people making use of the old tow path alongside the canal, now part of a cycle/jogging/hiking trail.  There were lots of groups of racing cyclists in their lycra club colours,

campers,

an old man on a mobility scooter taking his dog for a walk

some rather odd "bikes"

and a Velociped club.  Remember them?

The locks do not operate on Sundays until the 1st of May.  This is a lovely spot, really pretty.  There are a lot of mooring docks and we chose one in an off-shoot off the main Bocholt-Herentals Canal called the Beverlo Canal. 

It is a dead-end canal that runs 15 km to the town of Leopoldsburg, which we will do tomorrow.

We went for an 12km ride on the bikes.

This goose is sitting in a nest on the river bank close to our boat, and she was kind enough to show me her egg.

The solar panels that Ian installed a few days are doing an great job.  We have enough power to keep the fridge running all day, charge the bike batteries, laptop batteries, phone, etc.  And provide ice for my wine!

Barbecue tonight - chicken and veg.

Another moan about the internet here - it is so slow - like we had in Faial 15 years or more ago,  I have been waiting 20 minutes for a page to open!

Bocholt

From now until further notice, no jokes, pics, photos, etc, please!

We have run out of cheap wifi.  From now on my blogs will probably not be a daily affair.  Belgium, apparently, is not that good when it comes to catering to the itinerant tourist population.  Elsewhere in Europe (e.g.Holland and France) we can get a Lebara SIM card which supplies varying packages of telephone/data at really good prices. 

In Belgium Lebara is "verboden", not allowed, so you are restricted to the package deals from the local service providers, and they are uninspiring to say the least.  After spending €15 on a Mobistar card (€15 of phone calls with 250 Mb of data for "free") we discovered their data only package is €15 for 250Mb.  3 shops later, we were still getting the same message about Mobistar, but finally found a different service provider, Proximus, and they have a card that is data only, €10 for 200 Mb.  What?  That will disappear in couple of days!  But until we find another option that is what we are stuck with.

So, apart from the hunt for a data SIM card, what did we do yesterday?

First off we went by  bike to the  nearest lock (3 km away) to get a cruising permit  for the Flemish part of Belgium.  1 Jan to 30 June for €40 or €75 for a calendar year. 

Ian did his ICC test and the weather forecast was not great: the wind and rain were back again.  And the cold.  The test had to take 2.5 hours (why?) although the actual technical manoeuvres (docking side on and stern on, man overboard, etc) took less than half an hour.  We spent the rest of the time cruising up and down the canal, shooting the breeze with the examiner and having coffee and cookies!  He did the test on Shaun's 12m boat to get a rating for boats up to 24m.  If he had used our own 9m boat he could only get certificate for boats up to 10m.

I had put some washing in to soak the night before, expecting another sunny day. Fortunately by the time I hung it out in the afternoon the rain was gone and at least it dried a little outside in the breeze. Then, we broke out the fan heater,  I hung the laundry in the bathroom and it was all dry by the morning.  Great when you don't have to pay extra for electricity.  And lovely to wake up to a warm boat this morning.

Last day in Maastricht

I am not sure what has happened but this post seems to have disappeared from the blog.  I guess I did something wrong, I have no idea what.  I really am a blog ignoramus!  Anyway here it is again, a few days out of sync, written on 9th April.

What a beautiful day - summer has arrived!  It was about 20 degrees, brilliant sunshine, not a cloud in the sky and not a breath of wind.

Ian has got through a lot of chores in the past few days.  Yesterday he installed two solar panels on Shaun's boat.  It took the whole day.  Today he installed a gauge in our water tank so we can know how much water we are consuming.  That was quite a mission.  He had all the floor boards up so I spent the morning out on deck cleaning old paint off the windows with a blade.  There are also some old "vignette" stickers (waterways permits) which have been on for 7 or 8 years and have almost become welded to the glass.  I got one off this morning and started another, which Ian finished off.  Just one more to go.

This afternoon we took the boat to a fuel bunker to fill up with diesel and water, and then came back to the same spot on the wall. 

This evening we all went to a beer bar.  Now I am not a beer drinker and when I asked the owner if he had cider or wine he was insulted, and asked me what it was that I didn't like about beer.  Well, I had no idea how to answer that apart from "the taste"!  Anyhow he worked from what I do like to drink and presented me with a beer that was OK.  I can't say I am going to rush out and buy it but I did manage to drink the whole glass.

Then he asked Ian what he wanted, there are so many to choose from, hundreds I believe, we had another in depth inquiry: does he like bitter/sweet/fruity/another 3 or 4 I can't remember?  Bitter.  OK, do you like to feel the bitter on your tongue, or in your throat?  Then we had a biology lesson on how the tongue senses different tastes.  I had no idea that drinking beer could be so complicated!  Fortunately Lynn and Shaun had been there before and know what they wanted.

On the way back to the boat we passed a church with this instruction: No bicycles here

We will be leaving here tomorrow, heading into Belgium.  We are not sure how far we will get.  There seem to be quite a few places we can stop so we will just go till we find one that looks nice. The weather is supposed to be much the same as today - t-shirt and sandals!

We are having a barbie tonight, pork shops and sausage, that tastes very similar to boerewors, plus potatoes and salad.  And a glass to two of wine.