Day Four – Easter Monday, and Day Five

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April 5th, 6th

Left dock at 11:30, Shower, breakfast and another several gallons of diesel.. Thank you Walter! Kristine at the helm we started the official Ringvaard of Ghent. Only ½ around and we take the canal right heading to Oudenaarde. Our first big lock, I climbed up the ladder and went ot the office to get my “permit” to motor the Belgium canals. About 23 Euros. Good for 3 months ! Lock keeper was great and held the lock open until I got back into the boat. Not a lot of traffic then (is a holiday day) About 6 hour with locks and bridges trip. Very cold! But quiet, and a bit boring on the canals. The levies are so high you miss the towns and villages you pass. Only the bikers on the tow paths.

Reached Oudenaarde, Belgium around 4:30 and decide to tie up after the local bridge. Only boat there.

Walked to city center and there was a full-fledged carnival there. We walked the circle and found a wonderful wine bar. We were a bit “under-dressed” but that wouldn’t stop us. Great Sicilian wine for 5 euros.Walked back to the boat to regroup and ate salad for dinner. Plan, to leave early anticipating another 6 hour motor to Conde, just inside the French border.

Day Five – Tuesday, April 5, 2010

Today was a tough day. Each lock has brought us closer to perfecting our skills as two-handed boaters, but we find each one a challenge. Some locks take their time to fill, and others, it feels like a tidal wave crashing into the boat. We have also found the locks to get increasingly slimey as we go South. Our plan was to stop at Valenciennes, past Conde, but did not realize we actually went past it. No real town along the canal and more important, no bollards to tie up to. It was getting late and we finally found a mooring past the last lock of the day near Trith, France. Still cold and dreary, but the evening proved better. We found we had not eaten all day and so we almost inhaled our pasta dinner and salad. With the locks closed after 6pm, we had a quiet night at the lock bollards.

Day One of Canal trip

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Spent the beginning of the day filling the water tanks, waiting for our box from the USA to arrive with many of our personal items we didn’t want to take on the plane, and stowing gear. The biminy finally got up, bikes folded and lashed on the front deck. New “gangplank” we are hoping wasn’t a foolish purchase.

The weather, sunny, cool, windy. 12 kts average. Our plan, is to leave the marina and motor (of course) over to the locks about quarter mile from marina. Get through the locks after 5:30ish, and then moor on the opposite side of the locks until morning. If we went too soon, we would be shooed off. Our plan is to leave by 6:30-7am to motor the 60 K to Gent. Hoping Gent will be seen by 3pm. Dinner of left overs and Lyle on the stereo. Ken is sleeping on the settee and I went above to see how the lines were holding. Did I mention that we tied up just in time for the rain to start. Noticed we have company on the Quay. Another sailboat. The lock is a 24 hour lock, but most don’t like to travel after dark. It is cool in the boat, we have plenty of wool blankets and I have the hotwater bottle under my feet as I sit here. (taking it to bed tonight)

Day two – Heading to Ghent through the Oosterschelde

We left our mooring around 7am and with reasonable warm weather gear on headed to the Oosterschelde to motor through the Zuid-beveland Kanaal.

This is the first real lock we will encounter and it opens up to the last saltwater we might see in a long time. Motoring became miserable only due to the blowing, freezing rain. We believe we were getting pelted with sleet. Finally resorted to full-foul weather gear. Went through several sets of gloves as they would get wet and then our hands would freeze.

Our mission was to reach Terneuzen, Belgium the start of the Belgium canals. Be in Gent by mid-afternoon. Tom, from Bruinesse (Van Swaay) told us to stop at the KYCG yacht club at the top of the Ringvaart of Gent. We almost went past it as we were finally “off” the nave charts and using paper charts. A boating skill to rediscover. Very small yacht club, but they let us dock and after finding out that Tom had sent us, they became very friendly and by early evening, we were drinking at their club bar like old friends. Sunday, Easter, Walter (Harbor master) is going to drive us to the petro station with several small liter cans. We are almost on empty and the diesel is hard to find. We have a 2 gal tank, and that would be many trips to the gas station on our bikes to fill 35 gal boat tank. Walter has collected several small tanks from his other boaters here and has offered to drive us twice to the station.

First log – April 2, 2010

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A long winter, a little elbow grease, (Thank you Van Swaay team) and the boat is ready for the canals and further adventures. Ken and I have spent the past week and half getting the boats final prep completed. It is ready, the boat looks great, and tonight we hit our first lock for an early long-haul to Gent. We will spend Sunday in Gent and then continue through the Belgium canals. Along the way we will search for our link to the world (Internet) and of course, I will take many pictures. Sorry this first one is so uninteresting, but more flavor to come!