Trip to France - Part One

 

 

We found a great software program to plan our route from Netherlands to France.  You input the size of your boat, length, width, draft (maximum depth) and height.  Then you input your start location and end destination.  You can then choose the fastest, shortest, or easiest route.  The software plots your route on a chart and lists every bridge, lock, turn, change of waterway and how far you might be able to go each day.  It will only take you on waterways where your boat will fit and will notify you of any possible stoppages such as scheduled lock or bridge maintenance or, in one case, a scheduled strike by lock workers.

We had been studying the route for several weeks and had painstakingly loaded it into the chart-plotter where the boat driver could easily follow the recommended route and not miss any turns. Sounds simple enough but there were about thirty different waterways that we would need to traverse so making the correct choice at each fork in the canal could be quite critical.

According to our route plan, we would be traveling a little over five hundred kilometers (about three hundred miles) and would need to negotiate forty-three locks, both up and down and two underground tunnels.  We would travel through three countries and would need to speak to lock-keepers in either Dutch or French, neither language very easy for us to comprehend.

 

 

We finished the last of our projects and began preparing the boat for river travel.

 

 

Maybe someone was hoping for a free ride to France?

On a Wednesday morning we made our final preparations, settled our marina bill in Heusden, Netherlands and said good-bye to the new friends we had made there.

 

 

Intrepid travelers that we are, we set out for our next new adventure.

 

 

The busy commercial river Maas runs just outside Jachthaven de Weil in Heusden.  We had been seeing the steady stream of large commercial barges since we arrived.

 

 

It didn’t take long for us to encounter these giants hauling everything from oil to coal to sand to containers from the busy ports of Amsterdam and Rotterdam to destinations all over Europe.

 

 

The first order of business was to top up the fuel tanks at a recommended stop about three hours down the river from our marina. Our boat actually carries about three thousand liters of fuel (about eight hundred gallons).   We were not sure that we had purchased that much fuel in all our years of sail-boating, much less all at one time.  Luckily, the tanks were more than half full so the fuel bill shock was not as great as it could have been.

 

 

As soon a we finished fueling, it started to rain and became foggy. It happened just in time for us to reach the junction of the Maas and Waal (Rhine) Rivers, a major shipping crossroad. We did our best to simply stay out of everyone's way.

 

 

We made about fifty-five kilometers (about thirty-four miles) to a lovely village called Willemstad the first day.  We had visited here by car the previous year and had stayed at an Inn in the village. While walking the streets we had thought about how nice it would be to visit here by boat. And finally we had actually made it!

 

 

It is a very popular boating spot with two large marinas and a small basin for visiting yachtsmen right in the village.  In the summer, boats are often rafted two and three deep in the inner harbor.

 

 

It was now sort of the end of the season but we still ended up with a sailboat rafted next to us in the morning and were asked to raft outside of another boat for our second night to make room for more and larger boats in the harbor.

 

 

We had some trouble starting the engine when we had left the fuel dock and when we tried to start it the second day, it refused to even turn over.  Jim tested the voltages and connections and studied the wiring diagrams but didn’t have all the tools and equipment to make a complete diagnosis.  We found a boat repair place just across the river and they were able to send a technician right away. He found a bad starter relay which amazingly was available at a small boat shop just down the harbor.

 

 

In the end we decided that ten year old engine starting batteries were probably the real problem, so we made a plan to cross the river the next day and spend the next night at a marina right next to the repair shop.  They were able to install two new batteries the very next day.  We were certainly impressed that a boat project could actually get done in such a short period of time.

 

The Numansdorp Marina was quite long and narrow with a channel just wide enough for us to enter.  It has an old sunken barge just at the harbor entrance that serves as a very effective breakwater for boat wakes from passing commercial vessels. It also is quite a conversation piece.

 

 

As soon as we checked in with the harbor master, he informed us that the “End of Season” barbeque was scheduled for the following evening and was sure to draw a crowd of the local boaters.  We were cordially invited to attend, how could we refuse?  We still had almost a month to make a trip that our trip planner said should only take eleven travel days.

 

 

The next day we were set to encounter our first lock.  We weren’t quite sure of all the rules but there were three large commercial locks with a separate lock for pleasure boats.  Each lock has posted the VHF radio channel on which you are to contact them.  Most of the radio activity was from the commercial lock but it was all in Dutch anyway so not much help.

 

 

It turned out that several other pleasure boats were waiting for the lock so we were able to just follow them in, tie up to the multiple bollards and ride up about three feet.  Seemed simple enough, only forty-two more to go.

 

 

Our route was to take us nearly to the North Sea via some large rivers and smaller cuts through the many peninsulas of Southwestern Netherlands, an area known as Zeeland (Sea-Land), a province with nearly half of its area under water.

 

 

We began to see ocean-going freighters and barges along with many sailboats and the air took on a salty quality.

 

 

While our boat is technically rated for coastal sailing we were glad to have sunshine and nearly calm conditions for this part of the trip. The North Sea lies just beyond this long bridge.

 

 

We spent the night at a huge marina with three separate protected harbors. It was mostly sailboats, many equipped with fancy ocean racing equipment. It felt strange being one of the few powerboats in this decidedly sailing marina.

Our slip was at the end of this long pier, easy to get to from the river but a long walk to the havenmaster's office.

 

 

By the time we entered our fourth lock, the big rivers and open sea were behind us. It would be just narrow rivers and canals the rest of the way to our destination.  We felt like we were sort of getting the locking process down. The one thing that turned out to be consistent about all of the locks, bridges and tunnels is the light indicators.  There were always two lights.  One red means wait, a red and green means get ready to enter and one green means you may proceed.

 

 

At this time of the year, there were not many other pleasure boats but there were always plenty of commercial barges, many of which are owned and operated by a family. It was quite impressive to watch a hundred meter (three hundred plus feet) fully loaded barge enter a lock (sluis) and one person (maybe a wife or son) walk forward to place a line easily around a bollard and ride up or down with the water level.  We watched them closely to see if we could make the process look half as easy as they did. 

 

 

By our fifth travel day, we had reached the Netherlands-Belgium border.  Looking ahead on our travel planner, this route through Belgium offered few “real” marinas.  Our overnight options were small “Yacht Clubs” or maybe just a couple of mooring bollards along the canal.  The reservations for these places were quite casual, sometimes with a phone number posted but rarely answered, but mostly whoever got there first secured a spot for the night.  We wondered how this might work in the summer when there might have been more pleasure boats with very few places to spend the night.

 

 

 

We reached our first lock in Belgium and it turned out to be the busiest one we had seen so far.  Sluis Evergem does not have a separate lock for pleasure boats so we ended up in the lock with eight large commercial barges, rafted three deep.  We were tucked in the back corner of the lock.  The lady lock-keeper promised she would watch out for us as we needed to stop at the lock exit to purchase a Waterway Permit to travel the Belgium waterways.  It seemed like a well-choreographed dance as she directed incoming barges in several languages to allow “Pleasantier Amanda” to travel to the port side docking area.  With official waterway permits in hand we were ready to forge on toward France.

 

 

 

 

Click Here for Part Two