Trip to Anwerp 7-10 June Our trip from the shipyard in Keizersveer to Antwerp was on some of the busiest commercial shipping channels we had been on. And we had gale force winds as well. On Friday we were back into the water at the ship yard by about 9am, and left at about 10am. It was quite windy, about wind force 4 (we are not covered by our insurance if we travel in anything over wind force 5), and it was a little tough getting out of the unprotected harbour. But we were soon underway. At each junction in the waterway, more commercials seemed to be joining us, and we were sure that this was one of the busiest waterways we had been on. We arrived at our destination, Willemstad, at about 2pm and went into the canal. The water was very rough at the entrance with waves from passing commercials bouncing us around, but once in the harbour we were mostly protected from the wind, and was able to turn around and moor on the wall in the inner harbour, a lovely spot, just over the road from the old town and restaurants. For the first time we had a mooring rate that was based on your square metres. By the end of our stay we understand why. They moored everyone side by side. By the time we left they were moored 3 or 4 deep. Luckily not us. The wind on Saturday was forcast to be wind force 6, and at times wind force 7 so we had a day off in Willemstad, which is a lovely old star fort town. By Sunday morning the wind had abated so we set off again. Our first obstacle was the Volkerak Sluisen (Locks), just around the corner from Willemstad. They are, according to Wikipeadia "the largest inland navigation locks in the world on the basis of passing tonnage (more than 240 million tonnes)." Luckily for us one of the 4 locks was for pleasure craft and we didn't have to mix it with the big boys. And also we sailed straight in, so no delays. From there it was fairly easy sailing and we reached out destination around 2pm. But I was exhausted and had a couple of hours sleep before we went to have a look around town. When we got back to Moondance we found that we had another barge moored up alongside. It was De Vrouwe Anna Maria, with Charles and Judy on board that we had met at the barge rally. So we invited them over for a drink and had a good chat about all things barge. In the morning they had to let us off as we started at about 8:30 am. Nice to catch up. It was Whit Monday a major public holiday in many European countries, so we hoped the major Antwerp ports would be less busy than on a normal work day. At the Kreekraksluisen, we were told to follow the three commercials in front of us into the lock, but there was a delay before we could enter. I left plenty of room (I thought) between us and the boat in front, however he decided to reverse, so I had to as well. Then another large commercial arrived and stormed past us to the front of the queue leaving Moondance stuck between the reversing comercial, and the rushing commercial. Anyway, we were fine, and eventually settled in at the back of the lock, behind four commercials. Just after entering Belgium we saw 't Majeur coming in the other direction (another DBA barge). After that we were soon in the Antwerp harbours. This took us over 2 and a half hours to negotiate the route through the harbours. But it was quiet. And as planned we reached the Londonbrug which is the entrance to the Marina, in plenty of time for the 3 pm opening, and even had time for a quick lunch before we came in and moored. Our mooring in Willemdok - Antwerp's marina
3 Comments
Deb Colley
10/6/2019 10:13:39 pm
Hi Deb
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Robyn Coates
11/6/2019 12:56:59 am
I enjoy reading all your posts and looking at your pictures even though this is the first time I have replied.
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Cheryl Poustie
16/6/2019 08:41:50 am
Hi Deb.
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