Instructional Cruise in September, 2005 - Roger Van Dyken will conduct a one week instructional cruise aboard the 21 meter Klipper Aak Vertrouwen from Thursday afternoon, September 22 to Thursday morning, September 29.  This will be a 3 couple-max hands-on cruise through the Picardie region in northwestern France, primarily along the historic Somme River.  You will experience a variety of cruising grounds, from cities to villages, rivers to canals, and, of course, locks. Email or call us for more information!

2004 Cruise to Germany - We cruised from the Netherlands to Germany's Berlin region for the 2004 season.  If you are considering such a cruise, please see details at the bottom of this page. The summary is this: for barges over 15 meters, be licensed or exercise care; once you are there, it's one of the most fabulous cruising regions we have encountered in 14 years and 7,000 km of barge cruising in four countries!  Details below.

French Stay Limitations - We've heard from several cruising friends asking our advice about recently imposed limitations on how long one may remain in France.   While we don't have any definitive answers on how it may affect you and your barge on an extended cruise in France, this perspective may help.  First, France removed its traditional visa requirement about a decade ago.  However, following a series of terrorist attacks and a massive migration into France from North Africa (the site of many former French colonies whose citizens ostensibly hold French passports), France imposed a limitation on length of stay to deal with the flood of poor immigrants who put a significant strain on its social welfare system.  There is another factor somewhat unique to France:  the highly respected French bureaucracy ("bureaucrat" after all, has French origins) is provided all the tools necessary to accomplish their job...just in case they may someday feel a need to use them.  Just because Parliament passes a law does not mean it is intended to be implemented, but rather as something the gendarme can pick off the shelf to use should it become necessary.  So you revenue producing, economy stimulating bargers are not the object of the French stay limitation law, and we would be surprised were any such person evicted unless they made a decided pest of themselves.

Berlin Cruise Report

    The delivery:

        Summary: 

-         Boat delivered to Potsdam, just outside Berlin

-         Delivery took 14 days, including 2 day roundabout through Friesland and 2+ days down for repairs

-         Replaced failed raw water pump (bearings shot), domestic water pump, engine bilge pump and VHF (both evidently due to lightning).

Cruising Detail:

-         As planned, we left Zwartsluis, our home port in West Overijssel province (20 km NW of Zwolle) on a Friday about noon, heading north toward Groningen via Meppel, intending to take a short cut canal from Groningen to the Dortmund Ems Kanal into Germany.  Two things went wrong with that plan: 1) Just north of Meppel, we were told that the canal between Meppel and Groningen wouldn’t be open on weekends until NEXT weekend.  2) There was one shallow section of the Groningen to Ems run that had the same charted depth as our draft (1.3). Rather than sit for two days, we did a 180 and spent the night in Giethoorn (ah, reliving the good old times), then further northeast to Heerenveen (Saturday night), through the Sneekermeer and up the Princess Margriet Kanal northeast to Groningen (Sunday night). Cracked the dawn to arrive at Delfzijl (northeast tip of Holland, on the North Sea) at 0930.  Entered the salt water and followed the buoys through the wide water to our first German city, Emden, where we moored as I searched out the local Immigration authorities and the ubiquitous Wasserschutzpolizei (water police).  We called an emergency meeting of our crew.  We figured if we were going to be turned back, it was better to have it done immediately rather than halfway to Berlin, or worse, in Berlin.  Immigration was happy to pound away on each passport and our water police contact turned out to be a stocky English speaking officer who stuck out his considerable chest and announced: “I love America.”  (Whew!)  Goes to Florida regularly on professional exchanges.  When I pushed the envelope by offering that the US requires no licensing (unless passengers for hire) he waved his hand dismissively, rolled his eyes, and said “Yah!  I know.”  I specifically did not tell him I had a Dutch license and the ICC (International Certificate of Competence) to test if the US flagged vessel/US citizen would work.  Encouraged, we pressed on.

-         We rode the massive 3 knot flood tide to Leer, doing about 16 km/hr over the ground.  Splendid and vibrant little city, but we almost didn’t get out of Dodge in time…the tide varies so heavily that the city entrance lock cannot operate at the lows.  Once above the first river lock, the current was negligible, the scenery most pastoral and pleasant with the water always lapping pasture banks.  Oozed into a tiny yacht club harbor for the night.

-         Wednesday morning we finally “caught up” with our original plan, where we had hoped to enter the Dortmund Ems Kanal from Groningen last Saturday.  Made it to the intersection of the Mittelland Kanal for the night.

-         We are surprised at the pleasantness of “by the toe” cruising through largely pastoral German countryside.  The views are not spectacular, and are frequently interrupted by long stretches of trees and high banks.  But it wasn’t the industrial stuff we had anticipated.  The canal is definitely German engineered, with the depthsounder showing a consistent 4 meter depth and our eyes calculating a 50 meter width between the carefully laid stone banks.  We moor in Minden, just before the canal crosses high above the Weser River.  We’re a shade disappointed in this rather dull city.  The eyes of the its plain looking people are cast downward, and its architecture largely reflects the grayness of its inhabitants.  It feels like East Germany must have been, though we are not even close.

-         The countryside begins to mirror Minden.  A bit less interesting.  Finally a lock, as we press eastward, that hoists us 15 meters.  At times the canal burrows through the farmland, and at other times we look down on fields and farms.  We marvel at the engineering and investment in this massive canal undertaking, reminded of its cost as each kilometer seems to have its bridge.  As dinner time approaches, we come upon a pleasant mooring cutout in front of a holiday restaurant not far from a tidy little village and dine on schnitzel and fresh asparagus as the local girls skinny dip in the canal below.

-         Another day and another big lock.  This time we drop 9 meters.  The land begins to roll, spotted with well kept forests, as we float by the Volkswagen plant.  This is a Mecca of sorts for crewmember Marty and we again suck it up and slither into the only possible mooring at a local yacht club on Saturday night.  We are adjacent to a car guy’s Disneyland, “Autostadt” (car city) and we are all impressed as we meander through buildings imaginatively designed, set in a park, each reflecting the mood and spirit of one of Volkswagen’s car lines.  On board, we had noticed a howl from the engine room (well, some of us did…the rest thought we were a bit daft) that we traced to the blue raw water pump.

-         We leave early Sunday morning and enter no man’s land, the 5 kilometer stretch between the former Germanys, laced with a million mines.  We don’t make it through.  After a few miles, additional ears pick up the sound of the water pump.  Crewmember Lew lessens the belt tension and the sound disappears but the shaft is loose in the bearings.  The white flag is raised and we retreat to our pleasant mooring by the Autostadt in Wolfsburg, call Arend, our Dutch mechanic, and tour the town.

-         Monday, we tour the town, again.  And the Autostadt, again (Marty). 

-         Tuesday afternoon at 2 pm the truck from Zwartsluis rolls in, our on board mechanics go to work, and by 1515 we are underway.  Make it through the East-West zone this time and immediately notice rusty bridges alternating with sparkling new ones.  Reconstruction is manifest, also evidenced by massive amounts of canal reconstruction and improvement, particularly through the former East Germany.  Dusk approaches soon and so does our destination, Haldensleben, a former East German town that proudly sports a new harbor, replete with sparkling moorings for about 50 boats that now hold 5 rusty buckets.  They’ve been open for a year and a small crowd gathers at the clubhouse to watch the biggest boat they’ve ever had enter slowly and carefully.  We sandwich our 21 meters end-to-end with a VW employee’s boat headed to Berlin…as they do regularly.  The VW couple buy us beer and adopt us, marking out carefully the route we should go, what to see and what to avoid.  Potsdam is the best place to moor for Berlin, they say, and show us the exact marina.  The lady speaks English, with some relish.

-         Wednesday morning we push through clouds and rain to the Elbe, where an engineering feat attempted before WWII has been completed within the last few months.  Giant spans transport us…and several thousand tons of concrete and water…far above the Elbe River.  Once across, we wait four hours until we can at last drop 20 meters down this brand new double…and half working…lock.  But at least, and at last, the lockkeeper speaks English and seems delighted to work us into a bunch of descending boats.  We go down tied to an East(ern) German tour boat.

-         Thursday is the day of entry.  As we leave our industrial mooring in Genthin, both countryside and climate begin to smile.  The clouds retreat to blue skies as we slowly enter a magic land.  Still a chunk of industry where we fuel (not many along the way) then through a lock, and it is as if Alice has entered her wonderland.  We traverse a tree lined lake, with long fingers that wind off in various directions, and a sense of peaceful tranquility settles in.  A peniche approaches from around a bend in the lake and seems like a black apparition intruding on pristine waters.  Hour after hour we wend our way from one delightful lake that links to another, and yet another.  As we near Potsdam, park-like trees and lawn introduce us to splendid palaces along the shore.  Now we pass under a bridge, with memorials on either side.  We learn later this is the famous bridge, of prisoner and spy exchanges, linking the American sector of Berlin on the left and East German Potsdam on the right.  Our subsequent harbormaster tells me later that it was an area with underwater nets to prevent escape, and searchlights and machine guns.  Many people died; he shakes his head.  We turn right, down a waterway that seems as if we are gliding through San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park…yet now the sun disappears behind dark thunderclouds.  Within 5 minutes, as we approach Potsdam, center of Communist power past, they unleash torrents of water, so that five of us peer out of the pilothouse to help Lew pick his way into Potsdam.  We angle sharply to the right again, our bow now about to push into the tiny bay in the very heart of the city, a bay overlooked by the high rise that housed the Communist Party elite, its 13^th floor reserved for visiting Soviet Generals.  Our American flag flutters at the stern.  The rain intensifies, and thunder rolls.  We can barely make out the shore.  Suddenly, crewmember Vivian screams! The boom and flash are on us simultaneously.  For an instant the watery grayness vanishes, split by what seems like a Paul Bunyan flashbulb exploding in a gigantic Fourth of July BOOM! Just as fast, it's gone.  The soggy darkness returns. We gaze around, shudder a bit, and nose carefully into the little bay.  We simply stop dead in the water, floating beneath the high rise.  During the next half hour, the wind gradually relents; the pelting rain slowly gives way to gentle drips--as it were, tears upon the water.  We restart the engine, tie up at a pier end under the high rise and shut down.  We have arrived.  Only later do we discover that the starboard lights and all aft lights are out and the bilge pump and VHF are fried by the lightning bolt.

-         Next day we bid fond adieu to Marty and Gail as they explore the Czech regions, and for a day I cruise with Lew and Vivian as we poke Vertrouwen’s bow into downtown Berlin.  Everywhere are parks and gardens and new buildings renewing the old.  The avant garde Reichstag Congress building, symbol of the new clean and crisp Germany, rises sharply on either side of us as we float the river Spree into the former East Berlin.  The old Reichstag, dirty, sullen and craggy, sits beside the new, and is intentionally overshadowed by it, as Germany scrubs her image and looks to the future (the old Reichstag received a refreshing sandblasting later in the year.)

-         Near one of the bridges we find space at a 24 hour mooring spot, guarded faithfully by a perpetually inebriated chap.  We pull in just forward of a bit smaller barge and get a welcoming wave from the older German couple aboard.  I pay my respects and we chat in German.  I ask how close we are to a bus line going to Tegel airport, where I must be at 5am the next morning.  The lady kindly points and I bicycle in the direction of her finger.  Regrettably, the bus drivers aren’t out that early, so I find out how to call a cab at that early hour.  I return to the barge to find that our elderly hostess who provided bus directions had also checked the schedule, realized my predicament and now volunteered her husband to bring me to the airport.  “But I must leave at 4:30am!” I protest.  “Ah, we are old people and we have all day to sleep,” she retorts with a smile.  Their insistence overcomes my objections.  At 4:30am my new old friend stands in the darkness to help me toss my bag off the barge and takes me, the American stranger, in his 20 year old Mercedes to Tegel airport.  With keen anticipation for my return to Berlin later in the year, and a warm heart, I lift off, sweeping airborne in an hour over the rolling lands we cruised through over ten days, landing where we began, in the orderly green fields south of Amsterdam.

Later...we cruise through a city seemingly built for boats and venture into the wonderland of lakes to the north.

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Send mail to roger@bargingineurope.com with questions about Barging In Europe.