Shopping for Deisel with Adrianna and Crew

It had rained during the night, but the next morning was nice and bright. The place we were moored wasn’t ideal and we were not sure we were allowed stay there at all. So we set off looking for a more suitable spot.
After about half an hour cruising we came to a village on the north outskirts of Utrecht called Maarsen. There was a couple of boats there, but we were not sure if it was private, as there were no signs, but we took our chances and no one challenged us.

Most harbours are a step down off the boat. This was a brick wall more than a foot above the deck of the boat. What was really interesting about this place, was the car parking. The pier was about 5ft above the water and cars would park, sometimes as close as 6 inches from the edge. No barriers of any kind along the bank.

This was the day we had planned to hire a car and go in search of winter moorings for the boat before the channel crossing next year. It turned out to be a bit of a wild goose chase. We were hoping to get further south, so as not to be too far from the ports of Calais or Dunkirk. We had some places to check out, but none of them were suitable. But, on the way back to Utrecht, we checked out a lake on the north side of the city and found a likely contender.

Next morning, we set off for the lake to check out the moorings and see how accessible it was. Also, we could stay the night there and charge up the batteries. The following day, it rained all day, so we spent two nights there.

We were to meet Kevin and Karen in Weesp the day after that, so we head off early, north on the Vecht. Lots of lifting bridges, most of which lift shortly after arriving at them. There’s usually an operator who controls a number of them remotely. But, there are some where the controller lives in a cottage at the bridge. In these cases you sometimes have to press a bell. To do this, we need to get close enough a post which it’s fixed to and press with a long boat hook.

We met our passengers at 1pm and turned south again, back down the Vecht. This river is particularly beautiful, largely because of the fine houses, gardens and boat houses that line the bank.



We needed to take on diesel and the only place we could find to get some was out on the Rijn canal, which runs parallel and close to the Vecht. So, when we came to a short link canal, out we went into the big traffic again. Straight away, we had to stop as a big ship was just passing. When we got our chance, we got out and over close to the right bank heading south for about 20 minutes.

When we found the diesel, it was actually on a ship, one that normally fuels the large ships. We had to tie up, one end of the fuel ship, in the choppy water, caused by the continuous passing ships. That was fun for our passengers who suddenly found themselves as crew!! The diesel man was older and hadn’t a word of English and our Dutch is no better. He was trying to instruct us where and how to tie to his ship. Communication was tricky, to say the least particularly with us bouncing around beside him. Anyway, we finally managed to get the diesel and head back for the Vecht, where we found a nice place to settle for the night.