Still in Schweich, June.

June 13th.

Night out in Saarsbrucken, waiting for the Yaris to be repaired. Stormy skies.!!

Also found these advertising billboards around the centre of town. After a while we gathered what they were each advertising but it took some time.

Well, finally,,, after 2 nights in a hotel paid for by the car insurance company, and a lovely day walking round a sunny Saarsbrucken, we set off to pick up the car. They gave us a re-conditioned alternator, (as it was cheaper) and we went to pay… Now remember this is a large Toyota car dealership…

” That’s 388 euros, and , Oh sorry, Sir,  we only accept German cards or Cash”  They didn’t like our french debit card, our Amex, or either Visa ( UK & NZ). So after much debate we had to drive off to find a bank machine to extract the cash. Now this we just found unbelievable,,, and when the insurance company phoned us to ask us if everything was alright, Max explained succinctly his complaint. But the Insurance Co definitely made it all easy for us.

Schweich.                                                                                                             So arrived back to the boat and friday morning Christoph comes down to check out the engine before our 2nd water test on the river and we find coolant in the bilge.. “Yes, he says that’s good!! “,,,, “ “  Good ? Max says.   “ Oh yes, that’s just left over coolant and water from when we dealt with your water pump and the mechanic didn’t have time to clean out last week”..

well !!! 

 

Max felt so so much better!!!  So we were asked if we would mind cleaning out the bilge before we took her out for a run on the river??.. Max dutifully goes head down, arse up and gets it spotless.

At least the coolant does look diluted,

 

So, we are ready…………………..EXCEPT the engine won’t start!!!!!! (shit,shit,shit etc)

Next day, sat morning the boys come down, take the injectors out and find we have water in the engine,,,,,water?? where bloody from???  and its fresh water….??           Max goes to see Christoph, who doesn’t look happy ( but then neither do we ) and the diesel specialist is phoned and will appear first thing Monday morning……………………We will be up and waiting!!

At least on Saturday Max had some light relief as we managed to get the NZ /Wales rubgy test live on the Radio Wales,.. a new experience for Max. The Oz/Lions was on live written update on the lap top because of Sky’s broadcasting rights.

     Then,,

we find this, which is on our intended route back to Toul.!!  But the rate we are getting the engine sorted it should be all over by the time we are ready to go…                       Between the rains, floods, broken locks and strikes, the joys of boating here never cease and all plans are made in Jelo  !!!… (apt description)

We even end up doing a jigsaw puzzle of a photo that Jan gave us for Xmas.

Sunday night…we found fellow boatie friends to party with ,, yeh,yeh,  so we drove to Merzig, 50mins away upstream. .…. We needed a night out!!

Max, Sue & Rob Cooper (NZ) and Austin & Susie (OZ/German)

 

 

What decent Kiwi bloke could resist trying the French style boys’ Portaloo.

 

Each one fits 3 at a time..

A very good night out with good friends.

 

 

 

 

 

Max’s latest!!

Max found this advert in a magazine in UK,,,,he thinks they might catch on quite well in New Zealand.  (they are real and have charcoal filtering properties!, google it. ) 

Maybe a new business venture for him!!!

Cheers, and happy reading.

Wet, rain and floods-Germany

June 8th.

Stuck in Schweich!!!!  Raining but we are still happily drinking.

Well this says it all!!.

All our emails between our boating friends talk about rain, rising river levels,people stuck unable to head on to rivers, or even canals, boats stuck from incidental broken locks and of course the Annual maintenance of the locks on the Moselle river being closed the first week of June.

In hind sight that turned out not to matter as with the rains the river is running extremely high in flood, and it would be too too dangerous to go on anyway.

We have heard from Tex and Anthea who set off from St Jean 2 weeks ago,  who are now surfing down the Rhone towards the Med, and we don’t envy them….well maybe but only because they will be in better weather.!!!

As we are stuck, we decided  to go for a tiki tour to visit friends. Started with Austin & Susie (Oz friends) who headed off as the rains started to about 3 hrs up river from us. They were moored on a pontoon on the Moselle River, and talk about being continually hit by passing logs and tree branches ( quite frightening at night)

When we passed this weir last September it was just a little trickle of water just wetting the concrete to this…………………………………….. 

 

Shows the quiet water of the lock entrance with the debris that has been caught in the eddies and the raging river.

 

 

So A & S were not going to head up that yet and neither are we. But how long will we have to wait???

So driving on to Toul, we are still googling to look at flights to Marrakech with Easyjet to run away and find nice weather. We are also having to juggle dates and times to start off on our way as Chris & Judy Ingram arrive from NZ on the 20th June. In fact as mentioned later in this blog,it’s lucky we didn’t decide to flee!!! 

TOUL.

We end up staying 3 nights in a lovely hotel we have been in before just by the Marina. Jan & Bill feed us and card games commenced. Unfortunately the boys took us girls by storm.!!!!!!!

View from hotel room window, the Marina and the Cathedral lit up..

 

     Jan again suffering the removal of her toilet by Bill, and has decided that maybe they could just leave it here on the front deck.

But she is not sure her balance would be good enough!!

 

 Left Toul to drive past the Saint-Louis-Arzviller inclined plane on the Marne-Rhine Canal on our way back to Schweich, as we will not be going that way for another few years. There used to be 17 locks rising 45ms over 4 kms, but used a lot of water and a whole day, and in 1969 the lift was built.

The boats go into a big bath tub, 41.5m long and 5.5m wide and 3.2m deep. It rises 44.5m on a 41% slope. We timed the decent at 3mins. its quite impressive.

Now as we drove through Saarsbrucken in Germany going back to Schweich, the short story is that the car died.

    OUR breakdown truck!!!  We have been very very lucky as we broke down in a carpark in town at 4.30pm.  A phone call to our insurance company (we have extended RAC cover for Europe) and a truck arrives within 40 mins.

   He immediately finds its our alternator and we follow him to a Toyota Dealer 3 mins away. They take the car, and the lovely towtruck guy even books us into a local hotel and drives us there.

You can’t wish for better or more fantastic service, we have been so so impressed.

This morning the RAC France have phoned us to say the part has been ordered and the car will be ready tomorrow afternoon…..so we wait in rainy Saarsbrucken with just enough clean clothes, rain jackets and an umbrella.

This is what’s happening down stream from us from Schweich, on the Moselle River .

The MOSELLE River at Cochem last summer.                                                        You can see Kiwi Rose tucked in behind the wall in the marina with the blue canopy.

A photo taken from the same place by Austin & Susie who took a train trip to visit a few days ago. Their photo on the right, shows the water over the marina wall and nearly up over the road.  And the walk way along the left side of the river has disappeared.

 

A cold & wet start to Europes’ summer .

May 2016

Over the winter they had taken the engine out to sort our defunct pistons ( even the rods were bent,) and the crank shaft, etc etc etc….and put her back with new hoses etc.

 

FINALLY leaving UK, and on our way, Friday, May 13th, (and we should have guested!!!), on euro tunnel and all looks good.

 

 

 

 

 

Stopped on the way for a night in Toul with Jan & Bill Caddey who have been on their boat for the last 10 days, with 10-12 degrees. Freezing and slightly bored, surrounded by Americans and Bill has done his back in and can’t climb off the boat!!. Doctors here in France are amazing and a visit on the boat by a local GP and drugs prescribed ( lots of Valium) and he’s starting to look good.

On to Schweich where the boat has been out of the water all winter and arrived in a mere 14 degrees. So just in case weather changed we took off the tent, up with the canopy and even washed the hull to get rid of the yellow stains.

SO as now the boat was ready to go into the water, we left in in their hands as the deisel company had to come in and be around when they did the river trials. Friends had watched to check she didn’t sink and all seemed well.

We had planned back in Feb a quick side trip to Greece for a week on the weds, which was just as well as driving each morning from the B&B the temp on the car said 5-7 degrees.

GREECE, and the cooler weather looked like it had followed us there.But we survived.

We only managed 2 very short visits to the main town of Chora, as once 10am came the people ( mostly over 70 and over 100kgs) from the cruise ships would swarm into the town for their day visit.

We got really lucky and the lovely owner man upgraded us from a double room with balcony to a lovely large 3 bedroomed villa with spa pool and large patio. 

The bikers!! we always have such fun ( but only Max drives!!)l Means we can explore and stay away from the busy town and party beaches!!

Some of the empty beaches we found as it is so early in the season. Still cool but up to 22 in the sun,                 ( when it wasn’t windy.).

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 The contents of our fridge,,bottled water,  beer, wine ( of sorts!!) gin, tonic, olives and stuff to go on crackers…….                                                                                                                     What else could one need to survive???

Its tough when the the cheaper stuff is on the lower shelves and one has to get on hands and knees to see the labels…

GERMANY..

Got back to Schweich and found the boat nicely in the water. Good friends Austin and Susie ( from Sydney) kept an eye on her for us. And watered our plants..not that they needed it often.

Had a good 3 hrs out on the river to test the boat and Max is very happy with the engine ( of course we haven’t paid the bill yet!!)

Then we have had a series of hiccups. ( as all boaties do)   We find out that all the locks on the Mosselle River are closed each year for the first week in June for maintenance ( nobody TOLD us.) Added to that we find a few electrical problems and the new 6 month old water pump is behaving irratically. Then the horrendous rains in Europe, with floods everywhere , means half the rivers are now closed because they are in flood and and half the local forests floating in them.

These are photos from the BBC reports

The Mosselle next to us is no exception. Its racing like the Rhine on a good day, about 10-12 knots. It will take a few days to slow up but its all the debris that causes continuing problems.

 

WE have been very busy though,                                      installing santas present to Max in the kitchen. After visiting friends we realised we have the 50ml version and NOT the 25mls   (oh what a shame, we just have to get larger glasses!!)

We have had a few good sessions with Austin and Susie (Freshwater) who set off for the Saar before all the closures and at the begining of the rains.. Spent their time dodging the forest on the river but luckily didn’t have to go too far to get through the first lock, and safe from future closures for the week.

  AND SO WE WAIT, its June 2nd, so we couldn’t go anywhere even if we were ready as the locks won’t open till the 8th June

So we have the trusty little Yaris and we will go visiting others friendly boaties who are also stuck around within a 2 hrs drive from us due to locks closed or out of action for a few weeks.

Being on a boat here is certainly full of little problems that challenge your peace of mind, and make making plans laughable.

 

MAXS’ NEW MOTTO FOR THIS YEAR