First Locks
We set our course to the Krammelsluizen following dozens of other boats. I must admit I got a bit nervous. Karolina asked how big the lock might be, and I told here they are huge and high, maybe 10 m in height difference. That was what I had experienced before, I said. "How old were you then?" asked Karolina. "Well, about 11 years, I remember it well....". As a response, I just received an expression on her face, saying it all.
My reputation as experienced locker was by that reply varnished.
We did what the others did, moored against a pontoon where a sign explained in what order and in how many rows you should wait. ZEEPAARD behaved exactly like I had expected, nice and smooth something in between DATSY and REGINA, but clearly more like DATSY without drifting as much. But the big difference was the engine. I had never experienced something similar. What POWER! ZEEPAARD stopped immediately on reverse and steered wonderfully by using the power of 28 hp! But there was no time to practice engine power now, since shortly thereafter, the lock opened, we moved forward, but the lock became full before we could enter. So another practice to moor. It was in deed exciting.
All other crews seemed so relaxed. They made coffee, had some cakes, sat in the sun and seemed to enjoy the situation. How could they? Were they not to go through the lock soon? Did they not have to do some preparations? At least mentally.
Even more surprisingly, they all entered the lock just as calm, this time with us in the middle of the lot. Everything went very smooth until I suddenly found ourselves on the port side of the lock! Oh, Jurriaan, you said I should preferably opt for the starboard side, I thought, and now, in our first ever lock (as a mature young man that was…) we got on the port side. My heart was beating faster. Surprisingly enough, it did not feel much different from mooring to any pontoon, with the only difference that the pontoon was a wall and we did not jump off.
I had forgotten to ask Jurriaan if you switch off the engine in a lock, so I kept the engine running, since I heard a lot of engine noise in the lock which meant all the others kept theirs on, too. I heared a piiiip from one other engine, meaning someone else switched his off, but all other engines seemed to be still running, judging from the noise in the lock. I thought I try the same, and switched off ours as well. Suddenly it all became quiet! Did they all switch off their engines at the same time as we did, or was the echo really so heavy in the lock so our engine had filled the whole lock with engine noise?
Next challenge: We were in the Osterschelde with real tidal waters, one of the reasons we came here. Of course, we wanted to test it, but not as soon as today, so we made our way quickly to the next lock, taking us into the Grevelingenmeer with salt water, but no tides. A distance of tidal waters of 1,5 nautical miles. Karolina made some calculations with the tidal tables and the current charts and proudly presented her result: 0,1 knots of current in SW direction! We could not feel much, but at least we had real tides! The fact that Öresund normally has knot of current or the fact that the Westcoast of Sweden actually also has tides you don't take into account, did not change this exciting situation a bit: We were sailing in real tidal waters, directly connected to the North Sea!
The next lock was similar to the first, except for two things: We had much more routine (in the meaning that we had a coffee-break with some cake while waiting for the lock to open!) as well as the fact that this lock was so much bigger! 5 boats next to each other, so wide was the lock! Also, there was no limit of the air draught in this lock while the first lock had 18,5 m - bigger sailing boats had to go with the "big buys" next door in another lock. So much bigger sailing boats were also in this lock (we saw one beautiful HR 39!). The people behind explained that it can become very hectic with a lot of wind and when the boats can't stop in time when being blown into the locks. Well, I think we had still a lot to learn... Hundreds of people looked at us from the shore, presumingly waiting for some disaster to watch or just to be equally astonished as we were about the crowd of boats in the lock. We went down again some 0,5 meters and we were out in the Grevelingenmeer!
Locking takes its time, and it had already become 3 o'clock in the afternoon. We motored along in the calm wind to a natural island called, Mooselbank, between the lock and Herkingen. (We had by now just entered the Dutch chart from the right you can see here.)
This was another experience! Since there are so many boats sailing around here, they have increased the capacity of this beautiful island by building bridges and pontoons so we could moor alongside and just walk ashore! What a service! This is something for Bohuslän, which also gets so crowded in the summertime that you can hardly find a natural harbour! And Jessica, who was a bit sceptical why we should sail in Holland at all, became excited! This was just as nice as in Bohuslän, since hundreds of children were running around fishing crabs! So we, of course, also had to build some fishing gear. Jurriaan, we have "borrowed" one meter of your Marlow whipping Twine (4th drawer in nav-table) and Christiene, we have as well "borrowed" two clothes-pegs, but they have been well used! Jessica and Jonathan had great, great fun fishing crabs! "This is much better than Bohuslän!", shouted Jessica, "While we have to wait for one crab to come in Sweden, here they fight for the muscle and want to be fished!”
The whole family was in harmony and we looked forward to many new impressions for the forthcoming days.
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