Off the mooring at 6am to make use of the incoming tide up the rover.
It's nice to leave early, the sky always seems to look prettier and today there was no wind which made it even better:
The current got quite fierce, at some stage we did 10.4 knots and we were certainly not pushing the engine.
By 10am we were already at Papenburg, where the Meyer shipyard builds cruise liners.
The landscape along the river is really very attractive, the fact that it is tidal and that there are lots of little muddy creeks along the shore makes it even better. And there are sheep grazing as well.
Soon after Papenburg you get the first lock, after which the river is no longer tidal. By now we were 'stuck behind a barge, which is not a bad thing as the locks as a rule don't operate for pleasure craft on their own, but you can 'hitch a ride' with commercial traffic. We fitted into this lock (Herbrum) and the next one (Bollingerfähr) with the barge and 4 other pleasure craft. The next lock (Dörpen) is smaller and only two of us could join the barge. Actually, we would have been fourth and having to wait but two of the others (#2 and 3) wanted to travel together so they let us in first.
So all in all it was a very pleasant day with lots of good fortune!
We are now in Surwold, 10 Km up the canal. Tomorrow we will do the remaining 55 Km to Oldenburg.
Rumour has it that there is free WiFi in this very friendly harbour, so I am going to try to upload this post now.
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