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| Edwald - tug with two pans of logs |
Hazy clouds, sun out – hot –
thunderstorms and torrential rain in the afternoon. Apart from being restricted
to 24 hours the mooring next to the partially completed flats was a noisy
mooring due to being directly under the flight path for aircraft landing at
Tegel airport. Set off at 8.30 am No signs of life on board the big cruiser in
front of us. It was very pleasant and quiet. Passing the Hohenzollern kanal, which
leads into Berlin, a WSA tug and pan followed by a cruiser were the first
moving vessels of the day,
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| Queue of boats overtaking |
then we passed the entrance to the Tegeler See on
the right and a big modern WSP police station with four or five patrol boats
moored on the left. We kept left, heading north up the Havel. A motor ferry set
off from our right as we were about 200m from it so we had to slow down to let
it past. As we entered the wider lake WSP1, a large police patrol boat, went
past heading back towards its base. At the northern end of the wide bit we
passed tug Edwald pushing two pans loaded high with logs of wood. An
unconverted DB was moored on the ends of the pontoon moorings at KP8, unusual
to see such a large boat. Tug Finn pushing a pan loaded with bricks and planks
looked like a private building contractor afloat.
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| Cruisers in Lehnitz lock |
He was followed by three big
pans of scrap metal being pushed by Polish tug Janine, now German registered in
Berlin. As we were on the Niederneuendorfer See and nearing the junction with
the Havel kanal and the Harvel, an old launch went past, called Gustav, it had
a lovely shape and made virtually no wash.
Turning right on to the Havel, with the Havel kanal behind us, there was
a busy passenger railway line alongside the river as we motored on into Henningsdorf.
First there were lots of boat moorings either side of the river until we
reached the town centre, then as we continued under the road bridge and into
the industrial end of town we passed a Polish Bizon tug pushing two decked over
pans (a strategy for carrying more cargo on shallow navigations like the Polish
rivers Oder, Warta and Notec) with big heaped piles of gravel on top.
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| Kuhnle hire boat above Lehnitz lock |
Three
cruisers were behind it waiting their chance to overtake it. The banks on our
left were lined with commercial quays and factories. Some joker had placed a
child’s toy digger halfway up a pile of scrap metal – the camera wouldn’t focus
on it in time to take a photo – I’ll get it on the way back! Made a cuppa and
we went shade chasing along the right hand bank where there were trees and
delicious cooler air coming from between them. WSP2 came past, crew waving
cheerily, taking no notice whatsoever of the woman in a bikini who was swimming
up the middle of the river. She smiled and said hello as we passed her. Past
the junction with the Oranienburger kanal, which leads to a series of lakes,
Neuruppin and Fehrbellin, and then more and more cruisers started making an
appearance. Some very nice houses and holiday homes had been built among the
trees along the river as we went through the outskirts of Oranienburg.
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| Cruiser speeding along less than 1m from bank |
A long
string of small boats and yachts overtook us around KP23. There were lots more
people swimming in the river by the bungalows before the Oranienburger Havel
and Mike took a photo of the long queue of boats stretching out in front of us
as a French-style hireboat cruiser overtook. Into the Lehnitz See. At the top
end of the lake we passed yet another Polish tug, Odratans pushing two 45m long
pans of coal heading south down the lake. Lots of boats were anchored in the edges
of the lake, no doubt for lunch, and there were a few more swimmers and canoes
about. As we arrived at Lehnitz lock we could see the lights were green and six
or seven of the cruisers that had recently overtaken us were going very slowly
into the empty chamber so we followed them and two canoe paddlers followed us.
Fore and aft ropes up the very chunky bollards set in the metal piles walls.
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| Boats moored above Liebenwalde |
One paddler came and hung on to the fender I’d hung out over our port side,
just in case there was no room on the right (we always try to use the starboard
side to the wall for locking). The skies went black and the wind picked up,
trying to wrench the boats off the wall. The cruiser in front was having serious trouble holding on (why do they HAVE to hold
the ropes directly with their hands instead of
putting them round cleats or bollards on their decks?) and I noticed all of he
cruisers’ crews were doing the same, rope round the bollard in the wall and
hanging on to the end of it. Thunder rumbled in the distance. We rose 6m
steadily. No sign of a lock keeper but plenty of cameras – another remotely
operated lock? Above the lock we were on the Havel-Oder-Wasserstrasse (HOW) as
the name suggests it links the Havel with the Oder. Among the queue I spotted
the first we’d seen of the big square-looking solid hireboats from the Kuhnle
hire firm, so I took a photo. Reminds me of the hefty hireboats they had on the
Canal du Midi that we nicknamed the Moissac Monsters. We passed Janet, a loaded
1,000 tonner followed by three cruisers.
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| Boats moored in the Langer Trodel |
The bearded skipper waved, but looked
annoyed at something. A cruiser came towards us skimming the left hand bank by
less than a metre making an emormous wash between boat
and bank. How do they get away with that, and better still, why do they
do it? It must make steering hard work. I made
some lunch. Our paddler had stopped at an Imbiss (a small café). The
thunderstorm was rumbling closer. Mike changed the sunshade for the brolly. He
closed all the doors as the rain started. It was torrential and we huddled
under the brolly eating our lunch. A yacht went past, the steerer in his
waterproofs laughing at us under our brolly. The claps of thunder became very
loud and the lightening close by. Nowhere to stop so we had to motor on and we
were getting wet even under the brolly. Disaster number one struck when we
found the mooring we were aiming for at the beginning of the Malzer kanal,
below Liebenwalde lock, was no longer available, new
“No Mooring” signs. It had been completely taken
over by the WSA and they had dumped some metal pipes and a pile of rocks along
it. Two cruisers were moored at the end, taking the risk of being fined, maybe
just to shelter from the storm, which had just eased off. The sun came out as
we followed five cruisers into the now automatic DIY lock. Just enough room for
us on the left behind a big wide cruiser. Once the gates were closed we moved
back to give them more space. Last time we came through this lock there was a
lock keeper and the traffic using it were tugs and pans that had to uncouple as
the lock is shorter (51.3m) than the one 7kms further on (85m) and the mooring
was used by private boats to wait for the lock and keep out of the way of the
manoeuvring tugs and pans. Looks like the commercial traffic has finished on the
Obere Havel. The Malzer kanal finishes at Liebenwalde where the Finow Kanal’s
Langer Trödel starts (now abandoned, unlike the rest of the Finow on the south
side of the HOW which has been preserved and is navigable). From Liebenwalde
the navigation is called the Voss kanal. Less than halfway to the next lock,
Bischofswerder, we met the cruisers coming back – disaster number two - the
lock was shut for the next two days! We carried on to find out what was
happening and check for possible mooring places on the way. The site of an old
lock was now a boatyard, so no stopping on the old lock wall. The rest of the
canal followed a minor road to the lock and there was a fisherman’s place that
might have been OK. There was a cruiser called Boot moored at the end of the
waiting place for the lock on the right, which has no bank access. The guy on
the cruiser said the lock was closed for two days, but didn’t have enough
English to tell us what had happened. We moored by the cabin-high piling on the
opposite bank and Mike put pins in to tie to. It
was overgrown but there was an old set of wooden steps up to the road. It was
4.35 pm. Mike went to take a look. No one around at the lock and there was a
queue of boats waiting to come down the lock. We set the TV up and got the bike
off the roof. Mike was just about to set off to get the car when the cruisers
from above went into the lock to come down. We put the bike back on the roof,
took the satellite dish down and got ready to untie and go into the lock when
they cleared it. They guy on Boot said we can’t go, it will take two days. What
will? The lock looks like it’s working? A posh electronic sign board said there
was a Schifhartsperre – a shipping blockage and stürmschide, which we took to
mean storm damage (schide must be schade misspelt).
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