Of Turtles and Trams

 June has been a month of contrasts, Belgium recorded their coldest and hottest ever days within the same month.  As I write we are moored in Hautmont, melting in a Europe wide heat wave.

A very welcome shady bankside mooring in Jeumont  

Having reluctantly turned back from our planned route South via the Dender and Blaton- Ath canals, we revisited Tounai, Peruwelz and Thieu, making our way to the Sambre route into France cruising through Wallonia, the French speaking region of Belgium.

Approaching the Streppy-Thieu lift 

Moored up inside the chamber, and

 about to be lifted 75m less than 15 mins

  The Streppy-Thieu lifts us to the summit level and the coal fields of La Louviere. This waterway has in the past been an essential conduit to carry this fuel North to Brussels and South to heavy industry in Charleroi. Now the mining spoil hills beside the waterway are green and tree covered.

Industry shows its face as we cruise smartly through Charleroi

Abbaye d'Aulne, a church was founded on this site in 657 

Not far up river from industrial Charleroi are the ruins of the Abbaye d'Aulne marking a change to a forested and rural lanscape. The abbey built in 1250 as part of a Cistercian monastry was largely destroyed in 1794 during the French revolution. A brewery now occupies part of the grounds.

We welcome the sight of the smaller locks

The Walloons have a pride in their region of Belgium 

We even spot a turtle by the riverbank

The lush green lanscape of the Sambre river.

   I confess to being a railway nut, so an extra day was called for in the riverside town of Thuin, in Wallonia but close to where the Sambre crosses the border into France. Here a private museum houses trams and they play trains every Sunday through the Summer. We ride several noisy kms into the countryside aboard a diesel powered Tram, one of many built post war powered by re-purposed Sherman tank engines. 

At Thuin, they bring the trams out on Sundays 

This electric tram once graced the streets of Brussels.

This diesel powered tram uses a salvaged Sherman tank engine.

On special occasions they fire up a steam tram. 

Beautifully restored wagons inside the tram museum  

 At Jeumont we cruise across an unmarked border into France, leaving the manned locks of Belgium behind and taking on a remote controller at the first French lock. 

The 'Telecomander' enables us

 to remotely control each lock opperation

While at Hautmont I take the proper train two stops up the line to Le Quesnoy, This town holds a strong affiliation with New Zealand, having been liberated by a New Zealand brigade in Novenber 1918, in a remarkable manner. The 2000 Germans garrisoned there were taken by surprise by just a few Kiwis who had scaled a long ladder around the back of town, and convinced the defenders that they were surrounded. not a single civilian in the town lost their lives. 

These massive high walls and a wide moat 

enclose the town of Le Quesnoy

Vauban fortified this strategic town back in 1668   

Inside this Kiwi museum, is the story of the town

 and its liberation after four years of sometimes brutal occupation. 

Weta workshop (in NZ) created this 4 times lifesize 

replica of a Kiwi rifleman.  

A symbolic ladder reaches up through the museum

The town, twinned with Cambridge (NZ) 

shows respect to their Kiwi liberators 

It was at this point that the Kiwis scaled the wall.

Evening light at Soire sur Sambre, it is 11pm mid summer.

 Once this heat wave passes, we will climb to the Sambre summit level, before heading downhill to Paris.

Flanders

It is May and wild poppies are blooming everywhere in Flanders, poignant reminders of the human carnage that took place on this same soil, in the 'War to end all wars'.  What have we learned?

Waterside and among the thistles are banks of scarlet blooms.

For our shakedown cruise we made our way up the less travelled waterway to Ypres. It is 14 years since we last moored up in the town basin.  Walking the cobbled streets, the dramatic history of the town becomes very real. The town centre has been rebuilt exactly as it had been before 'The Great War'. The fleeing city fathers took the original plans with them. 

Ypres, Menin Gate, and one of the pair of replicated lions. 

Thousands of Anzac and commonwealth troops marched past this lion to the front line and never returned. The original Lions were gifted to Australia.  

Every evening at 8pm, hundreds gather at the gate.

The town falls silent as buglers sound the 'Last Post'

Inscribed on the walls of this gateway are the names of each of the close to 500,000 commonwealth servicemen who never returned  

Evening light behind Ypres old cloth hall.

From Ypres we retraced our route through Diksmuide to Nieupoort and through Passendale, a springtime of green fields, where mud and trenches had once filled the landscape 

The sea 'Sluis' at Nieuwpoort became strategic defense weapons. 

As the German army advanced eastwards along the coast, the Belgian afterguard opened three massive floodgates and turned the lowland of Passendale into swampland and literally bogged down any further advance, defining the front line for 3 years. 

Brugge city quay and customs houses.

 The city's wealth was derived from the cloth trade

The picture book city of Brugge was mostly spared the devastation suffered by the front-line towns just a few miles to the west. Tourism is now their primary industry.  A friendly lock keeper tipped us off to visit the 'Vlissinghe', the 'Oldest pub in Belgium' dating back to 1515 and off the tourist radar. 

Well-worn steps lead to a back yard 

The Vlissinghe is well hidden down a back street

I get to sample a Brugge beer

 beneath a portrait, reputedly of the original owners.

After a few heatwave days in Brugge, we cruised to Ghent where, on a stormy day dawn, we lock out onto the tidal Scheldt at high water to ride the strong flowing ebb tide for three hours and lock into the Dender river. This will take us South and into Wallonia, where we take a right turn onto the Canal du Centra, Thieu, Saneffe, and the Sambre into France later in June. Our cruising plan for the season is taking shape. 

An early start to catch the tide, Merelbeke Sluis.

For three hours we see no other boats, 

Where is everyone?

The Stadhuis Dendermonde, they do love their flags.

 

After the stress of the tidal Scheldt, we took time to explore Dendermonde, a hidden gem. A strategic riverside town settled in the Bronze age, fortified by the Romans, sacked by the Vikings, re-fortified by Napoleon. Garrisoned by Wellington, flattened in WW1, authentically rebuilt in medieval style and within commuting distance to Brussels.    

Minstrels with a story

A hand crafted 'Hurdy Gurdy' 

a very different string instrument

We happened on a medieval gathering in the square including this minstrel couple.

Both of these medieval instruments were hand made by the husband, both the 'mid-European' pipes and an authentic replica 'Hurdy-Gurdy'     

As I close off this post, we are in Aalst on the river Dender held up by lock repairs just a few kms ahead of us. We are informed that this may take two more weeks to fix. We are faced with a change of plan, retracing our route through Ghent and Southwards via Tournai.

 

Spring 26

 In late April, despite the dire NZ travel advisory, we flew up from New Zealand with Emirates in two of their superb A380s.  Transiting at Dubai and on to London, the pilots carefully skirted the war zones below. In the end, this was one of the most stress-free journeys we have made.  Our London destination was in order to catch up socially with a few folk before heading over to Antiope in Belgium

                           

At the Diksmuide boatyard, we find Antiope 

still snugged up after her winter sleep. 

Since my last post in September 2025, we have had a busy NZ summer. Alongside tasks at home,

In February we attended the annual gathering of Kiwi Cruisers in Europe, an eclectic group of like minded snowbirds. Charles has also skippered several sail training trips aboard Lion NZ and Steinlager. These trips can be challenging at times, however the rewards of seeing the students grow in confidence are worth it. 'My best job ever'!

The annual Kiwi cruisers meeting in the Bombay hills.

Steinlager 2 is no match for Team NZ 

and their foiling 40 

Taking students to sea aboard Steinlager2 

and Lion NZ is my best job ever

Another achievement has been to finally complete a model replica galleon, a task handed to me by my daughter several years ago. The final act being to see it installed safely in a glass cabinet at her home in Tauranga. 

Finished at last!

More or less authentic rigging,

Even the gun ports open.

Returned completed and safely behind glass.

While in London we found a warm spring day to visit the Chelsea Physic Garden, this having been on on Annie's bucket list for a while. The extensive walled estate owes many of its specimens to Joseph Banks' early voyages with Bligh and Cook. Exotic plants and trees have been nurtured alongside carnivorous and deadly plants for over 350 years, all in the interests of science and medicine.   

A flowering kowhai in the Physic Garden.

This Wardian Case once transported 

exotic plants by sailing ships.

    

A homage to my misspent youth.

 A pint in my old 'local', The Nightingale Pub

 

Another visit to the Suffolk seaside coincided with a Classic car parade in Felixstowe with over 600 vehicles entered and all ranged up alongside the beach huts.  

Even a 'Trabant' on show

A Dodge Charger...General Lee, 

an immaculate repro  

Hands up those who can remember the Dukes of Hazzard.

1953 Ford Popular. My dad had one of these!

This Morris Cowley is a century old

As I write we are back aboard Antiope, in Diksmuide having found her in good shape after a long winter sleep snug inside a large shed in the company of many craft of various vintages. Hauled outside, Antiope is currently sitting in a cradle on the hardstand while we complete some pre-launch tasks.

                                                                     STOP PRESS

 

We are back afloat