Moordrecht to Williamstadt

It rained quite heavily around 5 am, but it had stopped by the time the kettle went on at 0630, although the wind was still gusty. We cast off from our helpful barge at 0713 and motored down river for an hour until we reached the Algera Bridge, where we tied up to wait until rush hour finished and bridge lifts resumed.

When the bridge lifted at 0925 we passed beneath it in company with four modern Bermudan yachts, while another two bermudans headed the other way. The clouds had lifted and the sky was mainly blue but the wind was strong; not as strong as in the UK though, where the dying tropical low that had been hurricane Bertha was about to hit!

We retraced our route to Dordrecht, going from the Hollandse Ijssel to the Nieuwa Mass to De Noord. All the canals were busy with frequent wash and mostly a head wind, although we did manage to use the stay sail for a few minutes. We did not need to wait for any bridges since Kajan's air-draft is only 8m, and we had 11m clear which was plenty, even though it did not feel like it due to wash and waves! The yachts we were with at Algera, that had all motored off much faster than we could, were all waiting for the lift when we got to Alblasserdam Bridge, but we just went under it and kept going.

At Dordrecht we turned to starboard onto the Oude Mass, a very busy stretch of water. There was a quay available for a lunch stop (3hrs max) where we could have moored up, but it was only 1130 so we did not bother. When we got to Dordrecht last time, from the other direction along with about 40 other gaffers, we had waited for the railway bridge to lift, then travelled in convoy escorted by a police boat into the old harbour; this time we did not need to wait as our air-draft let us pass beneath.

A big barge came off a fuel dock by the bridge just before we got there, and we followed it through, keeping out of the way of another big barge manoeuvring onto the fuel dock, and a 3^rd barge heading in the other direction and using the same bridge span. I did not look up to see our clearance (it's scary); I knew our air draft but could not help crouching slightly in the cockpit as I steered with a careful eye on the barges!

Turning into the Dordtsche Kill from the Oude Mass took fine judgement! We had to slow down a little to let a barge pass us, then turn to port to cross the Oude Mass, making sure we did not obstruct a barge heading along the Oude Mass towards Dordrecht, another 3 heading up the Dordtsche Kill to turn into the Oude Mass both to port and starboard, and another one coming fast behind to turn the same way we wanted to. Not to mention the 6 leisure craft of varying speed and size that appeared from behind the barges! We had been told that the junction of the Oude Mass and De Noord was the busiest junction on the entire European canal system. We had only had to turn to starboard there, staying on the same side of the river, and it had been easy. This junction was not!

We had soup, fruit, cheese, and crisps for lunch as we travelled down the Dordtche Kill. The weather was great, sunny, with fluffy white clouds and a strong breeze to cool us. The occasional gust reminded us why we were motoring through canals rather than sailing home! After that we turned onto the Hollandsche Deep for another head to wind motor, but with a longer fetch that raised waves to slow us down. The big barges stayed stayed in the middle of a wide lake and the yachts coming towards us were sailing very broad reached, but tacking is forbidden in the Hollandsche Deep so we just motored the rest of the way to Williamstadt.

We entered the harbour (which has a new marina to one side) and headed for the harbour master's barge. He was already on deck and told us to go into the Old Harbour and raft up right at the end “on the other old boats” Just what we wanted to do!

There were 2 rather smart Dutch steel yachts (one almost exactly the same shape as the old bottar we sailed on at Hoorn) and an OGA boat, with the gaffer flags still flying. Harbinger, a Solent based boat had been with the fleet on and off since Wemeldinger, but had parted ways at Edam to head south. The two bridges we had easily got under had cost them an entire day's travel due to their greater air draft. We moored up outside the two Dutch boats, which as well as being longer than Kajan were also beamier, which is not something we are used to!