Wednesday 13th October 2004 Wergensee to Kossenblatt.

Ten years later a much safer Beeskow lock - DIY automatic

1.2° C Sunny and cold. Mike set off at 8.30 a.m. Outside temperature only 2° C. I stayed inside all day as I had a bad back and was having trouble moving. Mike had estimated our time of arrival at Beeskow automatic lock (which works on the hour whether there are any boats in the chamber or not!) and adjusted the engine speed to go a bit faster than normal to arrive there at ten. We moored below the lock at a few minutes before ten. As Rosy was coming alongside us, the lock started emptying and blew Rosy sideways. Bill swore and backed off! When the flush had subsided he came alongside. When

Aug 1999 the old 40m lock at Kossenblatt, which was closed

the gates opened we went into the chamber still roped together. I noted there was no emergency stop button to halt proceedings if anything should go wrong. Mike went up on to the lockside to look and confirmed there was no shutdown switch. Hmm. This lock doesn’t conform with the rest of Europe’s health and safety standards, and it doesn't even comply with German ones! Mike did however find some interesting mushrooms and brought me a couple of them for identification. I

Kossenblatt in 2014, a new DIY auto lock (only12m long) and weir

couldn’t say for certain what they were as they were white with white gills, so I did a spore print which was also white. No confirmed identity so we didn’t eat them, although they looked and smelled good. We carried on up the Spree with Rosy in front of us. Made lunch at 1 p.m. and hobbled down to the stern to take it to Mike and managed to steer while he went insidefor a short break. We arrived at Kossenblatt at 3.15 p.m. and moored alongside Rosy in the mouth of the old lock chamber, with our stern almost touching the old gates. Later Mike lit the coal fire and burned some of the coal he collected from the old Siemens factory wharf.