4th - 12th May 2005 Waiting above Brda lock for better weather........

No photos as this posting consists of just some details from my diary of the daily problems of life on a narrowboat in Poland!

Wednesday 4th May 2005 Brda lock.

Grey and overcast, heavy rain started mid-morning. 12.4ºC overnight. Up at eight. Bill asked Mike if the chandlers did spare seats for Elsans as his had splits in each side which pinch both the cheeks of his bum! Mike sent a text to Peter to get him to ask about it in the chandlers. A trip boat with a happy, cheery party of guests on board, playing loud gypsy-style music, went down the lock for a trip on the Wisła. Mike decided to take our boat back upriver to the lake to test the echo sounder. It started to rain as we set off. Brolly up. As soon as we left the short lock cut the display began to show the depth, so it was the bad bottom by the lock which had been refusing to give a signal. Mike was very relieved to know that there was nothing wrong with the echo sounder - we will really need it when going down the river. Back to the mooring. Bill had moved Rosy a bit further along the mooring towards the lock, so we moored where we’d set off from - on the end of the dolphins. Once we were tied up Mike changed the engine oil. The trip boat came back up the lock in the late afternoon with a very happy, merry group of folks on board. Then Mike did a classic when he was getting the petrol can out of the front hatch to fill up the generator in the pouring rain – he took a dive off the bows into the river. It was deep, almost 5m and he said he opened his eyes underwater to find out which way was up and it was all green. He was OK except for being very wet – but he’d lost his glasses - again! Finished off the Polish stuff for dinner, stuffed pancakes and pierogi with chips and beans.

 Thursday 5th May 2005  Brda lock.

More bad weather predicted. Grey day with damp air, but little of the predicted rain turned up. Transbode-6 left just after dawn. In an attempt to recover his new varifocal specs, Mike attached my fishing landing net (not used for donkey’s years) to a length of copper tube which was attached to the end of the long pole for the HF mast. He used this to try trawling the bottom to retrieve his glasses. First the wooden pole at the end of the HF mast broke – it had several joins in it which came apart. We cobbled it back together with whipping cord and duct tape. It came apart at another joint. He found another length of copper tube to replace the wooden pole and we had a working dredging tool. He paused to go with Bill to see the lock keeper. They told him that they don’t work weekends so it looks like we’re stuck until Monday. Mike asked the keeper if we could have some electricity (after he’d spied the day before that Transbode-6 had been connected to an electricity supply under a plate on the the lockside) and we got a cable connected up for a donation of 20 Złotys. Not enough current to run the washing machine, but enough for the TV, ‘fridge and computer. Back to the search for his glasses. After about an hour of fetching up oozing, black, stinking mud and no sign of his specs we gave up, had some lunch and then ‘phoned Vision Express UK. Mike spoke to the manageress. She’d got all the details of his last pair and said she would try and locate the same frames and ring back. She rang back later to say they’d had no luck, they couldn’t locate the same frames so they couldn’t do him some new varifocals as they needrd to be measured very accurately. His only option now was to try to get some here in Bydgoszcz. He had also been in process of repairing Bill’s TV, which had stopped working on 240v but was OK on 12v. He’d found a dry joint and re-soldered it for him, but the TV still wasn’t working. Bill came over to see if he could help with doing the repairs. We got our ‘photos out to look at the mooring possibilities at the junction with the Nogat while Bill was on board, there were dolphins for big boats but not much else. So there was not much point going there until Monday otherwise we would be stuck on the river without a reasonable place for mooring. Mike puzzled over Bill’s TV. He gave up and returned it to Bill so he could watch TV for the evening – he’d have it back to have another look at it later. I cooked pork steaks for dinner with an apricot omelette for desert.

Friday 6th May 2005  Brda lock.

Grey, showery and cold. 6.7º C overnight. Mike ‘phoned Vision Express in the UK again and told the girl what had happened and asked if they would try looking to see if they had frames like the ones he had twelve months ago. She said she would ring back. He ‘phoned her again an hour later. She said she would call him back, she hadn’t found any yet. When she called back it was bad news, they hadn’t any of the older frames either. Nothing else for it than to get some here in Bydgoszcz. He went to talk to the lock keepers. There were three of them in the office (good jobs these guys have got - there has been nothing through the lock since we’ve been here but that one trip boat which went down and back) and one of them spoke a little English. Mike asked if there was an opticians at the local supermarket complex. Yes, three kilometres away and he would take him in his car. Saves getting the moped off, getting it up and over the piling on to the walkway would not be impossible but certainly wouldn’t be easy. He came back shortly after. A disaster had occurred. A lens had fallen out of his old glasses and smashed on the floor while he was in Vision Express (which was in the Auchan mall less than 2 kms away) and he could get varifocals, but it would take ten days. He had to go back in an hour to get his old specs back as he was having to have new plastic lenses in his old frames. I was finishing off the chores. He made himself some lunch then went back to Auchan with the lock keeper. He’d decided that we would pick up his new specs on the return journey, he’d toyed with the idea of asking to have them sent to Ostroda but it’s not very far to there and we could be back here in less than two weeks. Mike came back to the boat and went out again – he said the Polish were up to another scam. I had just sat down to eat my lunch. A guy had asked if we wanted some diesel. He said he’d got 20 litres. He wanted 120 Złotys for it. No way, Mike told them – that’s far too expensive – at 2,50 Złotys a litre (like we paid the barge skipper) that’s 50 Złotys. OK, he said. Then he carried the can down to the landing. Mike said there’s never twenty litres in there! Bill measured it, there was 15 litres. Bill gave him 40 Zlotys for it. (Hoped it would burn OK!) Mike came in to tell me all about it and show me his new lenses, 90 Złotys (£15) not bad! The bill for his new varifocals was 1,140 Złotys (£190 only slightly dearer than the ones he’d just lost which had cost £186 last year) he’d paid a deposit of 500 Złotys using his Abbey card, which got stuck in the machine and there was a right performance to free it! He will pay the balance when we come back to collect them. Sorted out the coal store – we’d got very little left, just egg coal and briquettes, plus he shifted the anchor to the stern, ready for going downstream on the Wisła.

Saturday 7th May 2005  Brda lock.

7.2º C overnight. Sunny spells and very heavy downpours of rain. Three small power boats came up the lock, they were emergency services and they went past our mooring at quite high speed making a lot of wash. A Dutch boat, a 15m Westlander called Uhuhru, turned up and moored behind us on the dolphins where the barge Transbode-6 had been. Mike went for a quick few words with the skipper. We’d met before in Havelberg. The skipper was German and was working single handed. He had spent the winter in Szczecin and was on his way to the same place as us, Elblag, then Ostroda. He planned to go straight down the Wisła to the Nogat in one go. It’s 115 kms, but he expected to do 10 kph with the flow. He said he would leave the boat in Ostroda with a friend boat-sitting, while he went back on his motorcycle to pick up his wife and then they would go to explore Iceland. We got ready to go and do some shopping in Auchan, which was about a mile away. The German guy’s boat was in the lock ready to go down as we set off on foot. We had a few words with him as the gate lifted behind his boat and wished him “a hands breadth under the keel” as he left. (We thought the keepers here said they didn’t work on weekends?) It was a pleasant walk past the old lock and out through a gate by the old German lock house (the navigation was built by the Prussians) - once we’d sussed out that the main gate wasn’t actually locked – no one answered our knocks on the door, although we could hear voices. Past lots of small houses surrounded by scruffy plots or neat vegetable gardens, with lots of lilac starting to bloom. The road was bordered by some ancient acacia thorn trees. Crossed the busy main road into Bydgoszcz and we were in the hypermarket. Next door was a Leroy Merlin DIY store and there were lots of little shops (the usual clothes boutiques, sports shops, etc, even a Flunch - all French!) in the small, double-allied mall in front of Auchan. It was pretty quiet when we got there at around 10.30 a.m. but gradually became crowded with Saturday shoppers. It wasn’t much like its French parent, the goods on sale were subtly different – the French would have been surprised to see a complete double row of hundreds of types of smoked sausages on sale and the aisles had shelves reaching up some four metres making it feel like shopping in a warehouse or cash and carry. However, we found most of the stuff we wanted and more. I restocked the freezer with meat at half the price I’d been paying in Germany; chicken and pork chops, tenderloin and diced meat for a stew; some spuds, salad and cooked meat; a new broom handle to replace the one we broke fishing for Mike’s specs; pan scourers and Chinese noodles and we were spoiled for choice for fresh bread. We spent 150 Złotys (37,50€ or £25!) Mike dropped a card with our ‘phone number in at Vision Express (same size shop as any small British opticians, not a huge optical lab as in GB) while I packed the groceries into our two rucksacks. We almost made it back to the boat before it started to pour with rain and a strong wind blew it almost horizontal. We headed for shelter behind a large storage shed. The rain was pouring off its roof and we were still getting soaked. We ran for the bridge over the tail end of the lock chamber and Mike started to fish for the boat keys which he had left in the bottom of one of the bags. A security guard had seen us and came sprinting over, under cover of a large black brolly. He realised we were from the boats moored above the lock. He spoke no English and used the word “barka” for boat, which means barge according to our dictionary. Once back on the boat (not easy getting down off the horizontal sloping piling, especially in the wet) I changed most of my clothes and hung them up to dry. Emptied the rucksacks, which were also very wet, and hung them up to dry too. The boat looked like a Chinese laundry. I set about stowing all the food. Mike made himself a salad and I had a slice of wholemeal baguette with tuna and real Hellman’s mayo (I bought a huge jar – German mayo is not to my taste, it’s not even like British salad cream). Had trouble getting the analogue satellite to work later when Mike set it up ready for the F1 Grand Prix racing from Spain next day. The three small power boats went back down the lock. They sat in the chamber for ages before the lock gate lifted and the chamber emptied. Mike scanned a booklet which the German guy off Uhuru had given to Bill, a canoe guide to the Wisła. I cooked Chinese fried rice with pork for dinner.

Sunday 8th May 2005   Brda lock.

6.2º C Pouring with rain when we got up – it rained heavily up until late evening. Mike watched the Spanish Grand Prix. Bill came over for a chat. Gave him the recipe books I’d just scanned. The forecast for Monday’s weather was just as grim – more heavy rain – not the weather for following bank markers through binoculars. Another day off.

 

Monday 9th May 2005   Brda lock.

3.2º C overnight. Bright sunny morning turning showery later – the showers were heavy. Mike printed Bill a copy of the translation we did the night before of the Wisła canoe guide. He asked Bill if he would post our two 35mm films off to Doubleprint as he was going to the post office by Auchan. When he returned he said the woman in the post office wouldn’t accept the envelope as the address wasn’t the right size (admittedly it was only a little square in the corner) and so he put it in an envelope (he said he had to get some envelopes for himself anyway) and had to pay 3,90 Złotys to post it – so much for Europewide freepost! Three tugs from Gdansk came up the lock with a pan on which there were several large steel constructions. Two of the tugs sped off in front while the largest pushed the pan up the Brda heading for Bydoszcz. Bill knocked – he hadn’t even noticed the tugs! – he wanted to know if a keyboard he’d given us came with a disc as he was looking for a file which might be on it. We couldn’t find the file he was looking for. Put the central heating on again as the temperature took a plunge.

Tuesday 10th May 2005   Brda lock.

Down to 3º C again overnight. Chilly, sunny with heavy showers. Mike ran the engine for an hour while I did the ironing which had been hanging about for a week plus. The washing pile keeps growing, but that will have to wait until we get to somewhere where we can get a supply of water. Bill called to ask if we’d seen the weather forecast – no – more showers tomorrow. All we can do is wait it out. Lunch. Mike brought the HF antenna mast in the cabin and made the new broom handle fit once he’d removed the stub of the old one. I had the PC on to do the log and more scanning - while we have electricity we might as well do some work on it. Tandoori chicken nuggets and chips for dinner.

Wednesday 11th May 2005  Brda lock.

3.8º C Sunshine and showers with a nasty hailstorm in the afternoon. Chores in the morning and then after lunch we went on foot to get some groceries from Auchan. I bought a nice new salmon pink cotton tee shirt top for 9,99 Zł (£1.59!) but Nivea deodorant was more expensive than German prices at 10,06Zł (£1.60). Spent a total of 167,17 Zł (£26.50) The gate by the old lock house was locked. An old lady came out of the house, so Mike called hello and she turned to speak to us, but didn’t understand that we needed the gate unlocking. A middle aged man (her son?) appeared and he understood. He checked, the gates were locked. In German, he said follow him and we could go through his garage. He had a car in there being repaired which he showed us. It was a Fiesta which had had an accident in Germany. He’d bought it to repair it and was making a good job of it, replacing the damaged passenger side doors, then all it will need is a coat of paint. He said the engine was good. His son was working in England and was coming home for a five week holiday starting Sunday. We thanked him for letting us through his garage and we crossed the old lock, pausing to have a look at all the gear which was still in place for opening and closing the gates. As we went to look at the water level marker (pegel) by the new lock – it had risen from 3.83m to 4.45m (at one point it had gone down as far as 3.4m) it started to rain, so we made tracks back to the boat but the rain turned to hail as we said “Hello we’re back” to Bill. So we all disappeared inside rather quickly. Mike had been searching through the rucksack to find the keys and couldn’t find them, he thought he had locked them in the boat. Fortunately he hadn’t snapped the lock on the front door. I put the groceries away, made a cuppa and had a sit down. Mike and Bill decided to set off downriver in the morning and so he set the alarm clock for 5.30 a.m.

Yr. 12 Day 361 Thursday 12th May 2005  Brda lock.

4.2º C overnight, sunny spells and heavy showers. Mike got up at 5.30 a.m. and got the boat ready to move. As he and Bill were standing watching the grey skies turning blacker as it got closer to lock opening time of 7.00 a.m. it started to pour with rain. Brolly up. It rained for half an hour. The lock staff emptied the lock and brought work boats into the chamber. At that point we gave up. Mike reconnected the electricity cable and put the satellite dish back up, then he collected Bill’s TV to have another look at it to see if he can find out why it was only working on 12 volts and not on 240v. I made a buttered chicken curry for dinner. We’ll try again tomorrow to start the long trip down the Vistula.

Tuesday 3rd May 2005 Junc Noteç canal to above Brda lock. 21.3kms 4 locks

Below lock 6 Osowa Góra.

12.1º C overnight. Warm sunny day. Up at seven, away at eight and in the top lock, No 6, Osowa Góra, twenty minutes later. No one around. Mike went to see if there was anyone at the house by the lock. Nope, nor the house a little way down the sandy lane. Bill tried ‘phoning the number for the lock that was in our German book. The man who answered didn’t understand. Mike suggested there might be someone at the next lock which was a kilometre away. Bill rode down on his bike. The people there got the next lock ready - he wasn’t sure if they understood that

Below lock 5 Prądy

there was no one to work the top lock. A bloke appeared from the house in the lane, he would ‘phone to get us a lock keeper. A woman arrived, not looking very pleased, at 9.45 a.m. after we’d been waiting for an hour and a half. She closed the top gate behind us and did the paperwork, charging Bill for two locks. We dropped down 3.4m in the top lock chamber of No 6, Osowa Góra, with a crowd of gongoozlers watching who’d gathered on the bridge over the tail of the lock. A man went past driving a loaded cart pulled by two white horses. The sharp right turn on a steep slope l

Old lock above lock 4 Czyżkówo

eaving the left side of the bridge looked very tricky, they did it at high speed making it look like something from the chariot race in Ben Hur! We trundled on down the short pound to the next lock and I made tea and toast whilst vacuuming the carpet. At lock 5, Prądy, another sullen faced woman worked the lock for us. She didn’t even want to see the previous lock receipts. Lock 4, Czyżkówo, was the first deep, modernised lock, worked by a keeper pressing buttons in a high cabin on the lockside. A young man came out to have all the details and relieve us of

Below lock 4 Czyżkówo

22,72 Złotys for the two boats for two locks. We hadn’t got the right change, we were 5 grosny short - he said forget the grosny - 22 Złotys was OK. An old chap accompanied him who was keen to know where we’d come from and where we were going. We’d moored as usual on the right hand side of the chamber where two paddles, counterbalanced with huge weights in an open tube, let water out into two economiser side pounds before the gate paddles in the bottom end mitre gates let out the remaining water into the short pound below. We descended 7.8m, fast, with recessed bollards set into the lock wall to hang the centre rope on. Just one

Below lock 3 Okole

kilometre to the next lock, No 3 Okole, where an elderly couple were out on the lockside to welcome us and call us over on to the left hand side. All the ropes, etc, were set up to use the right hand wall, but never mind - we have to be adaptable! Mike asked the old lady if there was drinking water available, she misunderstood him and said we had to move the boat down two more bollards towards the tail end of the lock chamber - Mike thought this was to get to a tap in the control cabin - no it was something to do with the suction from the paddles, which were on the left wall this time. I'd just about managed to get Bill’s rope attached to our bows

Electricity works on the river Brda

when the old chap had pulled the plug and we were descending. Mike had got the centre rope which he left to me and went to help Bill sort out his stern rope. Then he was moaning at me about not controlling the ropes properly and the wind was blowing the boats off the lock wall, so he had to restart our engine and bring us back on to the wall so I could change the rope over on to the next bollard down! What a fiasco! The old couple had retreated into the lock cabin. Below the deep lock - we’d gone down a further 7.4m - we were on the river Brda, following Rosy into Bydgoszcz. The flowing water was clear - we could see sandbanks below the surface! Two bridges

Rail bridges - very battered wooden baulks

very close together caused some consternation when Bill went through the middle arch of the old (and surrounded by very battered wooden baulks) three-arched, high, brick railway bridge. Too late to change our minds we spotted the navigation sign way up above us attached to the railings on the more modern road bridge, indicating we should have been over on the left. Fortunately there were two navigation arches – we’d gone through the one for uphill traffic, luckily there was none around! (There had been no sign of any “change over to the left bank” sign either!) Below the railway bridge we could see more sandbanks on a big left

Double railway bridge

hand bend as we went past a park full of people enjoying what must be a holiday. There was a fun run going on, lots of people in shorts with numbers on their vests were racing towards us along the path on the left hand bank. People in the park waved cheerily and there were lots of young people in rowing skiffs heading upriver being guided and coached by the usual guys in small speedboats with a megaphone. A red, white and blue painted tug coming towards us, stopped by a landing near the park just before the next bridge. It was a trip boat or water taxi, unloading passengers and picking up more. We carried on downriver into lock 2,

Bydgoszcz, where a pleasant young man came to take details and requested more cash. Mike asked if he had drinking water and we were glad to find he said yes, swop over to the left side of the lock again. We were down to half a tank. Our yellow hose and one of Bill’s short green ones did the trick and the tank was soon full. Meanwhile Mike went in the cabin to pay up –the guy got his sums wrong and tried to charge us for two locks, his and the one we’d just come down – we’d already paid for that one! We hadn’t got enough change still – Mike paid him 10 Złotys plus all the change we’d got - another 45 grosny - instead of the 11,36 Złotys that it should have cost us. I spotted some graffitti on the wall of

The water taxi in Bydgoszcz

the building behind the lock cabin, which was all smartly painted yellow, where someone had scrawled the word “Druid” - I took a photo (for our old friend JD) of Mike on the top steps of the lock cabin stairs with JD’s boat’s name written on the wall behind him! The trip boat arrived and came into the lock behind us just as I handed the hose over to Bill to refill Rosy’s water tank. A mere ten minutes later we were descending another 3.5m. The phone rang as the keeper started letting the water out - Mike had to hang on to the lock ladder with a boat shaft in one hand and ‘phone in the other, as the wind threatened to force the boats off the wall again. As soon as the lock was empty and Bill had moved out, the trip

Church and old granaries in Bydgoszcz

boat roared off to drop passengers at a landing in the city centre and overtook us again ten minutes later as we were passing a restaurant boat, called Melody, a converted 80m former commercial boat. There was a kid’s party going on on the right bank with loud pop music and a bouncy castle. More rowers were coming upriver, dodging the trip boat as it overtook us. I made lunch which we ate on the stern. We gauged that the Brda was gently flowing at around 1.5 kph. Out of the city centre and into a series of lakes. There were fishermen everywhere and posts either side of the channel

Modern building on banks of Brda

through the lakes. Judging by the ducks standing on the bottom several metres from the edges the lake was pretty shallow by the banks. Among the trees surrounding the lakes old factories were visible, with ancient brick chimneys extended upwards with concrete tubes, a hotch-potch of buildings and houses. We passed an old wharf with cranes and a few old boats still moored there and evidence of the days of log rafting remained where loads of logs had been strung together with thinner poles atop them and grouped together. Several dozens of these were located along the edges of a couple of small lakes next to a big woodyard where

Church on banks of Brda river

huge piles of timber were being kept damp by rotating sprinklers. There were lots of ancient dolphins for long-gone boats to tie to, now occupied by birds - cormorants, terns and gulls. A chorus of three gulls, sitting facing each other on top of three posts close very together, made us smile - they almost seemed to be singing in close harmony as the squawking changed note and key! Under a railway bridge we turned sharp left to face an enormous regatta site. The whole of the lake seemed to be occupied by strings of small yellow marker buoys for rowing lanes. At first we couldn’t make out which way to get around it, we couldn’t see any signs or

Statue of high wire artiste over the river Brda in Bydgoszcz

channel markers. Then, through binoculars, we spotted a small green cone on top of one of the starting gates for the racing course, way over on the far right hand bank. We didn’t think there was enough space between that and the bank until we got closer and could see there was a sizeable channel which lead to the lock. On the left bank an old commercial boat, about 100m long, was moored bows to the bank and beyond it was a small sailing club where a handful of little dinghies were enjoying the light breeze. By the lock there were dolphins linked by gangways with bank access which was occupied by a lone commercial, an 80m empty called

More statues in Bydgoszcz

Transbode-6 from Wrocław. Beyond it there was also mooring space on the left where another length of linked dolphins with a gangway on top of them, fronted with horizontal piling, lead to the lockside. We moored there and Rosy came alongside. Mike and Bill went to investigate. Bill carried Fanny as the gangways were made of open metal grids, which the dog hated walking on as it hurt her feet.  There was no one at the lock except a security guard, who told them that the lock opened at seven in a morning. Mike took the echo sounder out of its tube as he thought it was losing sensitivity and suspected the end of the transducer would be covered with molluscs. Bill sorted out a length of 22mm dia copper tube for him and soldered a fitting on to it to extend it with a piece of 28mm pipe with a copper to compression converter and a polypropylene nut glued in with araldite to make an extractor to pull the echo sounder transducer out of its tube, as it had become stuck and couldn’t be pulled out with the co-ax.

Log rafts on river Brda close to junction with  river Wisla (Vistula)

Bill (remember he is a diver) had baulked at the idea of freeing it by pushing from underneath! Although he did offer to lend Mike his diving mask - who quickly retorted - thanks, Bill, but it won’t fit me! Meanwhile a very drunken man staggered down the path towards the commercial moored behind us. He had two plastic bags with vodka bottles in each of them and the bottom fell out of one as he was passing our boats. He stopped to retrieve the bottle, which had fallen in the grass, and keeled over. He sat there for a while wondering which way was up and how to get there! Mike hid in the cabin - coward! A little later the skipper from the boat came to chat. Mike and Bill asked where they could obtain cheap diesel and he said look no further - he could sell them some of his. We moved the boats to moor alongside the battered old barge and he filled our containers from his tank. Mike was surprised to find it was white diesel, not red. He charged us 2,50 Złotys a litre (€0,62.5) and we each had 80 litres before he said no more. He’d just been showing Mike an advert in the paper for the local naughty ladies – he pointed to one advert and made a ‘phone call, got changed and then set off into town on the back of his friend’s motorcycle - we guessed where the profits from his diesel selling were going to be spent. We moved the boats back to the mooring and Mike continued trying to sort out the echo sounder which he had cleaned (it had been covered with mussels) but wouldn’t register any depth. He hung it overboard while I watched the display in the engine room and it showed a depth of 4m, but the display kept going off and wouldn’t register anything when he put the transducer back in its tube. Eventually he gave up and said it must be the grotty state of the bottom of the river under the boat causing the lack of return signal. Transducers either work or they don’t. I made a chicken five spice stir fry for dinner. Later we watched the European weather forecast on Sky News and saw a huge belt of heavy rain forecast for northern Poland and Germany for the next day. Mike told Bill he thought it would be a good idea if we stayed put until the bad weather cleared up. We couldn’t get any information from the barge skipper about moorings down the river Wisla towards Gdansk and we knew it would take us at least eleven hours to get to the Nogat where we knew there was a mooring below the lock. The mighty Vistula is a very difficult navigation at the best of times, so it would be advisable not to go if it’s pouring with rain as good visibility for chasing the channel markers is vital on a river full of shifting sandbanks. 

Monday 2nd May 2005 Nakło Zachód to Jnc Notec canal. 19.4km 3 locks

Naklo nad Notecia town form the river

Up at seven. 5.9º C overnight sunny. The lock keeper at lock 9, Nakło Zachód, was dressed in his best uniform when we entered his lock at 8.00 a.m. Mike paid him for five locks and we rose 2.8m. Mike told him we would be pausing for shopping in Nakło, but he didn’t want to know. We moved on into the town and found a mooring at the waterways yard, next to a red painted inspection boat with our bows on the bottom by the bank. A very helpful man came out to take a rope, etc. He even found us a gangplank! OK to stay a couple of hours while we go shopping? Tak! Yes. It was 9.30 a.m. In front of our boat was a Bison tug boat and an accommodation

Fuzzy photo - moored in waterways yard
at Naklo to go shopping

boat for the dredging gang who were working a couple of hundred metres further upstream. Mike liberated our old trolley off the boat roof and gave Bill a hand to get his bike off, I found our rucksacks and we all went into Nakło. Bill went off on his bike to find an Internet café (which was by the Post Office) and we went to post some letters. We went the wrong way to start off with, turning left when we reached the town. I asked

Junc Notec (right) and Bydgoski kanal (left)
Cheating as this pic is from on the way back
Rosy is going downstream

a young man where the Post Office was, using my phrase book - which he read - then told us it was back the way we’d come, fourth turning on the left. We found it and queued to post our letters. It cost 9,50 Złotys to send two envelopes (about £1.60 which was very expensive). Back into the town for groceries, which we bought from a very small and very crowded supermarket. The choice was extremely limited. Most of the vegetables on offer were looking sad, there was no lettuce and the

Josefinki lock 7

spuds were tiny and shrivelled, but the tomatoes, mushrooms, bananas and broccoli were not too bad so we bought some. We added some cartons of longlife skimmed milk and a big bottle of pop, some pasta sauce and a jar of jam to the trolley and I also bought some Polish stuff, smetana (like cream) kroketi (stuffed pancakes) pierogi (meat stuffed ravioli) and a big pack of dumplings as we hadn’t found any decent spuds. Mike asked for some cheese at the deli

counter and got some, no idea what it was. Bread looked OK and I found some toasting bread too. A scruffy bloke who was stood behind us in the queue really stank very bad as if he’d poohed his pants. Spent 82 Złotys (approx £13.50). Loaded it all into two rucksacks, which Mike strapped on the trolley and wheeled it back the 700m to the boat. It was 11.15 a.m. when we got back. Bill returned about ten minutes after us, having spent two Złotys (33p) for an hour in a crowded internet café, but he had also bought very little from an equally rough Netto supermarket. We set off after Bill had eaten his lunch at 12.10 p.m. A bald man wearing a vest, shorts and wellies worked lock 8, Nakło Wschód (east), for us while two women sat on the 

Rubbish minicam pic - moored with plank to bank
Bydgoski kanal summit

lock edge chatting and laughing while the lock filled. His two small dogs yapped at Fanny. We rose 2m on to the kanał Bydgoski. Not far to the last lock before the summit, lock No 7, Jósefinki, where there were good quays both above and below the lock. Two men worked the lock and we rose 2m in the chamber. Noting that there was no lock house by the lock and wondering how we should get a keeper to work the lock when we return, we set off on the summit level which was on a low embankment to start off with, a couple of metres above the surrounding countryside. It was 1.00 p.m and we had 16 kms, almost all of it dead straight, before the first downhill lock. We told the keepers as we left that we would go into Bydgoszcz the next day - jutro - 

Looking down Notecki kanal at jnc with Bydgoski kanal

tomorrow. Six locks left to go down to the Wisła. A boat was coming towards us, which we thought at first look through binoculars was a loaded boat, but when it got closer we could see it was a crane boat being pushed by a small tug. The left bank was covered with silver birch woods, while on the right there were open fields leading to low hills. We concluded that the population must be on holiday when the banks were lined with fishermen and there were lots of small kids playing. I made some lunch and a cuppa. Mike discovered he’d got a job to do when we stopped. The rudder was loose, the welds holding the swan’s neck to the rudder post must have broken. We’d have to get the welder out. Bill had got a broken pulley for his alternator which needed welding too. We moored on the left bank, just before the junction where the Notec canal goes off to the right. Bill had explored the right bank and had ground to a stop some way from the edge. The left bank was shallow and we grounded on a hard sandy, gravelly bottom. It’ll have to do, so we slung the plank out and Mike banged four stakes in the edge of a grassy field. He set to work welding Bill’s pulley first. It had fallen apart, cracked off its boss, so he welded it on. Then he ground off the old welds on our rudder and re-welded that. Three young lads came and made a nuisance of themselves, running up the gangplank on to the back deck and pulling on the mooring ropes while Mike was grinding the weld. I brought the camera out to try and stop that. The ringleader pulled his coat over his head and ran away. Then he came back and lifted both ropes off the two mooring pins by our bows. Luckily there was no flow (as we were on a canal) and the boat was sitting on the bottom anyway. Bill went after them, but they ran away down to the footbridge over the canal beyond the junction. Not being able to talk to them was a strong disadvantage so we decided we’d be better off on the other bank. We fetched all the ropes in and the plank, moved over to the right bank under the trees and Bill put ropes around the trees. It would be a long walk round for them to reach us, as the first lock on the Notec canal was about a kilometre away and the last bridge across was a long, long way back up the Bydgoszcz canal. We had no more trouble with them. I made a Polish dinner, dumplings, stuffed pancakes and pierogi with broccoli - and some leftover curry sauce. Different and very tasty.

Sunday 1st May 2005 Nakło Zachód.

Holiday. Canal closed. Woken at 1.30 a.m. by a loud scrabbling noise, which seemed to be underwater? When Mike went outside to investigate he found a cat frantically trying to get out of the water between the two boats. He came back inside and found his motorcycling gloves, just in case it was a feral cat and not used to being handled by people. I got up when he brought it inside. It was icy cold, drenched and filthy. We rubbed it dry using two towels 

Rubbish photo from minicam

out of the dirty washing bag and it was still trying to curl up into a frozen dithering ball - but purring. After half an hour of rubbing it to dry its fur and warm it up, I stopped and made us some hot chocolate, then we went back to bed leaving it still shivering, wrapped in a towel on the settee. It was still there when Mike got up. I was quite surprised it hadn’t died in the night. Mike gave it a bit of corned beef which it tried to eat, but just sat there, not moving. Not surprising really if it was only used to eating live mice and had probably never seen a saucer of milk before. Mike said it was drooling, when I looked it had still got the piece of corned beef in its mouth. I risked getting my finger bitten and prised it out from between its teeth. It livened up a bit then. Mike got ready to go on a voyage of exploration on the fizzer - to look at moorings and shops in Nakło and moorings in Bydgoszcz. He opened the side doors and I picked the cat up to put it out on the bank. It suddenly

Bydgoszcz town from the river.

showed great interest in getting out, using my hand as a launch pad and leaving me with a great scratch across my thumb from its back feet claws. Thanks cat! It went half way up the bank, stopped, turned and stared, then ran off in the direction of the little house alongside the lock. Perishing farm cat! It had been 7.5º C overnight. The day was sunny and warm until lunchtime, when it started raining, we had a few heavy showers and then the sunshine returned. I did the chores while Mike was away on the moped. Plus I cooked some buns for lunch and made some gooey chocolate brownies while the oven was hot. Around lunchtime the rain started pouring down. Mike sent a text from the river bridge in Bydgoszcz at 2.10 p.m. He said the Wisła was not flowing as fast as the Oder had been and it had just started to rain. He was back at 3.30 p.m. just as Bill started Rosy’s engine to do some battery recharging for an hour or so. I made him some soup for his lunch. He said all the shops were open and not because it was a holiday, it looks like Polish shops open Sundays anyway.

Saturday 30th April 2005 Krostkowo to below lk 9 Nakło Zachód KP43. 24.7kms 1 lock

Marsh harrier - Wikimedia photo by Boldings

Colder overnight 3.8º C, a warmer sunny day. Light breeze. Coats off! Set off at 8.25 a.m. after pulling the pins and getting the plank back on board. Mike had to use a pair of Stilsons to free the pin he’d banged into an old tree stump. There were lots of weekend fishermen by the 194 road bridge near Osiek N. Notecią and a wooden landing stage by the bridge with mooring posts! Remember that for on the way back! A little further on we saw a male

A family of wild boar like the ones we saw
Wikimedia photo by Steve Hillebrand

hen harrier, his silver back gleaming in the sunshine as he flew low over the reeds. Shortly after a loud splash caused us to look to the left bank where we were amazed to see a large family of wild boar galloping down the bank and crossing a field drain before running up the other bank and scooting along the edge of the meadow and into the tall dead reeds. There were four adults and upwards of fifteen striped piglets. Wonderful! The little ones short legs were going hell for leather trying to keep up with

Gromadno lock - Wikimedia photo by Przemyslaw Jahr

their parents. A female hen harrier, all rusty brown, was gliding over the rough ground on our right. Two pairs of buzzards were soaring higher and higher, catching the thermals and being attacked by a pair of unidentified smaller birds (crow sized). The flow on the river had reduced to about 1 kph. We arrived at lock 10, Gromadno, at 11.00 a.m. A man on the bank spoke to us in English. He was working in Doncaster as a

Survey boat above Gromadno

security guard and was in Poland for a couple of weeks on holiday. Two men worked the lock, one of them took the details of the boat but no money. The lock was a deeper one at 1.7m rise. When the lock was full the top end gate lowered to the bed of the canal all by itself. The men told us there was a boat coming downriver to watch out for. Bill lead the way out of the lock and Mike gave him a call on VHF radio to tell him to look out for the boat, which we expected to be a

Survey boat passing Rosy

commercial. We passed Rosy and just a few hundred metres further on a survey boat (possibly an old passenger boat) came round the bend towards us. I took ‘photos of it as it went past. Cooked some part baked bread buns in the oven and made some biscuits while the oven was hot. Lunch. The buns were nice and crusty. A pheasant flew right over the boat from one side of

A beaver feast

the river to the meadow on the other, skimming over the roof. I had just remarked that there didn’t seem to be much evidence of beaver attacks on the mature elm trees that had been planted along that stretch of river, when we saw some old tree stumps, long ago chewed away and then some branches in the river with recently gnawed off bark. We arrived at lock 9, Nakło Zachód at 1.45 p.m.  There was no one about so we sat in the chamber and waited. A woman with a couple of kids came and looked over the edge of the deep lock and went away again. We sat chatting for a while and then I went inside to get a few jobs done. Mike went up the ladder and couldn’t see anyone, so he came back on the boat and lay on the sidebed and snored. At 3.00 p.m. the noise of something clattering on the lockside woke him and we went to see if a lock keeper had arrived. Nope. We decided to back the boats out and moor next to a very convenient concrete quay. As we were tying up and packing stuff away two men came to chat in Polish and German. One told us that the lock house was on the far side of the weirstream, but the lock was closed Sunday as it was a holiday. There were shops in Nakło about 500m from a hafen, he said. We will go there on Monday. Great, looks like we’re here until Monday then.

Friday 29th April 2005 KP 102 nr Ujscie to nr Krostkowo KP 34.5kms 1 lock

River Notec Wolsko hills

Not as cold as expected overnight at 4.8ºC. Sunny day with white strands of wispy clouds. Breeze still cold. Got ready to set off for 8.00 a.m. It was 8.35 a.m. by the time we’d recovered the ropes, stakes and plank. Followed Rosy upriver. The water was brown and peaty, but at least there was less flow to contend with. We passed two red deer grazing not far away on the right hand bank, shortly after a fox went galloping across the same meadow. Several storks were pacing the left hand meadow, searching for frogs. The river

Needle weir Krostkowo lock  R. Notec

wound through wide meadows, fringed with the remains of last year’s reeds, the villages in the valley were set well back from the water on distant hills. There were lots of friendly Friday afternoon fishermen out along the edges of the meadow on the left hand bank as we passed by Dworzakow, perched high on the hill a couple of kilometres away to our left. Mike suddenly spotted a lock marked on the map that he hadn’t spotted before! We thought we had no locks to do today! Never mind. When we arrived at 3.00 p.m. the lock, No 11 Krostkowo, was

Below Krostkowo lock

running water with all four paddles up. The needle weir alongside also had some stumps pulled to let water through. Two teenaged girls came out to work the lock for us. They must have forgotten how to do it, as they wound the top end paddles down and started winding the bottom ones closed too before opening the gate to let us in! The older of the two had the notebook and wanted all the details. We have to pay for the next three locks further on. Mike wanted to know if the locks were closed on Sunday. Yes because it is May Day. OK.

In the sloping sided chamber of Krostkwo lock

The lock was turf sided and shallow. Concrete stumps with horizontal bars between them were there for boats to attach to and keep them off the rocks along the grassy edges. Bill got tired of waiting while all the chatting in Polish was going on and went to wind a paddle. They didn’t let him, the younger girl wound both and the gate when the lock was full. Mike took a couple of photos, then we steamed off to find a mooring place for the night. It was 3.30 p.m. as we left the lock. By 4 p.m. we’d found an

Leaving Krostkowo lock

old tree stump to tie the bows to and water deep enough to be almost, but not quite - due to roots and reeds - alongside the bank. Bill brought Rosy alongside and tied up. Mike went to investigate why the bolts had broken again on the air cleaner. I put nets in the doors to keep wandering bees out of the cabin (they’d been a nuisance all day). Mike replaced the air cleaner by hanging it on cords. To our great surprise an empty commercial from Wrocław went past, nice and slowly. That was only the second working boat we’d seen moving since leaving Germany. We didn’t bother lighting the fire as the evening was quite warm until the temperature took a dive later in the evening – so we put the two duvets on the bed instead.

Thursday 28th April 2005 KP137 Lipica to KP 102 nr Ujscie 24.2kms 3 locks

Romanowo lock

Damp and grey. A mild 7.9º C overnight. Brief sunny spells. Drizzle. Up at 7 a.m. to be away again at 8 a.m. We finally unhitched from the muddy, peaty bank at 8.30 a.m. At lock 14, Romanowo an elderly and inquisitive woman in an apron came to chat (in Polish and German)  accompanied by several older men and a younger one who worked the lock and took all the details but no money. Pay for three locks at the next one.  I asked if we could get water and they said yes, from the house. We’d got plenty of hoses between us and Mike found an iron reducer to

Ferry at Walkowice

connect up to the tap. We both filled up our tanks. They didn’t want any money for the water, but I found a bottle of wine out to give to them, which we didn’t take no for. Dziękuję (pronounced djyen’kooyeh) thank you! They beamed. When were we coming back – a couple of months? About that. Mike asked if they could put our rubbish in their bin, they did. We’d seen no bins anywhere. It was 10.30 a.m. when we set off. Mike had put the pins in to run the Markon and do some washing now we’d got water. I got Bill’s stuff and filled the washer up and did the

Paddle gear at Walkowice lock

first load as we ran on to the next lock, No 13 Walkowice. Again several men came over to chat, mainly in German, and a lady wearing a warm woolly hat came to fill in the paperwork and relieved Bill of 34,08 Złotys for the group of three locks. A little brown long haired Jack Russell followed the keeper about and Fanny wanted to play, but Bill wouldn’t let her get off the boat. Off to the next lock. I swopped washer loads and put five pairs of jeans in to wash. Made a cuppa as we ran on to lock 12, Nowe, where a quiet old man worked the lock

Lock house at Walkowice

for us. Put the washer on again to finish off the jeans and made some lunch. I’d finished the last of my German soft brown bread and was on to the bread I’d bought in Dresdenko, which was a bit hard. The next reach was a long one, it was 43 kms to the next lock. The water speed increased until we got to Ujscie where the river Gwda joined the Notec. After we’d passed through the multiple channels in Ujscie the rate of flow decreased. Once we cleared the town we started to look for a mooring place. There were low hills all long the river on the

Junction of the Gwda with the Notec

right bank, which gradually opened up into a wide flood plain again. We moored at 3.45 p.m. alongside a reed bed with low flying clouds dropping a fine drizzle. It reminded both of us of the summit of the Leeds and Liverpool canal. Not a house or living thing in sight.

Village of Ujscie