 |
| 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
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
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.
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
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.
 |
| Needle weir Krostkowo lock R. Notec |
 |
| Below Krostkowo lock |
 |
| In the sloping sided chamber of Krostkwo lock |
 |
| Leaving Krostkowo lock |
No comments:
Post a Comment