27 May 2017

Dalfsen to Roggebotsluis

- River Vecht, Zwaarte Water, Ijssel River, Randomeer

After a good peruse of the maps on Saturday morning, we decided to put in a long day and get all the way back to the Randomeer. For us a very long day, as it happened, 57 kms. 

"Let's get through the bridge early." Skip declared, so we did. However, just after we got through the lift bridge out of town, he spotted dozens of old tractors parked up next to the canal so we tied up again the first spot we could and wandered over to take a look. What gorgeous old beasties they were.

The Bulldogs were the growliest of all.

This weekend, as part of the town's festivities is an "Oldtimers" meet. Yesterday were the vintage cars and today were the tractors and classic cars. The tractors set off for a 19km route, the cars would do 59km. Getting all the old girls going took some doing, with a lot of cranking and hand-spinning of flywheels and backfiring. (I called it kabooms and bang bang bangs - Skip corrected me and said it was backfires).There was a fair amount of tinkering involved too. There were some lovely old cars too, but somehow the tractors had more personality.

Back aboard we carried on downriver and then took a left turn in into the Zwaarte Water for a couple of kms past Zwolle and through the big lock into the Ijssel River. Being Saturday, there was no barge traffic but there were loads of small boats out and about enjoying the hot weekend weather.

Cruising past Kampen.

 "Take a look at this!" Skip called excitedly, showing me the speedometer. We were doing 14kph which, considering our maximum cruising speed is 10kph, was pretty impressive. "We've got 4kph current with us for a change!".  Which was great, as the whole journey took less time than we had calculated. There were also no lift bridges or locks until we got to Roggebotsluis in the Randomeer where we had decided to stay the night. Speedy. 

We had decided to stop at the Roggebot Jachthaven for no better reason than it was  a) convenient and b) free as we had been given a voucher by our home marina Strandhorst for a free night's stay at one of the other Randomeer marinas. 

 Hard to believe we are in the midst of 180 trailer/caravans. The site is carefully planned so one doesn't feel overwhelmed by campers.

Although the river water is brown, it is perfectly clean and a GREAT way to cool down. Today's high temperature on the aft deck reached 32C.

Turned out a happy choice as it is a delightfully small marina with lots of trees and grassy banks. The place is half empty at the moment with only a couple of the remaining boats occupied so it is very quiet. There is also a huge campground with over 180 mobile homes and caravans, but the way it is laid out  between the meer and a lake, with trees, hedges and plantings between them it seems very private. But hot, hot, hot so we dug out the swimmers and hopped off the back of the boat to cool down. Heaven!