Today was a day for open-water cruising, something we don't often do in Saskia, not least because we don't much like waves. The day started punctually, as the building site got going at 7 a.m., so we were off soon after 8. It was a flat calm, with the sun starting to burn the mist off the water. A few boats about to begin with, but the numbers built up as the morning went on. The waterway was wide, some miles in places, but the channel was wide too and well marked. There was only one choke point, a lock and lifting bridge for boats with masts up. Here we are queuing to go in: I counted 15 boats coming out, and we were 10 going in. After all the kerfuffle and delay, we dropped all of 30 centimetres, not quite a foot! Hardly seemed worth it.
Most of the boats in the lock with us powered off ahead of us. We chugged along at our sedate 10 kph, with Flevoland as ever on the right:
Towards midday the breeze was beginning to fill in and there were increasing numbers of sailing boats – all shapes and sizes, sailed by young and old:
We found a rather special little harbour on a island for lunch: plenty of others had found it too. But there was room to dock. By this time, families were splashing around in the water and enjoying the first really summery day we've had:
More sailors as we set off after lunch:
We turned in to the mouth of the River Vecht at Muiden, our destination for the day, passing this rather sad (or romantic) wreck, with the castle in the background:
Here's the castle more prominently:
The yacht club that refused to provide a space for Ethan and Leslie's hire boat last year was more welcoming this time and gave us a good berth. The harbour-master even hoisted a red ensign to celebrate our arrival:
We plan to visit the castle tomorrow morning when it opens at 10, do some shopping and then head off. We're now covering ground we explored last year, and hope to make it to the market at Weesp by lunchtime. It's only a few kilometres upstream.We'll be heading in the general direction of Utrecht, but not sure how far we'll get.
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