Friday 13th May 2016 Anhée to Namur. 21.1kms 4 locks.

Illuminated rocks at Houx (night before!)

10.1° C Sunny after a wet night, warm but with a chilly (but not cold) north wind. Away downriver a bit later than usual at 10.20am as we hadn’t got far to go. A Dutch cruiser went upriver before we set off and we met a Swiss one under the first railway bridge. The valley widened out where the town of Anhée had been built on the left bank with low wooded hills beyond it and cliffs on the right. 5kms to our first lock. Just before we arrived at the lock a car stopped on the road

Sharing Riviere lock with 80m loaded boat Hellboy

alongside the river and its occupants got out to wave and shout “nice to see a red duster here!” That was nice of them. Into lock 6 Hun after a little Luxemotor and a converted péniche cleared the lock. There was a climber on the cliff face to our right as we entered the lock. The keeper emptied it slowly. There was quite a queue waiting below, three cruisers milling around in the weirstream and another DB. An 80m boat called Hellboy from Namur was at the first quay

Ship-shaped swimming pool, undergoing renovation,
above Taifer lock

downriver. His hold was almost filled with piles of soil which had been loaded down a chute from tipper lorries. 4.8kms to the next lock. Passing through Rouillon there were some really beautifully designed houses along the banks. I particularly like one that looked like a Swiss chalet and another that resembled a castle with round towers and conical roofs. Mike took pictures of the TV antenna on the hill at Le Bois Laiterie. He called the keeper as we arrived at lock 7 Rivière, because the lock was full but had a red light on. The keeper

Elevated road near Taifer

didn’t reply on the radio, but came down out of his cabin to talk to us. He said there was a commercial coming. OK, we said we’d wait and tied to the quay. When Hellboy arrived, now fully loaded, the skipper said follow me – we asked if the lock was long enough and he said he was only 80m! Don’t know how long the Meuse locks are down here, maybe 110m. It wasn’t, there was only just enough room behind the big boat. Looked in the book later – it was 98m, we thought it was a

Polar bears (why?) on the weir at La Plante

tight squeeze. The keeper emptied the lock very slowly and we dropped down 2m and then the big boat left slowly too. Hung on to our ropes until he had practically cleared the chamber before we followed him out.  He was soon out of sight around the island at Lustin. Another cruiser went past heading upriver. Two cruisers had stopped by wooden stagings at Petite Hulle where a restaurant was doing a good trade, lots of people sitting outside in the sunshine eating. Two converted houseboat péniches were moored on the bend at Boreuville. Passing the big quarry on the

Moored by the Casino (gambling not supermarket). Namur

right at Lustin we could see in the far distance that Hellboy was already descending in lock 8 Taifer. Took a photo of the garden swimming pool shaped like a ship which was now surrounded with scaffolding (must be having a makeover) and two new blocks of flats were under construction behind it. A cruiser was coming up in Taifer so we threw a rope around a bollard on the quay to wait. We had some lunch. The cruiser was one from Senneffe Boat Club and Mike recognised the Capitain from the club just too late to shout greetings. Just us to go down, 2.2m drop. 6.3kms to the next lock, passing two large islands, Ile de Dave and Ile Vas-t’y-Frotte. Into lock 9 La Plante, (there was a burnt-out boat almost submerged tied to the bank above the lock), down another 1.5m and then we moored by the Casino. Numea, an empty péniche from Landelies was tied up there, plus another houseboat péniche and a UK-flagged tjalk. It was 3.25pm. The skipper off the tjalk came to chat, he was off into the Netherlands after passing a couple of winters at Toul. He said they charge for mooring on the quay, about 10 or 12€, plus tokens for water and electricity. Nobody came to collect any fees.