Kortgene to Willemstad Sint Annaland
8th June
We woke early and after a morning cuppa, went and showered and dressed ready to face the day. First job – shopping. At least we knew where we were going. Once back we realised that the wind had increased – yet again, so we got ourselves organised and after a few tense minutes getting out of the box mooring, we were off. Original destination – Willemstad. We motored for some while until we reached Zandkreeksluis, which is a lock to get us into the Oosterschelde, where our depth would increase to 49 metres. We queued up with half a dozen other boats and didn’t have to wait long before the gates opened and we got the green light to enter. We tied up nicely and waited for the water to go down. There seemed to be a problem, but after a short while, things got sorted and the gates opened and off we went. We are now back in tidal waters so need to be aware of tidal streams.
Because of the wind direction, we had to motor a bit longer. However, once we turned the next bend, we were able to put up a small amount of sail and move along quite nicely at around 6 knots. The wind had moved to a NE direction and was now a Force 6 most of the time. We both agreed that it was going to be hard going to make it to Willemstad with the wind still increasing, and the boat beating against the wind, so we decided that plan B – Sint Annaland would be our next port of call.
We had visited here on several occasions and found it to be a very pleasant marina. We had our charts out and then began counting the buoys off until we had to make the turn for the marina. Again we were unable to call in by VHF to the harbourmaster, so we moored up on the visitors’ hammerhead pontoon and called in on their radio. No answer, so we walked up to the office and waited with others for his return. Eventually we got our berth location and on our way back to the boat, we checked it out. We slipped our lines and got our ropes and fenders organised for mooring on our berth. All was looking good. Carole had stepped on to the pontoon and secured the spring line nicely, but just at the wrong time a huge gust of wind took the boat away from the pontoon and Chris had to throw his stern line to Carole and fend off of the boat next to us. Luckily the occupants of said boat jumped to assist and within a few minutes, we were safely tied up with only a rubber mark on our side to show for our trouble.
A short time later, Chris didn’t feel quite so bad when another boat came in and got into more difficulty with four men on board and more onshore assisting. It doesn’t seem to matter how experienced you are or how many of you are onboard, you can still have trouble mooring up in bad weather.
We took a walk up on the wall to see what it was like outside of the harbour and weren’t surprised to see very troubled water with lots of foam. There was a small yacht anchored up outside. We don’t think he will have a very peaceful night.
We cooked a nice tasty supper and Chris washed up. Chris then set about adjusting lines and fenders to eliminate any unnecessary noise for when we settled down for the night.
As for tomorrow – we shall have to wait and see what the weather does.
9th June
We were rudely awoken just after 7 am by the sound and reverberation of a piling hammer coming from a construction site outside of the marina. As there was no chance of getting back off to sleep, we reluctantly emerged for a cuppa, showers and breakfast. It was no surprise that the wind was still blowing strong, so we headed off to the harbour master’s office and paid for another night’s stay.
We took a walk around the town, then a further walk round the large supermarket, well named “Jumbo” and got some shopping to take back to the boat. We are still finding it quite interesting to shop here as many of the products on sale are not found at home, so we are buying some different things to try.
Chris got involved with some work matters early afternoon, so Carole did some cleaning below decks and made everything look and smell sweeter.
Not much to do this evening, so we watched a couple of ‘Have I Got News For You’ s, on the iPad, which Chris had downloaded. We then wrapped up well and took a stroll before turning in for the night.