Barging on ANJA

We have successfully negotiated the Upper Rhine River from Niffer to Strasbourg. We went approximately half way and stopped about 6km down the Canal de Colmar, which comes off the Rhine River. We spent two nights at the small village of Kunheim and caught a taxi and bus return to the historic and exceedingly pretty town of Colmar. The designer (Bertholdi) of the Statue of Liberty was born here and the town has a strong German influence as it has been German a number of times in history and was also annexed by Germany during the war.

We spent hours in the famous Unterlinden museum which was excellent. We also walked around and saw many other notable sites. The day was a little marred by rain, but we survived quite well.

The Rhine went surprisingly well. There were plenty of commercial vessels, but they all behaved very predictably and exactly as expected. The lock keepers were good and by radioing ahead, they took note of our presence and speeded us through much more than we expected and had been led to believe by various English bargees. Perhaps they like Aussies more? As the Rhine River is the border between Germany and France, we crossed the border into Germany many times on the trip.

An American barge owner (Jerry) had warned us that he got caught in a vicious whirlpool where the river divides between the hydroelectric station and the locks (all locks are huge with a pair of locks side by side. Both are 185metres long with a fall of about 15metres and width 22metres and 11 metres). Jerry was thrown across his wheelhouse as his large boat (bigger than ours) got sucked into the whirlpool. Fortunately, he was not injured.

So, we were very careful of the whirlpools. At one stage we were behind a largish passenger ship carrying about 150 passengers. They went too close to the danger zone and next thing, were spun sideways and then in a complete circle! Fortunately, they seemed to get out of it skilfully. Indeed, given these people are so professional, we wonder if the skipper deliberately steered into the whirlpool as a bit of extra excitement for the passengers? Guess we will not find out.

When we got to Strasbourg, we easily found a good spot to tie up and will spend a few days exploring. We had been nervous because another bargee told us it was extremely difficult to find anywhere to stop, but this appears to be inaccurate.

Pictures show:

Montbeliard (2)

Strasbourg container port

Pusher barge on the Rhine

Hydro Electric Statiuon (they are every 15km and supply 20% of France's electricity

Colmar

Little Venice (Colmar)

Unterlinden

Famous Issenheim Retable (Colmar)

Rhine River (2)

Charlie keeps us against the lock

Best Regards,