This picture shows one of the many rearranging of barges made during the weekend; this was one of the less chaotic as Mooi Aak and Shell V manoeuvre to start the man overboard demonstrations.
This is Pete’s impression of the organised chaos that was the berthing plan during the barge handling competition. I think Waterdog occupied 5 different berths while keeping out of the way of the other competitors and all the shuffling of barges that that entailed. During cruising with Pater and Tracy we often drew up our thoughts for the day on this white board for the evening debriefing session.
This year we came second in this competition and so had to hand the trophy over to Shell V. The conditions had been very windy for the event and I used the bow thruster once to keep in control for the reversing along the course. We had kept the trophy for 2 years since Paris in 2009 so were very happy to pass it along.
Here are Lorna and Tilly admiring the barge gathering from the road above the moorings.
The last night meal was a self catered event on our quayside, a lot of extra work for some members of the crews such as Lorna who did a great chicken curry which went down well, together with beer, wine and champagne. Here are the crew from Waterdog for the weekend. We normally cruise with just Lorna and me but we had our two best friends over from England (Pete and Tracy) plus a couple assigned to us by the rally organisers who had come by train and were staying in a hotel (John and Linda). The extra couple on this end (Steve and Lynda) are building a barge in England with the dream of cruising Europe in years to come.