Back into Belgium
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Leaving Maastricht we headed back to Belgium starting with a quick stop in Liege. We were both really tired after exploring Maastricht so we did not bother with a trip into the town of Liege itself but moored up near a park that we had visited before, just the other side of an island, so in theory we would be sheltered from any wash from passing commercials.
(Apparently there used to be a school on the island which closed down many years ago, but when it closed they released all their pet rabbits into the wild, and so there are now lots of cute bunnies running around. The dogs absolutely loved it and were racing around sniffing everywhere like crazy, and although they did give chase a few time, luckily they didn’t catch any.)
In the morning we were woken with the boat rocking violently, and for some time it just got worse and worse. I got up and checked around, but there were no boats passing or any wind, so all I could think was that there was a bit of a swell going on in the river, maybe from activity further upstream. Plus, we are also a lot lighter now since most of our tanks are virtually empty which would impact our ballast, making us probably 3-4 tons lighter.
From Liege we continued along the river Maas, turned into the river Meuse and headed for Namur, turning off up the Sambre. We did look to see if we could spot anyone we knew moored up just beyond the bridge, but with no-one in sight we carried on to the next lock on the Sambre and stopped to wait for it to be prepared for us to enter. And who should come along but Keith, off Jeanne, who, along with Grainne and Andy (JoNi) were in fact moored at the bridge in Namur and we had missed them. We managed a brief chat before the lock was prepped and ready for us, and Keith was able to confirm what we already knew, that there was a lock further along that was closed for a few days for works.
Due to that lock closure we had to change our plans and had to stop at Floreffe for a few days.
