At first light this morning these guys turned up and started dropping pontoons into the water in front
of Rusty. It's a new terrace for one of the house boats round the corner.

Some time later they came back and dropped in another with outboard attached. They bolted that on the front of the line and started pulling the starter cord. And kept on pulling it as they drifted towards the boats behind us. By the time the cord broke they were just a few feet away.

But they were calm. They just walked it round and under the foot bridge with a nicely judged shove every now and then. Life is so much easier without tides.

We spent 9 hours on trains yesterday, travelling to Belgium and back, as Nick had a job interview. Plus bus time - we seem to be cursed with cancelled buses on job interviews.

I wandered around Leuven, which is the university town of Belgium, roughly on a par with Oxford, and similarly endowed with wonderful architecture and art work.

Lovely place, interesting job, but they may not be able to take a contractor, so everyone keep their fingers crossed.

It is still deeply embedded in our world view that if you’re travelling by train you aren’t leaving the country. We nearly forgot our passports.

There is a small shop by the harbour, De Havenwinkel, which also provides showers and does laundry, a godsend for those of us living on small(ish) boats. The people there are always very friendly and helpful, and we are gradually learning more about each other.

Today I discovered that they have a web site with thousands of water sport links from all over the world - www.nauticfriend.com

Nick’s cousin William and his wife Sandra flew over for a few days. They stayed at the hotel round the corner, De Magneet, with a view of canal and heron.

It was good to see them. They visited the museums and market, and walked round the sights. We had lots of interesting conversations, put the world to rights, and explored a few more bars and eetcafes.

One was a jazz and blues bar, where we were introduced to a Dutch jazz trumpeter, Eric Vloeimans. It turned out he was playing at a hall just around the corner at the time. We thought the bar was strangely empty for a Saturday night!

Another cold snap, and we've been eking out our diesel till the fuel berth opens again. Today we filled up, and to celebrate we've turned the heating up high!


Hoorn from the fuel berth

We've also been eking out the electricity, as the coin machine for the blue wedge has been blocked off. Anything with a slot gets closed for New Year, as the kids tend to put fire crackers in them. It's very disconcerting seeing the post boxes blocked up.