The Leie, the Schelde, and the Canal Bossuit-Kortrijk
August 8th to 17th 2024
It had been an interesting summer, cruising north from Saint-Jean-de-Losne in France to Diksmuide in northern Belgium in order to get our hull repainted, followed by a two week holiday by the sea at Nieuwpoort.
Now we had come about 75kms south to the small town of Deinze on the river Leie. Here we were to be ‘invaded’ by the first of two family groups – daughter Hollie, with husband Richard and granddaughter Sofia.
So a slight warning to those who read the blog to hear about boats and cruising; this post also includes a fair amount of us having fun at the places where we stop.
It was so good to have them with its on Calliope again.
For our first meal together we ate out at one of the many restaurants in Deinze – it was called tapas, but was far bigger than we expected.
Very tasty!
Although they were only with us for 3 nights, and had to be back in Deinze to pick up their car, we were determined to go for a mini-cruise. So next morning we set off down the Leie towards Gent in the hope that the little Sint-Martens-Latem mooring would be free.
The weather was perfect for the winding way through the country to Saint-Marten. In fact it was so lovely, and with such good crew, that I clean forgot to take any photos until we got there!
The river has so many twists and turns, some almost hairpin in shape, and runs past some of the most expensive and individual houses in Belgium, each with a big lawn down to the river. The gardens are adorned with sculptures, sophisticated seating areas, private pontoons and carefully cut shrubs, so always something to see.
Our arrival at Sint-Marten was a golden moment – a totally empty pontoon! We were soon moored up and able to enjoy our lunch.
After eating it was ‘walk-round-the-village’ time. Stu and I have been here before, a couple off times, and know that it is quite an arty place. Apparently it developed as a bit of a bohemian commune in the last century as artists escaped the smoke and noise of the city.
Now it is part of the rich folk’s commuter belt for Gent, retaining its artistic connections through beautiful (and expensive) art galleries.
We walked to see the well preserved old windmill, and then spent quite some time in one of the galleries. If you like modern style art it is well worth a visit.
By then we were all quite hot and thirsty so a stop at a shady table in the bar was inevitable, and enjoyable!
All too soon we were walking back down to Calliope …..
… who was just poking her bow into view!
Look closely!
The rest of the lazy afternoon and evening was spent aboard, feeding ducks, buying ice cream from a nearby van, and simply being together in this beautiful tranquil place.
Although there were moments when it was not quite so tranquil and the family fun took over!
Next morning we were greeted by another clear blue sky. We soon took down the front windscreen in preparation for the journey, and after breakfast we were ready to go.
The cruise back to Deinze was an opportunity for all trainee helms-people to get in some practise!
…. or relax on the fore-deck! This is our peaceful spot; sitting here almost the only sound is the swish of the water parting around the bow.
The perfect spot to watch the river unwind ahead.
We spotted the usual ducks and herons, the occasional moorhen or coot, and the very special jewelled flight of a kingfisher.
Not far out of Deinze is the one ‘obstacle’ of the trip – going through an old, unused, lock.
It is at Astene, towards the Eastern edge of Deinze.
Although the lock is now not in action, the lift bridge at one end still needs to be raised for boats of Calliope’s height.
It is still manually raised; a phone call to the ‘Bridgman’ brings him to his crank handle. You can just see him at work, in his red shirt.
We were back in Deinze in time for lunch aboard, and then a walk in the town’s interesting park – part playground, part arboretum, part menagerie.
There is such a mix of things to see and do. It was another quite hot day so we sought out the shade of the trees as much as possible.
Stu and I have been to the park a couple of times before and all the photos I wanted have been taken already. But I did get a couple of family shots. This one of daughter Hollie enjoying a view out across the park.
A couple of days before, we had found out that there was to be a hot air balloon festival that evening, apparently with 27 balloons all taking off from one car park on the edge of the river.
It seems a bit unlikely – had something got lost in the translation from the Flemish? We left the park, found a pop-up bar, and then a fritterie for our early evening refreshments, and finally a place to sit on the grass across the river from the car park.
And then it began!!!! All I can do is provide a few photos of a most surreal experience that went on for about an hour and a half.
After the relatively normal shaped balloons came the cartoon characters!
This is nothing to do with boating, except to show what unusual scenes we come across as we go.
It was a wonderful way to spend our last evening with Hollie, Richard and Sofia. And it was sad next morning to see them packing up their things after breakfast in order to go back to UK, but we had made lots of good barge memories with them.
Once they had set off to Dunkirk for the ferry we set off for Kortrijk.
This meant leaving the gently meandering ‘part of the ‘Toeristesche’ Leie and joining the Leie that has been widened, straightened and deepened for commercial traffic.
The 23kms to Kortrijk took us through two large sluisen (locks) at Saint-Baafs-Vijve and Herelbeke – the latter being 185m long and 11.4m wide!
Passing by the quays at Wielsbeke was a good reminder of how important cargo is to the Belgian canal system in 2024.
Kortrijk is a very familiar port to us. Calliope spent 3 winters there and we have been in and out, under the low bridge, many times. So once we arrived it did not take long to come in and moor up to the floating pontoon in sight of the historic Broel Towers.
In fact we were mooring up in Kortrijk at at about the same time as Sofia was looking out at the White Cliffs of Dover from the cross channel ferry!
While we waited for son Ashley and partner Theresa to arrive two days later we enjoyed more hot blue-sky days.
Things had changed a bit around the port. Where we had watched foundations being laid there is now a modern apartment block
At night rainbow lights shine down.
But this lovely small city was still the same and I had the chance to share it for a day with my very good Belgian WOB (Women on Barges) friend Mieke. Although she is a top tourist guide in her own city of Gent, she knows Kortrijk less well so I was able to do a bit of a tour with her as we walked back from the station.
Part of the walk included a visit to the local bakery where, in addition to some bread, I asked Mieke to choose us a cake for dessert.
A good choice!; we can pretend it is really healthy with all that fruit on top.
Next day was doubly special. First Ashley and Theresa were arriving and second I had booked a tour of a Belgian brewery for us all. Stewart’s favourite Belgian beer is the Kortijk brewed Omer, and as I had recently broken his special Omer glass I thought a trip to the brewery might make amends.
But first Ashley needed to take his car to the place where we would be at the end of his visit, in three days time. This meant driving to Tournai, finding a free car park for 3 days, and getting the train back to meet us win time for the bus to the brewery!
Somehow it all came together.
Three of had lunch on board, and Theresa made up a sandwich for Ashley to eat after we met him at the station.
I had already bought the bus tickets and before long we had reached the brewery.
Here are just a few photos of the Brewery tour. There are tours in English, but not on the day we wanted to go, so all our fellow visitors were Belgian, or Dutch. Luckily we had an excellent guide who spoke good English and gave us a quick potted version of all the information as we went.
We were shown the old brewhouse and also the current, high tech, modern one – but asked not to take photos in the latter in case we were industrial spies! The old brewhouse is beautifully preserved, all the copper gleaming.
After one more beer in the local pub, courtesy of Omer, we jumped on the bus back into the city centre.
Supper was booked in the Gros Markt – the Ribs ‘n’ Beer restaurant where you can have as many ribs as you can eat!
Obviously this is not us eating ribs! But was part of our outlook in the Gros Markt that night, a crazy tunnel installation!
Stu and I had been hanging on in Northern Belgium until the two sets of family had been to see us, but then needed to be cruising south towards our winter mooring. So next day was to be farewell to Kortrijk, taking Ashley and Theresa towards their car in Tournai.
The journey times are so different by car and by boat! It took Ashley about half an hour to drive to Tournai. We would take two days on the boat, although it could be done in one if you wanted a long day cruising.
Part of the reason was the decision not to leave Kortrijk until after lunch so that Theresa could see a bit of the city. We were there during the art Triennial and managed to see some of the exhibits.
To be honest the bronze sculpture of drinkers falling about was not part of the Triennial, but a favourite permanent part of the Kortrijk city-scape.
The first 3 narrow locks in the Kanal Bossuit-Kortrijk are manually operated by an ‘itinerant’ lock keeper, so we had to book our time to leave.
It was a change from the big locks on the Leie; these three are freycinet size; 38.5m long and just 5.1m wide. Calliope is 4.2m wide, so judicious steering required!
Here we are at the 3rd lock, with Ashley securing the bow rope and – look closely – Theresa helping the lock keeper to open the gates.
The canals widens out after that third sluis (lock), as we left the suburbs of Kortrijk behind and entered the countryside.
The new crew changed roles, with Ashley at the helm and Theresa as lookout! This section of the canal is used by commercial barges too, and it was not long before we were passing the first one.
The second trio of locks on this canal are much bigger, designed for the modern working barges.
This one, at Moen, is back to Leie dimensions; 110m long and 11.5m wide.
It is also deeper than the earlier locks, with bollards in the wall that allow you to move your ropes up/down with the movement of the water.
Just 4kms to go until the end of the canal. Our plan was to stay above the final lock for the night – a nice rural mooring – and drop down onto the Bovenschelde river the next day.
We had always moored on the port side of the canal when going in this direction, mainly because the pontoon to starboard has always been full. But today there was space on the right and we glided in, tied up, and sat back to enjoy a peaceful end to the day in the shade; it had been quite warm earlier.
Stewart and I have always loved the funky Vespa bar just below the final Bossuit lock, so sent Ashley off to see if it was open – and it was.
It is a delightful mix of Vespa hire, good beer, and very variable outdoor seating.
After a couple of beers it was nice to get back to Calliope’s back deck for aperos and supper. [Note Stewart using his NEW Omer glass that I bought for his at the brewery!]
And then to watch the sun go down.
Considering the blue of the sky the night before not was rather disappointing to wake up to greyness and drizzle. We needed to cruise on to Antoing, closer to Tournai where Ashley had left his car, so there was nothing for it but to don wet weather gear and get going.
The lock at Bossuit would take us down 11m to join the river and uses floating bollards to make the crew’s work easier.
Just get a rope round a bollard when at the top of the lock and keep an eye on it as the boat slowly descends – more fun in the sun than in the rain!
Readers of this blog will know that I am amused by small things! In this case it was being able to see into the lock keeper’s control tower and Calliope on his screen. 😌
Finally we arrived at the bottom of the lock and the gates opened for us to join the Bovenschelt – known as the Escaut in France.
You can see the mid-way lock doors here, which allow just half of the lock to be used when there is a small boat using the lock and a shortage of water.
The cruise to Antoing was not too far and only involved another two locks – long, wide commercial barge locks, but easy enough to navigate.
We also went through Tournai, which is a “one way at a time” system with huge traffic lights at each end. We were lucky and only had to wait a few minutes for a barge to come through before we had the green light to proceed.
There was an interesting manoeuvre as we went through the city! Ashley’s car was parked by the canal near the Port des Trous, the old medieval bridge that has recently been ‘adapted’ to allow the passage of giant modern barges.
Ashley’s idea was that by slowing down next to the new pontoon built but the bridge he could jump out, get his car, and bring it the few kilometres to the port at Antoing. (this is not my photo of the bridge – it’s from Wikipedia)
It worked. He jumped ashore, avoiding falling in, and after clambering up onto the land he was able to take this photo of the rest of us continuing upstream.
We soon met up at Antoing, a little port that we rather like. The afternoon was a chance for Captain and ‘old’ crew to put their feet up, and let ‘new’ crew go ashore to look round the town and find a place for supper on our last evening together.
An Italian restaurant seemed the best choice, and after an aperitif drink on board we went off to eat.
We set off in high spirits by the look of it!
All too soon, as with the Hollie team, it was drawing near time to say good-bye.
The weather was good enough for a ‘digestif’ on the back deck, and then to early to bed to be ready for their departure on the morning.
(It looks rather a functional black deck, with bucket, life belt, mosquito coil etc!)
So Calliope’s family fun was over for another year. One of the reasons that we bought the barge was for family and friends to come and enjoy life on the water with us. 2024 has been another year full of visitors!
Now it was time for Stewart and I to turn Calliope’s bow southwards and head for our winter mooring at Saint Usage at the Saône end of the canal du Bourgogne. The next blog post will track that homeward bound voyage.
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