There is a certain routineness about the days. Today, Tuesday, was quite like a lot of others. The main differences today were that we spent all day meandering through some hills, the river Inn came in and turned the water colour to a light grey and we had to avoid more ships than usual. We are now getting regular tourist ones - ships that is, not rivers; these are more of a nuisance than the big cargo ships because they go faster and, therefore, create bigger washes. We have now got into a rythum and can do six kilometres across the water (more in the morning) when we are actually paddling - Bart says it is because I can now steer better. This means that 30 km in a day is a reasonably easy target even without any current and we now always do at least that. We did today, but every time a ship passes we waste five minutes going across the stern so that we face the wash bow first. (You didn't know I was a sailing expert did you?) When this happens ten or fifteen times in a day, progress slows.
The real oddity today was the first option of a place to stop. This was a caravan park with a little marina attached. The caravans were weird though; most had rooves over them; had massive extensions - most larger than the caravans, hedges or fences between each one, many had gardens, hanging baskets and the unliklest collection of garden gnomes. The sort of place you might expect in Mississippi or West Virginia. Anyway the German equivalent of trailer trash certainly put us off and we went across the river where a few more brain cells were apparent - a few. Actually the first stop was Austria (this is what we have to look forward to?), the second back in Germany. A cruise ship has just gone past on the evening run, I can just imagine the commentator saying "On your right we have the Austrian trailer trash" I don't like saying it but the effect of the waves makes the reflection on the dieing light rather spectacular. See I am an artist. That reminds me I had better order some more wine.
We camp more often that we get beds but not by a huge margin - beds are veeeery comfortable. It always takes us a good hour to get up and get the boat packed so we rarely start before 8.30 but, now, never later than 10. Breakfast can be an issue, particularly when we camp and, of course, Bart is always hungry. So if we miss a decent breakfast and don't stop for a proper lunch, tiredness becomes a difficulty at the end of the day. Only once have we not had a proper dinner, although last night's is certainly best forgotten - everything in vast quatities of oil. It was so horrible even Bart left it. I was well stuck into my second litre of house plonk so I didn't notice until Bart told me. I don't think I mentioned the apples. In southern Germany it is illegal to have a pudding (or sweet if you are a southern ponce, Yank or other strange ethnic type) without apples. Four items on the pudding menu and they all have apples.
Anyway, I have digressed. Once we have Doris packed and in the water then comes the worst moment of the day - boarding Mrs. Dobbin. This involves nerves, shaking and fussing about. We don't fall in the river every day (the score is two - one to me in dunkings, although Bart would certainly get better marks for artistic impression and attracted a considerable number of laughs from the locals) but it always happens getting in the boat. We paddle for an hour or so - never more than about eighty minutes - and this is normally the longest stint of the day. Bart paddles steadily and fairly strongly (getting weaker as the day wears on), swapping sides every five or ten minutes. I paddle on any side that is necessary and am constantly swapping. The effect of my paddling is always to create a turn to Bart's side so, rather than slow "my side" down after ten or fifteen strokes I swap over and do three or four on the other side. This means that we don't travel in a straight line, the bow swings through an angle about 15 degrees either side of the straight line. Of course, if I am not concentrating we can wander all over the river. About every ten minutes Bart's swap of sides includes an arse stretch. This consists of lifting his fundament up off his seat with his hands on the side of the boat as well sticking his feet over the front. This manouvre always has me worried as he usually has a paddle in one hand (he has only dropped it overboard once so far) and I am worried that one hand will slip throwing all his weight on one side and over we will go. As he often does this as a barge is approaching in preparation for having to sit still for five minutes whilst we deal with all the waves from these things, my sang froid is usually sangless.
There is sometimes some current so we do get up to 10 kph. Sometimes, but this never lasts all day. After the first spell, 45 minutes are more common than hour stretches and, if we have done four or five kilometres, the approach of a boat is normally enough to cause us to take a break. Quite good to stand for 45 minutes watching the maintenance crew move the channel marker buoys or have a look at the barges doing into the locks - no paddling you see. Our normal breaks are fifteen or twenty minutes.
Doris is a truly, loving, kind lady. My navigational skills are not always of the best which can result in the odd impact on things unexpected and Bart does rather mistreat her. My best cockup was trying to come in alongside a sort of jetty going downstream, never the best of ideas, and I managed not so much to get alongside the jetty as power my way into the end of it; to say that we came to a jarring halt would be an understatement. Bart abuses the poor lady by insisting on getting in to his seat on dry land when we are a ramp. He then waggles his pelvis backwards until the poor old dear floats off - leaving rather more than her foundation and blusher attached to the ramp. Despite all this, she still doesn't shed tears inside the boat.
If breakfast has consisted of banana butties without the butter (normal on camping days) we might try and get a decent lunch but don't always succeed. If we had a bed night, we normally have a decent sized breakfast and lunch is apples, cheese or fish sandwiches. Unfortunately breakfast in this part of the world ALWAYS consists of bread rolls, slices of cheese and slices of meat (touching the cheese, naturally). The coffee is normally quite good but any extras are very welcome and no deviation is allowed - oh for cornflakes, eggs, beans, toast & tea. What am I saying? I am the great traveller. Emergency bounty bars are often required for the last stint of the day and sometimes the emergency brandy is required if the day is very arduous. We know how to live.
Bart is currently complaing mainly about his knees, not his back or his arms or his arse. In my case straightening up when I get out of the boat is normally the main effort. We do not sit down during breaks although occassionally Bart finds it all too much.
Locks are now less frequent, one or two a day, and there are now normally trolleys provided so the effort is much less, although we still usually mange to fart about enough to take at least half an hour over such manouvres. I have left that sentence in for the benefit of the one person who is actually interested in what we do, by the time the book comes out it will be a brilliantly witty discussion on the benfits of hydro-elctric power vis-a-vis letting all the nutrients through the sluices to fertilise the land.
For dinner we always eat out (except when we ended up in a village that had a "closed" guest house) and have tried to eat as much German food as we can but, frankly, most of it is shit - I could do with a good pizza.
Sleeping is normally dependent on how much alcohol Bart has drunk. If it is not enough, he normally gets a couple of hours good sleep before I crawl in to the tent after having taken enough medicine. If the medicine was strong, he notices my verbal outpourings quite early and heads for the bivvy bag post hatse. If he has had enough he sleeps in the tent perfectly satisfactorily. If he has had too much, he sleeps well but gets a hangover - not a prettry site.
The weather gods have changed their tune and we are back to autumn. We waited until midday and gave up on paddling for the day; we have done five days in a row so we don't feel guilty . Midday is the latest we can leave and still expect to do 30 kms. At that time, we donned the waterproofs that we have been carrying, unsused, for three weeks, whilst the rain was heaviest, naturally, and set off for a bit of a stroll up a hill. This was the furthest that we have been from the river since we started. It was not a great walk but, amazingly, I was in front going up hill when I neartly trod on this.
Bart had spotted him just after I passed. It is the brightest lizard he has ever seen.
The village, that had looked quite lively the day before, was - how can I put it - dead. So our rest day consisted of a good rest, a gentle stroll with wonderful lizard and a boring village.
Another lovely day, if not so sunny and ten degrees colder that we are used to. We spent the whole day going along a stretch of insized meanders with quite tight bends for a river that is now normally three or four hundred metres wide (one bend managed to exceed 180 degrees) and trees all the way with hardly a village to disturb the trip (just a few fucking pleasure boats), so lunch was rudimentary. We moved into Austria today and dinner was a great improvement. Camping is also looking good, an abandoned campsite so that is pretty cheap.
The ducks frequentntly provide us with amusement. A family of swans will sometimes paddle up and look elegant and refined; one could not say the same about the ducks. We regularly catch up with a bunch of them (a bunch of ducks? a quack? a surfeit? an excitement? a delight?) who then paddle off in front of us. As we overhaul them, they panic and start doing lots of quacking and start flapping wings and running across the water. They don't actually take off, but they do gain fifty metres on us and then settle down again. We then catch them up again and away they go again. This process is repeated about three times before they finally fly off. Twenty minutes later...
We are also constantly amazed by the number of big fish that the fishermen catch. Every time we pass one (and we pass lots), he seems to be reeling in something that weighs in the kilograms.
We have now been travelling together for more than three weeks, It is my longest travelling stint with one other person for almost thirty years. It is Bart's longest stint since he went inter-railing ten years ago. Neither of us are still in contact with the travelling partners from those trips.
One thing about these small places is that everything closes early, and I mean early - 8.30 in the case of the Gasthof associated with the last campsite. Of course, Bart just goes to sleep, but these well organised campsites have sort of street lights so, with a table and chair plus the emergency brandy, I could read until midnight when the lights went out. With no campsite and the emergency brandy finished, I ended up sitting under a street light reading a Lynda La Plante book - Lynda La Plante! It is the first time I have read one of her wonderful tales and definitely the last. I had often wondered what life would be like when I was sixty. I am also concerned that the only emergency supplies we have left is a bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon at €1.99.
Another long day on Bart's birthday and we reached Linz, which is by far and away the liveliest town we have been to. There are lots of streets stalls selling "local" rubbish. The place is heaving, it must be some sort of end of summer, last chance to rip off the tourists type festival. Birthday presents have been few - I got him an early one a few days ago (a lovely orange umbrella in case we got a follwoing wind) but so far he hasn't even stolen a birthday kiss of a gullible girl, just a sting on the arse from a wasp.
Bart had the choice of where we eat tonight so obviously we have gone for a pizza, I am happy to report that Linz seems free of the smell of doner kebabs, it must be the most civilized place we have yet been to - except for all the moored up fucking crusie ships waiting to pounce on us in the morning, obviously.
I wrote that before my late night reading. This time I found a chair but the light on the cycle path went off at 11 and I was left to read by the motorway lights.
We have only done two days since the last rest day but they were hard days. Bartw as for paddling but, being an afable fellow, he agreed to a rest day. It is not so much a rest as a bed that is required - four nights camping in a row is tiring. We have found a cheapish place (The Wild Man Hotel), had two beers at stalls on the way and listened to Upper Austrian brass bands (surprisingly pleasant) done the washing and are going out to hunt an internet cafe to send this guff after Bart has completed his kip induced by watching a Spaniard playing snooker with a german commentary.
We have decided to stop at Bratislava so should be there in about eight or ten days. If you are unlucky this will be the anti-penultimate post of this trip, if lucky the penultimate.
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