River Cruising Water Cooler

[Canal archive]

Has Spring sprung already? Day one of the New Year and 2 gentlemen Blackbirds are strutting their stuff across our decking for the benefit of a lady Blackbird who is completely unimpressed, I just thought it was a little early for that kind of thing but is it a good omen for smoother/lower waters on our European rivers, fingers crossed.

[notamermaid]

Happy New Year from Germany. Great fireworks in my neighbourhood. Good food, meaning I enjoyed my cooking efforts. Managed the tiniest celebration with a dinner of slow-cooked beef and vegetable casserole. Dessert was mulled wine fruit compote with master baker stollen slice.

 

A grey day here with a bit of rain and wind, but the sun may come out a bit more. Too warm again.

 

notamermaid

 

 

 

[Canal archive]

Notamermaid your menu sounds absolutely excellent it’s so quiet here no sounds at all. DH is off for a walk, no signs of life maybe just a little over imbibing. Very overcast day and loads of fireworks last night, but have you seen the absolutely fantastic photographs from the James Webb telescope, absolutely outstandingly beautiful. To go to the stars - in my dreams as I worked on the so called space race for many years. 

[Ritabob]

Woke up in 2024 with a blanket of snow on the ground. This after a warm very wet Christmas. 

Wishing everyone a happy, healthy, peaceful new year. May your flights leave on time, your ships be free of rude coughing guests, your suitcase be underweight....

[Daisi]

Happy New Year all, may your rivers have just enough water in them to sail, and the skies have enough sun to tour. Best wishes for all.

[notamermaid]

Well the day did not brighten up. Now we just wait how much rain we will get in the valley and how much the smaller rivers will flood (again).

 

Forgot to mention earlier that I happily mix English and German cooking. With beef and vegetable casserole I served Eierspätzle (speciality egg noodles). @Canal archive for the dessert I used this recipe as a base, but used my German glühwein spice mix: https://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/mulled_fruit_salad_08855

The red wine was "Rolling Gecko" tempranillo organic wine from - Aldi!

Has the Spode Christmas china adorned your table this year again?

 

notamermaid

 

 

[Canal archive]

 

Oh yes and my tree. Plus thinking about it our Christmas is a real mixture of German and English and why not!

[notamermaid]

More rain and flooding in England and we are following suit. Bavaria's rivers are rising again, the Moselle is carrying a heavy load, Northern Germany cannot even recover, but surprisingly the flooding for the Rhine has been forecast to be less than anticipated three days ago. However the Tauber (in the town name Rothenburg ob der Tauber) is flooding so Wertheim on the Main has a blinking red H for Hochwasser on the map. Not good at all.

 

Where is my January freeze and snow?

 

notamermaid

 

[Canal archive]

I thought this might interest you all, taken on the Rhône in Lyon 2015 our Scenic river cruise vessel had to wait some time for the Amadeus Symphony to clear this bridge.

 

[franski]

On 12/22/2023 at 1:58 PM, Daisi said:

 

 

Yes, there are certainly some "interesting" names for towns in both Canada & the USA. I know Newfoundland and Labrador, and Pennsylvania have some very good ones. 🙂

 

The prairies have some interesting ones as well...  Flin Flon, Moose Jaw, Moosonee, Medicine Hat, Okotoks...  My daughter lives in Cranberry-Portage... often just called "Cranberry".

 

Fran

[Canal archive]

Have just discovered that our Australian friends now have a Danish/Australian Queen. 🫶

[franski]

On 12/24/2023 at 1:37 PM, CPT Trips said:

And here’s hoping that our host is a DeadHead. By the way, the seller wanted $280 for the shirt. 

I bought a sweatshirt with that wording on it for my DH (a huge VW fan) a number of years ago... My son still wears it!!

 

Fran

[Canal archive]

My DH has a t- shirt, a gift from his daughters that on several cruises he could have auctioned it - the slogan - You can’t scare me I have two daughters - this seemed to resonate with quite a few of our fellow cruisers and the crew.

[RDVIK2016]

16 hours ago, notamermaid said:

More rain and flooding in England and we are following suit. Bavaria's rivers are rising again, the Moselle is carrying a heavy load, Northern Germany cannot even recover, but surprisingly the flooding for the Rhine has been forecast to be less than anticipated three days ago. However the Tauber (in the town name Rothenburg ob der Tauber) is flooding so Wertheim on the Main has a blinking red H for Hochwasser on the map. Not good at all.

 

Where is my January freeze and snow?

 

notamermaid

 

notamermaid,

As you say rivers in Bavaria have been rising again. The Danube tributary Regen at Cham hit their Meldestufe 3.  This video from a TV service for eastern Bavaria, based in Regensburg, describes the situation status of the river and how they are handling it. 

 

By the way the text provided in the news article that accompanies the video mentions the Florian Geyer Brücke in Cham. This was the bridge the young boys were defending in the 1959 antiwar film "Die Brücke".  The original bridge has been replaced, but the memory of the events depicted on that bridge in the film is still strong.  

 

Hope you are having a good start to the new year - or as they say in Cham "An guadn Rutsch und a guads neis Johr!"

RDVIK

 

https://www.tvaktuell.com/landkreis-cham-erneut-warnung-vor-hochwasser-580450/

 

Edited January 4 by RDVIK2016

[Canal archive]

Have just returned from an interesting heritage discussion about by- weirs which reminded me that there must be something similar across Europe. 

[notamermaid]

The rivers are keeping me busy, but I need to keep the reporting short today. Here is what my country looks like, far too colourful, should be green:

 

For that neighbouring country of ours, the Czech Republic, things are also not too good. To the left of Düsseldorf you can see the long line going North, that is the Maas (Meuse), now causing trouble for the Netherlands again. The Netherlands still also has to take on the water from our rivers, via the Rhine. And I have no idea how they cope around Hanover.

 

notamermaid

 

[notamermaid]

7 minutes ago, Canal archive said:

Have just returned from an interesting heritage discussion about by- weirs which reminded me that there must be something similar across Europe. 

By-weir, no never heard of that. Only know weir, not sure what it could be. Got a photo?

 

notamermaid

 

[RDVIK2016]

2 hours ago, notamermaid said:

The rivers are keeping me busy, but I need to keep the reporting short today. Here is what my country looks like, far too colourful, should be green:

 

For that neighbouring country of ours, the Czech Republic, things are also not too good. To the left of Düsseldorf you can see the long line going North, that is the Maas (Meuse), now causing trouble for the Netherlands again. The Netherlands still also has to take on the water from our rivers, via the Rhine. And I have no idea how they cope around Hanover.

 

notamermaid

 

That red dot in southwest Czechia is at the medieval gem Český Krumlov on the Vltava (Moldau) that river cruisers can visit when docked at Linz on the Danube. It sure would be a shame to have serious damage to Český Krumlov. On this chart there is an awful lot of red for Level 3 flooding which in their chart they label as "ohrožení" (threat/danger). https://hydro.chmi.cz/hppsoldv/hpps_prfdyn.php?lng=ENG&seq=307039&lng=CZE&lng=ENG&lng=CZE&lng=ENG

[Canal archive]

Basically a by-weir is a way of getting excess water past a lock.

[notamermaid]

This looks like a recent short video of Cesky Krumlov: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/qyEKdlhMzcg

 

notamermaid

 

[CPT Trips]

20 hours ago, franski said:

The prairies have some interesting ones as well...  Flin Flon, Moose Jaw, Moosonee, Medicine Hat, Okotoks...  My daughter lives in Cranberry-Portage... often just called "Cranberry".

 

Fran

Reminds me of the 74&75 Flyers hockey team players home towns. 

[notamermaid]

Just opposite England on the other side of the channel the area is inundated. Pas-de-Calais is seriously affected. The river Aa is seriously flooding and others are very high, too. This is from the French government website for the rivers, here the Northern part, https://www.vigicrues.gouv.fr/niv2-bassin.php?CdEntVigiCru=29:

 

 

This video is astounding. I have stood in front of the town hall at Arques. A pleasant town known for its glass factory. I do not understand much of the commentary but I do not need to.

https://www.francetvinfo.fr/meteo/inondations/inondations-dans-le-pas-de-calais-vu-du-ciel-un-departement-meconnaissable_6282639.html

 

Talking of odd names, Aa looks weird, but it is an old Germanic root and is not that uncommon, especially when you include its variations. As I said, I have been to the area of the Aa river, when you cross it on a bridge the sign says L'Aa. I still find it looks odd after having seen it dozens of times.

 

notamermaid

 

 

 

[Kristelle]

On 1/4/2024 at 10:21 AM, Canal archive said:

My DH has a t- shirt, a gift from his daughters that on several cruises he could have auctioned it - the slogan - You can’t scare me I have two daughters - this seemed to resonate with quite a few of our fellow cruisers and the crew.

 

That's a good one.

 

My dad has a tshirt that says

Warning! Retired! 

Knows everything and has plenty of time to tell you all about it. 

 

That always gets a good response from fellow travellers. 

[Kristelle]

On 1/4/2024 at 8:51 AM, Canal archive said:

Have just discovered that our Australian friends now have a Danish/Australian Queen. 🫶

 Yes so it seems.

 

( I have zero interest in royalty) 

[Canal archive]

Well some do.

Just a note my county of Wiltshire, because of the amount of rain had every major and many minor roads closed last night plus no trains through the county. The water table is so high there’s ominous gurgling in various pipes and to top it all the house feels nude as the Christmas decs are down and the tree topping fairy is tucked away in her box until next December, all before 12th night.