The marine notices said that the entire canal infrastructure between where we were and where we wanted to be would be closed till midday. So we phoned to make sure and were assured that only the lock in Bruges was affected.
Therefore we timed our run so that we’d got to the first of Bruges’ lifting bridges, the lock would be open and we’d be moored in the shade of the port before the real heat of the day began. When we reached the first bridge however, the lovely voice from the other end of the line suggested that as the lock was not going to working until five thirty, we might like to put ourselves on one of those kabob skewers and wait where we were, slowly revolving for the next five hours so we warmed evenly in the orange light of the heatwave warning. So we sat, fruitlessly keeping watch for anything resembling a sign of life near the bridge control.
We did have some sympathy for the dozen or so commercial barge crews affected by this outage, even if we envied their air conditioned wheelhouses, although once things did get going, because of the unique shape of the lock, the waiting pleasure craft were allowed to go to the head of the queue and sneak into the otherwise unusable half.
This meant we arrived in Bruges, tired, hot, and somewhat relieved to be sitting in the shade even though the port was as devoid of movement as the air was. Theres’ nothing can be done but settle down for a few more days of grinning stupidly and nodding in agreement every time someone says “You’re from Australia, you must be used to this”.
We really don’t have enough spare energy to argue.
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