Back in the Water.
06/23/2010
The travel hoist in Zeebruge has to travel along public roads for 500 metres and then go down the boat ramp and enter the water up to 2 metres before being able to launch us. Even though there were no parking signs along our intended route two cars were illegally parked, the police were called and two hours later with us still high and dry on the lift, a tow truck towed them away. As we were only able to enter the water close to high tide we only had a twenty minute window remaining. The hoist lowered us into the water and we tried to hold Alexes straight within the sling. We couldn't believe the current as the bow was being swept to starboard even with the bow thruster working overtime. The hoist operator was shouting as us to keep the boat straight when in finally dawned that the bow thruster's props had been replaced back to front and were pushing us further to starboard when we wanted to go to port. Now a simple matter to straighten up and proceed gently forward with ego bruised. The crowd of onlookers dispersed and the boatyard rewired the controls to compensate for the reversed props. They assure us that the props are identical so that thrust will be the same. We will see.

The trip back to the UK was uneventful so we stopped at Oostende overnight then to Boulogne for two nights then 60 odd miles to Brighton. Crossing the TSS (shipping lanes) at right angles added another ten miles to our trip and caused a few more grey hairs. The ships seem to travel in groups of four and dodging behind them isn't easy.