Eventually (almost reluctantly) we left the island Nieuwe Kruispolle/Nije Krúspôle, inside the enormous lake Fluessen/Fluezen on Tuesday the 18th of June at 11:10AM. Back on the lake Fluessen/Fluezen all types of ships are to be seen, like this elegant tourist-vessel. The one in the background is a special looking one, too.

On the way towards our next stop, Morra/De Morra we noticed loads of beautiful boats. Think of all the (black?) money involved! This must be near Galamadammen, a name for a hamlet worth noting, we thought.

Lake Morra/De Morra was reached later on – the engine stopped running at 12:30PM. This fabulous mooring-spot was recommended by a fellow DBA-member for being very dog-friendly. It really was (completely fenced off) apart from the grass that was, let’s say, much in need of a cut. The poles, acting as bollards, are hardly visible.

(Zoomed in) view over Lake Morra/De Morra at sunset on the 19th at 8:00PM.

We did send an email on the 19th to Marrekrite, the organisation offering and maintaining free mooring spots all over the province of Friesland/Fryslân. After starting with a well-deserved compliment about their services we pointed out that the spot inside Lake Morra/De Morra badly needed a cut. To our surprise – and delight- the next morning a Marrekrite-boat appeared at 10:00AM sharp and started cutting. They explained to us that (1) the spot was already on their ‘to-do-list’, (2) they cruised for two hours(!) before arriving at ‘our’ place, (3) the wrong sort of grass was sown in the past after creating this mooring-space, namely a fast growing ‘hay-creating’ sort instead of a sort of ‘lawn grass’ and (4) the names of the identical twins as met and described a few weeks ago are Sjoerd-Pieter and Pieter-Sjoerd. Haha.

Lawn mowing machines spread a load of small grass-particles against anything close to them. It’s wise to remove these fragments immediately, in our care using a watering can. If one doesn’t do this the particles are almost irremovable later on.

After finishing their job the place looks a lot better – and nice for the dog, too.

The maximum stay at anyone Marrekrite-mooring-spot is 3 x 24 hours. Therefore we left this marvellous location on Friday the 21st of June at 10:00AM. Less than an hour later, at 10:54AM, we ended up in one of Stavoren’s/Starum’s luxury marinas. This is what it looks like there. A load of masts, mostly (expensive) sailing-boats.

The view onto the Johan Frisokanaal from where we stayed for the night. We did see just one commercial ship on the canal this week. Pleasure-boats so much the more!

Saturday the 22nd we left Stavoren/Starum around 10:00AM and, after negotiating a lock, reached the IJsselmeer around half an hour later. This is just one of the stunning views one encounters when ‘at sea’.

The ship that was already visible with the last photograph crossed our path just in front of us. One can say this kind of pictures are rather blue-ish.

The Navionics program on our tablet (both tablet and program rather new to us) offers the possibility to register so-called ‘way-points’, thus creating a course one can follow by staying on or near the line on the screen. That invention suits us well – very well. Thanks a thousand times for your advice, Nico & Tineke Iseger! Note the tiny lectern, dating from our (unforgettable) narrowboat-era.

In the end we got Medemblik, our destiny, clearly in view, notably its spires. From that moment on it was just a matter of ‘keep the spires straight in front of you’. Discovering the ‘entrance’ to the mainland was difficult though. For him, that is. She saw it well before he did.

Inside Medemblik we were confronted with a second lock that day. Well, in this respect we’ve had harder times in every other country we’ve cruised. The Netherlands in general is as flat as a pancake and locks are indeed a rarity – especially in Friesland/Fryslân. We’re seen here waiting for the second lock of the day, descending 3 metres (10 feet) which makes one again contemplate the water management in our swamp-like home-country.

By telephone we’d arranged for an overnight stopping place for a mere proportionately € 1,-- per metre boat-length. (Yes people, that’s cheap!) We had no clue of what the space would look like. After some cruising back and forth we concluded that it must be one of the boxes we had just passed. We turned and crawled, in reverse, inside a box that was not very well suited to the length of our little ship. The bow protruded considerably and the pontoon just reached the side-door of the wheel-house. We enlightened the anchor light during the night, hoping it would keep drunken sailors away from our bow. And now the advantages: 1. The dog was able to run freely as the terrain was 100% fenced off; 2. A Deen-supermarket is located around the corner (as is an Aldi); 3. Proportionately ‘cheap’ diesel (€ 1,269 per litre) was for sale around the same corner, sold by a firm called ‘Peut’, which is slang Dutch for petrol/gasoline; 4. Electricity and water were included in the already mentioned mooring-fee, and last but not least 5. Nobody turned up to collect the money.

Today, Sunday the 23rd of 2019, we left Medemblik at 12:09PM, after having finished rather much activities, like vacuum cleaning, buying 132 litres of diesel, shopping, taking in water – that sort of things. Again soon descending a lock of 3 meters (10 feet) we arrived in the former Zuiderzee, now the Wieringermeer(polder) (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wieringermeer). We stopped at 2:21PM in a place called Middenmeer. This picture shows our current residence. Note the peeping tom (‘gluurder’) at the left.

The same peeping tom, here enjoying life, together with his mistress. Carpe diem in full swing!