Our first night in Vlissingen was ‘uninspiring” to say the least. The marina where we stayed is situated in an industrial area and is quite limited in its charm. There is a more traditional marina down town Vlissingen, but the water depth is only 2 meters. As we have a keel depth of 2.22 meters, we did not want to take any chances. The harbour master said it was "just soft sand" so no problem, yes well it is not his boat and not his risk !
We wanted to rest after our previous days sailing and catch up with family in the area, so we thought to relax, even though the area was not so pretty.
Esther from the boat against which we had moored for the night, said that we should not stay in Vlissingen, for the reasons mentioned above and we should go to Middelburg. She said it was really beautiful, a treasure in Zeeland, we must go there - and she was one of the harbour masters.
Sales pitch or truth ? We decided to trust local knowledge and risk a trip up the canal to Middleburg and to see what we could see.
After a pleasant cruise up the canal, with our blue wave of opening bridges we came across this is a delightful town, old, quirky, quaint like Medemblik, so we will spend a little time here before we head back towards Amsterdam.This has been the most friendly marina we have visited so far.
The weather has improved and we sit on the back of the boat in the sunshine, catching up with our work and correspondence. This is what we were looking for in our sailing adventures. A beautiful place where we can stop, rest and enjoy the beauty around us.
I borrowed an angle grinder from a Swedish boat behind us, making a 1 hour hack saw job to a 5 second grind - I must get one of these soon ! The Swedes, from S/Y Salsa plan to be in Portugal for the winter - we hope to see you there.
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