CANAL CRUISING.

King Country Chronicle, Volume IV, Issue 300, 5 October 1910, Page 3

CANAL CRUISING.

Gn the Continent. In England, owing to the stifling tactics of the railway companies a generation ago, canals for the most part have been allowed to fall into disuse, and very few rivers arc made use of commercially, but all over the Continent is spread a network of waterways—canals and canalised rivers—where the motor cruiser may wander until the weeks run into months, and the months literally into years ; in half a dozen climates, and with a constant change of scene. It is not only possible but practicable, to go between banks by canal and river from Holland to the Black Sea, and from Calais to the Mediterranean, and both trips have actually been made quite recently.

The field is unlimited. Given a vessel which does not draw more than, say, four feet of water, you may, choosing a fine day, slant across the twenty-odd miles that divide Dover from Calais with hardlv a splash aboard, and then enter ar inland cruising-ground that takes ii three-parts of France, all Hollanc and Belgium, and half Germany, too. For a limited holiday there is nothing better than Belgium or Holland. The distances are not so great and the delays in locks are fewer. From Ramsgate to Ostend is but fifty-five knots —a mere bagatelle on a fine day—with Dunquerque and Newport on the way in case of bad weather. All these places are linked by canal. Ghent, Bruges, Antwerp, Brussels, they are all within easy distance.

From Terneusen, at the north of the West Schelde, it is but a few miles of salt water either to Hansweert and the great South Beveland canal—which forms a highway from Antwerp to Rotterdam, or to Flushing—whence you may wander for weeks, in and out between the quaint old-world islands of Zeeland, until you come out into the Zuyder Zee and the Holland of the picture-books. —London "Evening News."