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| FISA tour 2014: 12 countries, 66 rowers |
Fri. Sept. 26 + Sat. Sept. 27 (Days 7-8): Deggendorf - Windorf - Passau
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| Last lock: Karen 2nd from left |
We can smell the barn (an idiom all languages appear to understand). Last night at dinner Werner instructed the captains that they must cox from now on since we are entering the heavily trafficked section of the river, but by now we're all ready for the big time. We go through our last lock, huge enough to accommodate a double-wide river barge. After almost 43k, we pull off at Windorf, on an arm of the river, tie up and walk across to our last hotel which boasts an unheated swimming pool; one German, one Norwegian and one Irishman are crazy enough to brave the cold water.
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| Passau Flooding 2013 |
On our last day we row to beautiful, historic Passau (are there any other kinds of towns in Bavaria?), city of 3 rivers. Here the Danube is joined by the Ilz and the Inn; not only is the current much stronger but there are river boats as well as barges, so we have to watch where we are going. Passau was deluged in the floods of 2013 and you can see the watermarks on some of the buildings. We turn right and row on the Inn for about 2k, cheering a bride and groom along the way, and making surprisingly good headway against the current, and then float down to the junction and row up the Danube for the last time to the boat ramp where we load up the boats for transport back to their various homes.
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| Hauling a church boat out on a trailer |
On our last evening we have a big dinner, lots of speeches, performances by each national group (OMG, you should have heard our rendition of "Rowin' (Rollin') on the River"... ) and give presents to the tour organizers. I finished the navy and gold socks I was knitting for Werner (having had all that time during the week to knit...) during the dinner. And we're done; we catch the train to Vienna after saying an enormous round of goodbyes at breakfast the next morning.
Unforgettable as Bavaria is, and no matter how enjoyable our 30+ hours of rowing, the real pleasure of this trip has been in the people we meet. There are 77 people I've never met on this tour and, shy person that I am, I feel quite ill for the first day or so. So I set myself as a goal to learn everyone's name before the tour ends, and to be able to associate some details with as many of those people as possible. Here are a few:
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| Werner's socks; just in time... |
From Jan, a cardiologist from Oslo: an old boat which looks as if it's seen better days is known as a Plimsoller; they were sold off to the Norwegians if they weren't seaworthy. From Detlef, one of our captains: calling someone "bahnhof" in German means "many trains, few getting to the station;" i.e. a bit of a space cadet. Arie van der Ent, from the Netherlands, and Rachel Creagh, from Australia, are both former women's masters world champions.
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| Jan and his lederhosen |
Many people tell me about their rowing tours. This is a revelation: in Europe and Scandinavia, people tour, in rowing shells, all the time! Clubs organize tours for their recreational rowers, calling another club to ask if they can borrow/rent their boats for a week or a week/end. National rowing federations do the same for their member clubs. Christy, from Limerick, tells me last year, when Ireland hosted the World Rowing tour, they had to borrow touring quads from all over Ireland; this year the Irish Rowing Federation is BUYING two touring quads for EACH rowing club so there will always be boats available for tours. How about them apples, US Rowing?? Christy also flies reguarly to England, to follow the horses and the greyhounds, and donned a black tie and tails to dance at the Lawyer's Ball in Vienna last February.
Jens and Marianne, from Oslo, recount a tour they organized along the Norwegian coast above the Arctic Circle, and another on the Nile, between Luxor and Aswan, before the Arab Spring. We lunched with a rowing couple on our last day who rowed from
Amsterdam to the Black Sea, and in Venice, at the carnival, in
masks. After our tour, 5 of the Australians - Frances, Suzie, Ainsley, Warwick and Bronwyn - are rowing 5 more days on the Danube, from Linz to Vienna. John and Caroline Miller, from the UK, formed a separate club, within their rowing club, solely for recreational rowers; they even have their own boats and trailer.
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| Oslo Rowklub - can we budget for this? |
Ruth lives in Winnipeg and is starting her own rowing tour company; she ran a pre-tour from Oxford to London on the Thames right before this trip. Lis, born in Denmark and living in Oslo, is the Concept 2 rep for the entire country; both she and the Norwegian Else are physiotherapists (PTs). Danish Else, one of many rowers in her 70's, is a retired doctor from Jutland. The six Swiss from Seeklub Kusnacht, near Zurich - Joop (Yoop) and Anneke, Walter and Heidi and Martin and Stephi - all sit together at mealtimes so they can share a bottle of wine. Stephi is an agent for opera singers. The youngest (we think) member of the tour, Rebecca, is from Buffalo and gave up a seat in a Head of the Charles-bound 8 to come on this tour; her teammates said they'd save a space for her next year.
Norske Studenters Rowklub, in addition to the murals and chandeliers in its boathouse dining room, owns 4 cabins in the woods which can be rented (for 10 Euros/day) by its members for winter skiing or summer lazing. Jacob, a grizzled Norwegian, started his career as a merchant seaman and remembers going to LA and Seattle with bananas from Central America. Now he tends both his, and his rowing club's garden, and rows. Vaclav (Vatzlav) lives in Toronto, and is in the same rowing club as Gudrun, who was born in Germany. And Frances, who is married to a Japanese, is German by birth and emigrated to Australia as a child, so she speaks like an Auzzie and translates German for us. Stories abound of people rowing into their 80's and 90's.
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| My two Irish rowing pals: Christy and Michael |
So now we are connected to the world of tour rowing. If I go to Denmark or Norway or Ireland or Switzerland or Australia, I can find out when and where there are rowing tours. I can see fellow rowers on future World Rowing tours. When I see those enormous river cruisers in Passau, I look at their deckchairs and staterooms and think how much more fun we're having rowing down the river than watching it through a window. Tour rowing is a great way to meet other rowers and see the world from the seat of a boat. What could possibly be more enjoyable?
P.S. Wonderful photos of our trip, which really give a sense of the boats, and the landscape, can be seen at www.worldrowing.com/photos-videos/galleries/2014-world-rowing-tour-bavaria-germany#gallery
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