Ostende and red diesel - BEWARE

oldvarnish said:
I was part of a small fleet of ten yachts which went to Ostend last weekend,and I thought I'd share the experience.

Of the ten, two were visited by customs officers and the choice seemed largely random.

They were not typical visits as a young woman was having her training day so the questioning was probably more thorough.

Questions were asked about the VAT status of the boat, although no proofs were asked for.

When it came to the issue of red diesel, the skipper was directly asked what colour diesel they were carrying. One skipper gave an evasive answer and the
officer was not happy. He launched into a speech about the importance of all countries obeying EU law. He then said that if the boat entered Belgian waters again their tank would be inspected. But he didn't take samples from either boat there and then.

It was all pretty reasonable, if tedious and drawn out.

It wouldn't be so bad if only they could bring themselves to smile a little more often.
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We offer good coffee, the last chap was a Republican who had to escort the King the nxt day on a visit. He was some what peeved to say the least but he enjoyed our coffee
 
Hello Bob here, this forum is jolly intriguing, I wonder if any of you chaps would care to explain what " going south of the station" means in plain English, is it like London cabbies refusing to go "south of the river"?
 
Just for the record, I had 2 customs visits this year. One in August & one in September. On both occasions they mentioned fuel & both times they said they would not check because they knew we could not get white fuel in UK. That kind of p..d me off as I had cleaned my tanks last year & made sure i have used white for the last 2 years as I have spent 45 nights in Ostend in that period
 
Marmalade said:
We were in Ostende 3 weeks ago. We were the only Brit boat we could see in either RNSYC or Mercator and had no visits.
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Cannot have looked far I was opposite RNSYC until the 4th Sept having arrived on 8 august then again on 6-8 sept. . Often very lonely as you sugges,t but did reach 5 British boats on one occasion.
It is a pity that the red diesel thing has frightened some boats off but it seems that the customs have decided to quietly ignore the issue.
Talking to Simon (the harbourmaster) the number of all nations visiting has been significantly down this year & they are barely meeting break even on costs so it may be that they may want to attract the British back again.
(Wonder if they will feel the same about Brexit in a few years time !!!)
 
We arrived in Zealand day after Brexit vote and over the next 3 weeks only Brits made any comments. Our departure port for the passage home was Zeebrugge where the HM was as ever most helpful. No inspections or problems throughout the cruise and we will nodoubt be returning next year.
 
On our way to Ostende on Friday, we were approached by a fast rib with 3 very polite customs guys who asked, as they were doing some training, if they could do a boarding a moving boat exercise, once aboard they wanted to see boat ownership details, think they were satisfied with ssr part 1 doc, insurance, radio licence and passports, they asked about diesel colour and took our word that we were using white. When asked what their reaction would be to red diesel, they said that if recent receipts were available for quantity in tank, they would be fine with that. So the news is, to all you guys going off to the anchor fest, a trip I would dearly love to be making, is that there is no news . Sure it varies from officer to officer but seems to be a more relaxed approach.
Read more at http://www.ybw.com/forums/showthread.php?478749-On-a-red-diesel-note#yedRAdIIX03Oq5hb.99

This has moved from below. Thanks Adam
 
This from the Haven Ports Yacht Club Facebook account today:

"Well, it's official - the Belgians don't want us in their waters. The Eaora race fleet is in Oostende and apart from loads of Schengen paperwork - one boat (so far) has been fined 500 euro for red diesel violations!! - Happy days"
 
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