Alright, alright, strike a light, cor blimey, aint it been a long time! In the company of Ealing studios I have finally found a minute to (ahhh) b-r-e-a-t-h-e.
Time has swiftly passed with family visits, gardening, clucking hens, oh! and the
narrow boat coming home. Here is a recap...
Home grown food harvested from the garden...
Home made poppy seed muffins...
Tour de France? Rather cycling to and fro work...
Our
narrow boat journey began again with the assistance of Dorian who set off for us with companion, Adam along the GUC going through Leicester and being pelted with mud bombs. Least the view was a delight
The next step was going to be Loughborough and the River Soar, preparation therefore had to be done. After much research and debating I settled with a purchase of a Delta anchor 20Kg from
Duncan Yacht, the galvanized steel sort. This was combined with even more expensive chain and rope spliced together from
Jimmy Green attached to the anchor via a rotating stainless steel connector. The decision for all this is that should one come a cropper on the rivers i.e. heading uncontrollably for a weir or in the instance of flooding dashing the anchor overboard (with the rope safely fixed to the ring in the bow) should hopefully save all lives aboard.
This section of the journey was taken by Leigh and Dorian, who began the day by bilging out in the engine bay the accumulation of water (really must get new boards sorted - appears to be a constant issue with the cruiser stern type boats).
.
Leigh and Dorian got all the way to Beeston where the boat floated happily beside willow trees. I joined the fun after returning from the clucking hens in Brighton and enjoyed clambering on the roof to pick up some rays.
A convoy began as Leigh steered our boat along towards the castle marina towpath and Dorian joining on his boat. Yes our boat is long and has many windows but we love her.
And thus all the hard work has begun, with the flat turned upside-down and inside-out as we plan to move aboard there is little relaxed normality, and then we are fitting out the boat on top of this. So first things first, the water pump which appears to be broken (from the onboard flood we had we believe) is being replaced with a much better quality Jacobson Max 3, have I ever done plumbing before? No, but I'll have a darned go. Then comes the burner, yes we opted for the morso squirrel...
and yes we do plan to install ourselves, allowing space at the rear if we later choose to install a boiler to heat water. Then comes painting the floor, and maybe some rearrangements in the kitchen area. Oh my, so much to do but we will get there bit by bit.
So, I hope to keep an update when possible on MollyFM and keep followers included, but please bear with her... she is starting a 'proper' job in August too, so will see how that goes.
Over for now.
