could be worse...

just when I think I'm having a miserable time on the canals, I am always reminded that in fact some people have it far worse.



still doesn't stop the really funny young people who knocked on my boat at 6.50am this morning, just because they thought it would be funny to wake us up. The man was just ready to leave for work so they got a suprise when he popped his head out of the doorway asking if he could help them. Stuck for anything interesting to say, they wished him happy new year.

They were lucky, if they had called by just 10 minutes later they would have had me waving kitchen knives at them and swearing like a steelworker as I was doing the pots and I'm very easily angrified in the mornings.

where's the punchline?

Living aboard a narrowboat on London canals just gets more an more exciting, the adventures never end.

Constantly cruising and trying to adhere to the rules as much as possible means we move. We move frequently. While the rest of the world (it seems) hides inside in a warm cosy place and rides out the winter only emerging in Spring, we continue the battle of finding somewhere new to moor each week or two.
Knowing we have to move means a few days before casting off I mentally prepare to move home again, mentally prepare my new route to work and mentally prepare for the boring journey ahead up a grim and grizzly london canal.

the travel power pulley has been replaced and a new belt applied. However when running up the engine the belt failed within 5 minutes, so there is still a problem somewhere with the belt fitment. Still no travel-power. still no automated home laundry. that's shit. I hate washing in a bucket.

However, onwards and upwards, since the engine is still capable of propulsion we are heading up towards the River Lea again for a final Assault on the River Stort. I want to see Sawbridgeworth and surrounding areas so that's where we are headed.

From Limehouse, the next stop is Springfield, just one lock and a couple of hours cruising.

Just one lock, Old Ford Bridge, lock 19, yes that's all there is, what could be more simple, it's electric so what can go wrong?

For a start, the lock could be jammed full of more shite than I ever thought possible. A couple of trees, a gate, a couple of doors, some planks of wood, a shopping bag on wheels, massive sheets of plastic, several different balls, 100 or more bottles, uncountable plastic bags, natural plant debris and a delightful swathe of diesel oil over the top of the lot giving off a lovely smell.
You can imagine this might challenge the lock operation a bit. It did. No sooner had I opened the bottom paddles than we had a red malfunction light flashing in the lock-keepers office.
I called BW (0800 4799947) to report the problem and the chap there advised me to "put the kettle on and have a cup of tea" not to be confused with "put your knickers on and make me a cup of tea" To BW's credit they came out quite fast for a cold, wet and windy sunday afternoon.

I sat by the fire warming my arse and clutching a beer* (Hobgoblin) ((*equally not to be confused with clutching my arse and warming a beer)), occasionally glancing out the window to see if anyone was on the lock. In-between glances. somehow the BW key-holding magician slipped under the radar, fixed the lock and buggered off. Maybe he buggered off because I wasn't standing there waiting with a cup of tea?

The lock doors opened and slowly emptied of shite, which was circulating in a cross current just outside. It was a delightful picture of unwanted household items swirling around in the green and brown sludgy paradise of the canal.
Getting in the lock was a case of, give the engine full welly, get some inertia up to tackle the howling side-wind and then knock it out of gear to glide over the swirling mass of rubbish, enter the lock a bit fast, chuck the centre-line and bow line round a bollard and hope Honey Ryder stopped before giving the bow a cill-shaped face lift.

Job done, we went through the lock in minutes.
Brilliant, isn't this canal boating fun?

Excitement over, yes really we do love electric automated locks where you can't control the paddles rate of opening...
Shortly after leaving the lock we realised the adventure wasn't over as we dipped our hands into the lucky dip barrel of fun. First pulling out a piece of wood that was blocking the upper lock doors to find a dead rat under it, then pulling round a corner into a fast flow on the river Lea with a strong head wind, we made progress at a rate of knot...

It's almost painful to watch the scenery go by in slow motion, watching a moorhen paddle past us was a bit like being on the motorway and being overtaken by a caravan... but in this case the caravan was being overtaken by a small bird with dubious fashion sense. ( a bit like me cycling through london in fact)

I can't believe how much fun it was, I could barely contain my joy at spending a whole day of my weekend moving a stupidly designed brick on water just a few miles in driving wind and rain, avoiding plastic bags and other products of human excess. There was nothing I could think of that would bring more joy to my life than doing that.

Oh wait a minute, yes I can.

the magic sponge

As with most modifications, they come about because of an urgent necessity through breakage.

Our travel power has been out of action for just over a week now, ok, it's 2 weeks but I was trying to think positive.

The first symptoms of something wrong happened, er, last year on our maiden voyage away from our marina at Easter. squeaking ( read squealing) bearings in a jockey pulley that stops the large travel power belt from flapping about.

We changed the travel power belt because it was looking a bit worn on the back and WD-40'd the bearings. Yes I know it's not a real fix but it does make the bearings go quiet for a little while. repeated WD-40 application was all it needed... yes, honestly it's got magical properties has WD-40... a bit like the magic sponge at football matches.

fast forward to christmas time 2007, having replaced the travel power belt again, it promptly failed after just 7 days of being fitted. we put it down to a faulty belt.

having adjusted the current belt several times and hummed a little tune while the jockey wheeled screeched away until it heated up we thought , perhaps one day we should replace the bearings.

SO, what happens when the WD-40's magic sponge effect wears off?
When bearings over-heat and explode, your jockey wheel seizes solid, bits fly off and embed themselves wherever it's soft enough, your belt gets fused to an almost red hot jockey wheel and you spend the next day on the phone ordering new parts.
Two new belts, at £14 each and a new "upgraded" jockey wheel that looks like the barrel from a gun, £74.

The new 12-shooter ( for that is how many holes it has bored through it to apparently keep the jockey wheel cool) is due to be fitted soon and normal 240v service should hopefully be resumed.

name that tune....

The tune we are humming is one of a Beta Marine BV1505 engine with travel power on the side.

Since the Man arrives home before me it's generally down to him to fire up the beast each evening to charge the batteries and heat the water.
Last night I arrived home and He tried to describe a new problem he had with the engine. First of all he says, "oh, the engine did a funny thing tonight"
I reply warily, "what kind of funny thing?"
"well" he says, "it was going along nicely then suddenly the note changed and it sounded like it was struggling"
"so what did you do?" say I

"oh, well, I turned off the travel power and nothing changed so I tried to give the engine more revs and still nothing changed"

I replied "have you checked the oil recently?"
(him)"no"
(me)"have you checked the diesel recently?"
(him)"no"
(me)"what about the travel power belt? because last time we had a funny noise that's what it was..."
(him)"no"

(me)"ok... well, we shall assume its one of those, and Im hoping its the latter"

-----------------

two new travel power belts are on order..... and Im hoping that's all it is

-----------------

extra note, the following evening I return home to be told the problem with the belt was that it has melted, yes melted and fused itself to a pulley, (cue funny french sherades describing the exact action and replicated forces which were needed to remove the fused on belt) which has seized bearings.
so, in addition to the new belts we now need to dismantle a pulley and send it off to be matched up with some new bearings.

strange as it may seem, this side of boating I quite like. How one small thing can totally fuck up quite a lot of other things. It keeps you on your toes!

The Victoria park posse

Life in London, moored on a busy towpath is never short of activity, gossip and curiosity. Not to mention unruly dogs and children.

This week, life in the nut house involved several events of note, hardly note-worthy on their own, but as a group, collectively they turn from curious to just plain odd.

So it all started on the Saturday morning when both myself and the Man set about a bit of bike fettling, the man was outside tightening up his bottom bracket (fnar) and I was inside struggling with a slippery cheap chain and tooling around. (fnar again)
The Banjo was on the roof barking at anything that moved and then arrived the first visitor of the day, a red haired lady from a neighbouring boat carrying a spanner. Having seen the Man outside with his tools she thought he was a good person to ask to borrow “one smaller than this” as she held out a 9mm spanner. He, being weak at the sight of a moderately attractive lady, offered her two!

So, fast forward an hour and we have our bikes put back together and are ready for a spin over to Greenwich market and Blackheath.
The Man goes to retrieve his tools.
The red haired lady ( we shall call Hillary) claimed that she couldn’t find them.
The Man comes back agitated and worried for the whereabouts of his 20 odd year old tools.
I sympathetically reply, “yes but they were a bit shit anyway, I’ve still got mine and they are better than yours…they will probably turn up in her cats bed or something”
This didn’t help.

So we arrive back a few hours later, still no sign of the tools, Hillary is very apologetic and adds that she is quite worried because her cat has disappeared. ( I shall call the cat Moggy-Joe)

A ha…. I smell a plot thickening.

So the hunt is on for both Moggy-Joe and the shit-old-tools. I casually mentioned that perhaps the cat has nicked the tools.
This didn’t help

I have spent the past few weeks looking for a remote control for the stereo, it’s small and black, it was last seen at the end of 2007. After yet another evening of searching for this intrepid remote control I concluded that the cat must have this too.

It was late, dark and quite a pleasant evening, then the Coots started hollering. They have a coots-hangout opposite where we are moored and they can be noisy buggers. After deciphering the complex hoots, coots and bird banter I came to the understanding that one of them had accidentally stubbed its boney clawed toe on a spanner absentmindedly left behind by Moggy-Joe after a few jars of catnip following the local wildlife’s secret poker game. The cat took off with the tools and my remote control to avoid getting a kicking from the vicious coots.

The following morning Hillary has turned her boat upside down but still no sign of cat, spanners or remote control.

So, the day progresses like any usual Sunday, the men of the Victoria park posse go about chopping wood, we, the Honey Ryder crew had a small fire on the roof slow cooking our tagine, beer was drunk by all and I turned Mini-Baghdad back into a kitchen again. Complete with useable surfaces and everything. I also answered questions from the tow-path, from curious or just plain stupid passers by. I have everything from "does your dog bite", "can I stroke your dog", "do you live on that", "how much do you pay to put your boat here", "can I have a look around inside?"

Tired of being treated like a freak show I finally sat down to some serious leisure gel battery research when the Man returned ready to serve up the tagine, hotly followed by the neighbours asking to borrow the dinghy to investigate a sighting of Moggy-Joe on the opposite side of the canal near the lock.
It turns out to be a case of mistaken identity. The unidentified cat was looking in a bad way as it seems the coots had caught up with it, thinking it was the cheeky cat that cleared them out at poker the night before.

However the Tagine was lovely and well worth the 2 hours cooking time

Moggy-Joe, the tools and my stereo remote are still at large.

if plastic bags were women?

having moved yet again from my favourite spot in Limehouse Basin we cruised up the Regents canal ( not the limehouse cut as we would later regret)

Now, anyone who's has been around London may, or may not have experienced this lovely bit of canal. It has taken me nearly a week to find the words to describe it eloquently.

Basically it's a shit hole and reinforces everything I abhor about canals.

we cruised quickly through the first lock (which of course had to be turned around as they are never facing the your way- thats the law of the sod)
no sooner were we through that lock and the next lock quickly appeared, again the wrong way round but that's ok, we were expecting that.

So, the Man (who is gradually getting less and less grumpy these days as the thoughts of selling the boat get more and more imminent and the dream of sailing the world get closer) was in fact on particularly good form and we were working well as a team and everything was going tooooo well.

We exited the second lock, swung by a rubbish barge, it wasn't rubbish, it was quite good, very convenient as it is a great place to chuck the rubbish...
fnar, so, rounded the first corner and suddenly we are going nowhere.
The realisation quickly dawned on us that the pound was badly drained and we were on the bottom, literally ditch crawling.
It's a shite state of affairs when this happens because not only is there very little water, the concentration of plastic bags per litre of rancid canal water increases 100fold.

We decided to head to the side and beach ourselves so we could have a good look in the weed hatch.
what we found was a prop completely engulfed in plastic.
You can imagine by now Ive been standing on the side a few times with a limp wet rope, my hood pulled up around my ears to keep out the freezing wind and a charming view of a pair of legs pointing away from the weed hatch.
It's at times like this I kill the time by entertaining myself with fantasies.

....As the french swearing faded to the back of my consciousness my mind was swimming around a blue lagoon, with turquoise warm waters, surrounded by ladies clad only in shiny plastic bikinis, I imagined their cheeky smiling faces laughing and all shiny from playing in the water, then as one cast away her restrictive plastic swimwear, so did the others and the plastic bikinis took on a life of their own, floating across the surface of the crystal clear water they take form, fill out and become a whole new set of lovely ladies, swimming about and causing mischief.....

back in reality the prop was cleared and we pushed the boat away from the sandbank at the side and continued at a snails pace on towards the next lock. After less than 50meters we were virtually motionless again and so back to the side for further weed hatch foraging and limp wet rope holding...
It seemed pointless trying to drive the boat the final quarter mile to the next lock so I set about bow hauling while the next load of bikinis were being liberated from the prop and rudder. The rudder yielded an impressive haul too, although I never did see a woman with breasts quite so big before.


theres a small pile of plastic by the door and more in the dinghy.

Giz a Job

Before life on board the good ship ( read: metal tube) Honey Ryder, my day consisted of, drag myself out of my flea pit at around 9.50am, splash some water on my face, have some breakfast and then hop on my pushbike and arrive at work at 10am. My work happens to be my "dream" job of working on a motorbike magazine. It doesn't pay well, but the perks stack up high. This is what is often called Golden Handcuffs and I've been wearing them for nearly seven years.

yes, life wasn't at all bad back then. I had time to go places after work, i could be home at 6pm, sometimes even earlier, I had time to do stuff in the mornings too if I wasn't too lazy. so the idea to go and live on a boat and commute to work was a bit of a deep thinking point even two years ago when the plan to live on a boat was hatched. The first problem is that Croydon ( the devils armpit of a town where I work) has no waterways particularly close to it, the second problem is that I chose to continuously cruise after having a particularly unpleasant marina experience at the start.

after much deep contemplation and a moment of wishful thinking I decided it would be worth giving it a try, to see how hard commuting between 60 - 120 miles a day really could be.

I have tried car, motorbike, scooter, trains, tubes, trams, buses and cycling. I think it would be fair to say I have tried every avenue of transportation available to me. To describe my findings on what it is like to travel between three and four hours per day just to get to work would take some time and since time is something that has become particularly scarce since I started all this, then I should get to the point.

it's sent me round the bend,

through a little village called Insanity, calling in at Asylum café for a cup of shut the F**k up along the way and then found myself heading into an unknown scary city called Quit-your-job, I found a parking space at a pub called the Golden Handcuffs and when I turned around my motorbike had turned into a horse. .

Valentines day 2008 (that's february 14th for all you non-romantics) will be the end of my working love affair, the end of an era, the end of free motorbikes. I am saying goodbye to my dream job and saying hello to a new job working at Horse & Hound magazine, which is in London and will mean a 30 minute cycle ride to and from work.

Goodbye commuting blues, Hello Dobbin.

double yellows

double yellows

Email this entry | Print this entry Jan 25 2008, 12:35 PM

I never thought I would see the day when the river has a "no parking yellow line" painted on the side.

until I got home my impression was that the bend with the yellow line painted on the pilings was so people could see the bend more easily.
In fact I got home last night to find a message taped to my door telling me to move my boat.

There is nothing at the side of the river saying I can't moor there, no written sign I mean... so I was quite surprised to see the message on my boat.

The canoe centre I am moored opposite has told me that BW requests people not to moor on the yellow line because the canoe centre has activities with young children??? WHAT?
Ive not heard such verbal bollocks in a while, the river is wide at the bend and since there is nowhere else to moor then I am moored to the nearest convenient spot where Im not obstructing anyone and not annoying anyone with my engine noise in the evening. It is afterall January still and I am one of the few boats that keep moving in this area.

I would move the boat if I had anywhere I could move to. everywhere is full at the moment.

Still, it's nice to feel welcome, yet again at a random stretch of river bank.

Entry the TO DO list

the TO DO list

Email this entry | Print this entry Jan 21 2008, 03:07 PM

once again it was time to move on, having spent two weeks at Victoria park in London we needed to move to a new mooring spot.

Living on a boat is never dull and rarely boring, there is always something to be done. Whether that is something you actually want to be doing is another matter.
Quick frankly, I was all up for a nice cosy weekend of cooking, faffing and sifting. Downsizing my stuff once again, because you can never have too few things. Minimalist is going to be my middle name. However this all had to wait as there was a "to do" list with my initials at the bottom.

Saturday stuff to do
- get up early
- cycle to regents street apple shop to get a computer fixed
- cycle back to the boat via a supermarket and stock up on food
- reverse the boat back to the waterpoint
- bail out my half sunken dinghy
- empty the poo-pot
- reverse through the lock
- turn at the bottom of the lock
- hang a sharp left into ducketts canal
- wizz through the 4 locks
- swing left onto the River lee and et voila, arrive Springfield/Hackney marshes at around 2pm
- cycle back to victoria park and collect my car
- spend a nice evening relaxing with a bottle of Bigga and a film

the reality was, well spot the difference...

- get up early? After a late night we scraped ourselves out of bed at around 9.30am, so much for early

- after faffing around with the bikes, by this time it was 10.15am and the rain had started into which we headed, with a strong headwind just for added pleasure.

- we arrived at the computer shop to be told we should have had an appointment to see someone, so we stood there, pretty moist and annoyed still with a faulty puter on regents street at 12.30 suddenly feeling hungry.

- on the way to unchain the bikes we accidentally wandered up to Carnaby Street and found a nice cafe and chowed down for 45 mins and mulled over the successful day we were having. I had a splendid hot dog (with onions).

- back to the bikes, the rain started yet again.

- We decided to leave the shopping trip until later when I needed to collect the car. So I carried a large empty bag, in the wind, all the way to the centre of London and back just for the fun of it - it's called resistance training.

- Back at the boat we see the neighbours and obviously stop and chat, the Man is offered the hand-me-round joint another boater has just rolled.

- Then followed the predictable chaos as I tried and failed to reverse the boat down seven lengths of other boats to the water point, my dinghy, full of two weeks worth of angel-piss was teetering around with just a few inches of free-board left, tied to the front of the boat.
The Man is still stoned and now munching away on any scraps of food left in the kitchen.
By the time we arrived at the lock, after a bit of stern hauling, it was close to 4pm

- at the water point we discovered that the taps dont have the same kind of thread as most of the others on the system so our hose doesn't fit. Well it didnt until we modified it with a good amount of PVC tape (no boat is complete without several rolls of PVC)

- I set about emptying the dinghy with a bailer, but am distracted by the Man (still a little giggly) taking the poo-pot to the elsan point... carrying it partly with the white handle, you know the one that operates the guillotine closure, the one that if you open it by accident means a whole world of sorrow at your feet, possible your legs and equally possibly in your face if theres a bit of back pressure...
once my voice came back down to sub-sonic levels of calmness after explaining the merits of carrying the case by its proper handle and NEVER ever EVER pull that white handle while the pot is full, I resumed bailing out the dinghy. ( thetford should colour the handle red to avoid confusion)

- water tank full, poo-pot empty, dinghy empty, lock emptied and boat hauled out and turned we finally set off "cruising" to our new mooring.

- down below I was sorting out the washing machine which had just finished, when I heard the engine change note, getting a little urgent, a bit more urgent, then quiet... then reversing quite urgently. I popped up to see what was happening and quickly see a grinning man looking sheepish at having missed the turn for Ducketts. a slight misjudgment led to a few minutes of maneuvering in the wind followed by a bit of a messy entrance to the link canal, followed by more requests from the Man for chocolate bars and a bottle of beer.

- three locks flew by in no time and before we knew it we were at Hackney Wick. And then we realised we were going quite slow...

- standing at the side at the junction of the river lee and ducketts I was holding the centreline while He went down the weedhatch with his favourite knife to remove the offending Argos bag and some pieces of tree. As I stood there, in the dark, in the mud, holding a cold wet rope, my trousers looking very secondhand after starting out clean that morning, I looked in through the large glass fronted apartments and remarked about how I imagined how many people were probably laying on their comfortable sofas in the warm and dry watching some shit on TV.

- a while later we arrived at Hackney marshes, 6pm, unloaded the bikes and cycled back the way we had just come to collect the car and go shopping. On the journey His bike got a puncture so we had to walk the rest of the way. Finally back at the car and loaded up with bikes we trundled off to do some food gathering. By the time we got home after walking back from the car with two bikes (one with a flat tyre), three very heavy shopping bags it was 9pm.
Once again my mind flashed back to those flashy but cosy looking apartments and thought, little do they know what's happening in the world outside their cocoons.

- after a couple of halibut steaks we sat down to watch a dvd, Death Proof and breathed a sigh of relief that tomorrow was finally going to be a day of faffing.

Entry madness at the park

madness at the park

Email this entry | Print this entry Jan 7 2008, 01:16 PM

After a brief stay at Springfield, Bow Locks ( arf arf) and Lime house, we moved up to Victoria park in london.

we cruised the ring from springfield all the way around without seeing more than two boats. However We have now discovered where they all congregate, and that is Victoria Park. That place is heaving with boaters, doubled up pretty much all the way. We managed to find a spot on the outside of a boat we were immediately warned not to walk on the side of and avoid the roof. This command came from a neighbour who helped us tie up.
The reason was not territorial but simply to avoid us falling through the boat!
It's quite a boaters atmosphere at the park, engines or gennies running, smoke billowing from chimneys, people wandering around chatting to each other, filling up with water, it's a hive of activity. feels a bit like a gypsy camp.

Quite a change from Limehouse which has very few visitor spaces and nobody seems to want to fight over them. I dont understand why there is so many people crammed into this one space at the park. We decided to go there mostly out of curiosity as we've never stayed anywhere so busy before.

We discovered fairly quickly after arrival why the boat next to us was single moored when she started her engine, it vibrated our boat more than our own engine. Noisy is one word to describe it. I have several others. I can say them at the top of my lungs because no one can hear me scream!

literary genius in the making

literary genius in the making

Email this entry | Print this entry Jan 2 2008, 02:14 PM

Narrowboating might be the death of me if I don't sell it soon.

Ok, so it's not actually for sale at the moment but it will be. I've had enough of this "living the dream", "life on the cut", "river gypsy lifestyle", and several other clichés.

Narrowboating, it's definitely not cricket. it's definitely not boating, it is definitely narrow though so I will give it that.

Im currently thinking of titles for my book, Ive searched and searched and I still cant find a book about the subject, which is currently forefront of my frontal creative imagination lobe. A humerous view from the side of those who in fact think narrowboats, roses and castles and rosie and jim should be consigned to the nearest largest skip available. (please note: I don't hate boating, far from it, I just hate narrowboating)

so far my working titles include:
great expectations ( already been done that so a no no)
narrowboat to hell ( a bit gloom and doom, i dont want to put readers off)
skip on water ( I like this one... )
the 4mph race (double entendre... race meaning people...geddit? )
sour dreams
when dreams turn bad!!! ( a take on the american police car chase tv programmes)

ive had loads more ideas but have forgotten them for the moment. Im happy to consider anyones suggestions.

Festivis

I love and hate this time of year, firstly I usually get a few days off work but then so does every bugger else which, lets face it can be a pain in the arse if you want to go anywhere or have a normal life.

secondly I dislike it because everyone keeps wishing me merry christmas... NO, I don't want a merry christmas, I dont want to drink to excess, eat to excess or do anything to excess and be merry, I don't want to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ, I don't want to waste valuable trees on pointless cards wishing other people a merry christmas too. I wish people would stop spending money on pointless crap like if they don't have it their lives may as well be over because mum/dad/brother/sister/aunty will be sooooooo disappointed.

Does this make me a scrooge? No! especially here... and here is currently Springfield on the River Lee.

I was working on Monday the 24th so the Man moved the boat up the river a bit so we could leave our boat amongst other boats while we left it for a couple of days. Springfield is right next to Stamford Hill, Europes biggest Orthodox Jewish area. Which is great because they certainly don't go ramming mindless christian festivities down my neck. In fact I can go for a walk and not see a single sign of xmas, christmas, Christ Mass anywhere.

Ho ho ho... bloomin marvelous.

Now I already had my own little celebration on the 20th, 21st and 22nd, celebrating the winter solstice and now we have turned the corner of winter and are heading towards longer lighter days, surely an excuse to celebrate if ever there is one.

So on with the loving side of this time of year, I get time off work, and so does my family and friends. Which means I get to see them for the first time in months. Catching up with a best friend is priceless, spending some time with family, talking about all sorts of things, putting the world to rights is great.
Being in a house and having a king-size bed you would image is bliss, but for me I couldn't sleep because I had too much space around me.

Back on terra-not-so-firma, we are rocking and rolling in the wind, back in the small and cosy surroundings of our metal box ( aka narrowboat)
I feel more at home than ever. although I haven't changed my mind about selling the boat it has certainly re-affirmed how much I still want to live on a boat of some description.

I have a to-do list as long as my right foot so I shall be kept occupied for the remainder of the holidays. Although I am very easily distracted and there's a strong chance that in fact sod all will get done except for some high class faffing.

Bow Locks

Bow Locks

Email this entry | Print this entry Dec 17 2007, 07:28 PM

We moved from Limehouse up the cut a bit to Bow Locks.

The more I look at the name Bow Locks.... the more it looks like bowlocks...
you can see where im going with this I imagine...

yes, puerile mind at play I admit.

So Bow locks it is for the moment. I have no idea where we will be this time next week. Perhaps a little further north? perhaps a little bit more inside London village?

I saw a gorgeous boat in Limehouse on the pontoon where we filled up with water.
I am sooooo jealous. I want one. No, I want two, one for me and one for him so he doesn't make mine all messy with his socks and shoes everywhere.


(this is not the exact boat or exact same location, you dont get palm trees in limehouse bsin)

of course, we can all dream, so come the boat show in January at Excel, Im going to be there looking at everything I couldnt possibly afford ever in my lifetime without a lottery win.

Entry Cheshunt to Limehouse Basin

Cheshunt to Limehouse Basin

Email this entry | Print this entry Dec 5 2007, 06:57 PM

After two and a bit weeks of mooring alongside a friend the time came for us to move on to pastures new.

The kind gentleman Cliff (and his frequently visiting lady friend Dianne) on his boat Axe looked after Honey Ryder while I was on holiday and kept me company while I was home alone , he even lent me his axe, labelled Axe should anyone want to know what it was or what boat it came from...

Axe has ventured north up the river lee and Honey Ryder has ventured south of Cheshunt for the first time in weeks. Heading due south we arrived at Limehouse basin six hours after we set off. The day started with a heated discussion about, I forget what now, but the inevitable parting of ways started off early as I walked off down the tow path to speak to a neighbour and turn the lock around while He took the boat up to a turning point, smoking a cigarette furiously as he went. We swiftly made friends again when we met at the lock and the day was plain cruising all the way to Limehouse. We cruised into the darkness but as we neared Londinium the light pollution made progress very easy and we moored up at the nearest convenient spot, which just happened to be a 7 day mooring spot. Hurray!

now it seems we arrived just at the right time, as the weather turned to howling banshee gales and sideways rain. We had to devise a new fendering method to stop the boat from slamming against the quay side. The slamming effect was fraying the nerves of the dog who jumped out of bed at every boom or bang as the boat bounced off the wooden pilings. At first I thought he was too nervous to poo when I took him outside to do his natural business, but in fact its just the lack of grass that's putting him off.
yes toto, we're not in kansas anymore...

the concrete urban jungle is quite a posh one around Limehouse, to rent a flat around there you are looking at a minimum of £500 a week.

despite the concrete, the citiscape is a site to behold and ive been loving the past few days of being there. with real boats to look at through the window, ones with masts, ones with big engines, ones with beautifully shaped hulls, it makes me feel like Im really boating at last. The fact we've had some harsh weather has helped too, making the boat rock constantly, which is a real source of comfort to me. I love it when the boat rocks. Except then I remember I'm on a narrowboat and remind myself that they weren't designed to rock.

I think I might write a book, they say everyone has a book in them, well, mine might be a tongue in cheek look into the world of living on a boat, "if it floats, then surely its a boat?"

muppets

muppets

Email this entry | Print this entry Nov 30 2007, 06:17 PM

The muppets of the puppetry type, a guaranteed way to raise a smile and add a ray of sunshine to your day

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7wMHcpMmV9g

oh and i found out last night that they caught the little muppet who broke into my neighbours car, thanks to a nice sample of blood he left on the door.

muppet.

Entry a one woman crime wave

a one woman crime wave

Email this entry | Print this entry Nov 27 2007, 10:38 AM

It seems as though this year is doomed to be a year of criminal activity. I feel like it is surrounding me at the moment.

At the start of the year, the boating year just after easter I had my bike nicked off the roof of the boat, that was a sign of things to come.
I bought a new bike and then two months later that was nicked too, this time from a secure carpark...
then came the car's time to be broken into and violated.

so you would imagine that the three things would stop there.

no, during my holidays my neighbours car got broken into in a supposedly safe carpark,
then a couple of days later Im sitting in the same car park fiddling with an annoying sticker on my car windscreen when one of the most beat up cars you can imagine came trundling into the car park full of young people, very suspicious looking I noticed the car had no plates and after some of the occupants disappeared off to the tow path they emerged and a few minutes later I saw them rummaging through a handbag that really didn't look like it belonged to them, so I reported it to the police once they left.
the next day my neighbours saw another car full of young people, again with no plates in th car park and that was also reported to the police...

So you can imagine my sheer delight when I arrived at my friends flat yesterday morning to discover she had been burgled while she was away for the weekend. thankfully the burgler hadnt trashed the place or even had time to clear it out completely but the feeling of being constantly violated by people who have no respect for others is starting to really get to me.

Its hardly suprising that as a nation we are becoming more and more protective over our land and our property, and are increasingly paranoid about strangers.

I dream of a day when we never need to use a lock and key again.

Entry A couple of weeks non-boating

A couple of weeks non-boating

Email this entry | Print this entry Nov 22 2007, 06:31 PM

As I near the end of my two weeks holiday, away from work, away from the man, away from all the infuriating commuting...
I have arrived the other side feeling so much energetic and full of life. I havent moved the boat at all, Im still moored alongside a friend who looked after it while I went away to the north, arriving back all I needed to do was run the engine and charge the batteries.

unfortunately with the boat along side me its created a really good metal barrier to my internet signal so tonight instead of propping the computer in a window in a very uncomfortable fashion Im sitting on the back deck with views of an amazing sky and a moon, almost full is reflecting nicely off the mirror calm water. my hands are seizing up nicely with the cold now.

This two weeks have been simply superb, I have met lots of other boaters, chatted to walkers and other passers by, so many of them seem amazed I would want to live on a boat in the winter. I remind them it's not winter yet but even so they can't understand it. I try to explain how hot it can get inside when the fire is lit, just this week I had a little experiment with coal in my fire and I nearly set myself on fire, such was the fury of the heat it was giving off. brilliant, except I was too hot all night once I went to bed. Ive never been too hot in a house before! At 5am it was still hotter than a rattlesnakes ass.

The neighbour lent me an axe to chop up some kindling, oh I want one of those now. an Axe... such good fun and great for venting any frustrations
not that I have any frustrations but it was fun anyway.

and so my holiday is drawing near to an end, I want to get as much done as possible before I have to collect the man from the airport on saturday morning. So much I had planned and so little has been done. I dont feel bad about doing practically bugger all, after all holidays are what you make of them.

tomorrow, if the mood takes me then i think I shall take the dog for a deep exploration of the local wildlife park. whats the point of mooring up slap bang in the middle of a watery wildlife haven if I dont at least go and have a look at what all the fuss is about.
although I could very easily end up by the seaside instead. yes, the seaside is a far better place to go than the local lake.

fish n chips, over looking the sea, with a dog begging at my side... now that is bliss.

clairvoyance, rose tinting and arid extra dry

clairvoyance, rose tinting and arid extra dry

Email this entry | Print this entry Nov 14 2007, 11:40 PM

Im on holiday, the kind of holiday where there are no plans, nothing to do but simply enjoy not working and having a chance to have some quality time with me.
Its been a few years since, in fact no, its been since NEVER that I had two weeks to do as I please, to do what I like, when I like because, just because.

I'm on my own here on Honey Ryder and for the first time since I've lived on the boat I feel like Im enjoying it. not because Im moving the boat, not because I even like the boat, but I think it's because it's feeling more homely and my energy has gone right back up there into the clouds since the grumpy "anti english" man I share my life space with (and most of my life energy it seems) has gone to france to do some professional faffing for two weeks and I imagine spend all the time being deliriously happy to be back in france!
I never realised a person could sap so much energy just by being in close proximity and being perpetually miserable. If I had known at the start maybe I would have called the boat, Les Miserables....

So my pecker is definitely lifted after just five days away from work and man and Ive just arrived back from a little visit to see my family so the world is looking rose tinted at the moment.

during those five days I have embarked on the start of a little bit of an educational journey. a spiritual one. well, i tried to make it spiritual but the cynical side of me kept telling the gullible side of me, "get a grip love it's just a load of old bollocks"
however, that didn't stop it being educational and Im keeping an open mind or at least trying to.
The start of this journey began by visiting a church. not any old regular christian church but a spiritualist one. it was a nice little place with purple walls and curtains and some gypsy trinkets around a small altar. Unfortunately I was left totally unconvinced by the Medium as she relayed her clairvoyance to some obviously emotionally needy people in the audience/congregation.
The atmosphere was nice though and the people seemed genuine enough. I think I need to see a bit more and visit some more churches or centres before I find the answers I am looking for.

meanwhile Im moored near to a very passionate couple, passionate and noisy. Im very happy for them, very happy indeed as they are quite a mature couple and seem to be putting the duracell bunny to shame. However it doesn't half make it seem like the Arid desert over here.

Just like marmite?

Just like marmite?

Email this entry | Print this entry Nov 8 2007, 09:55 AM

finally me and the man agree on something, we are definitely selling the Honey Ryder next year.
Well, I say selling, I mean trying to sell it next spring time ish.

First we have work to complete on the exterior paint, and an engine service or two to complete before then, plus fitting a new solid oak kitchen floor, renovate the kitchen and spruce up the showerroom.

That's where the agreement ends though. we need to complete the work, sell the boat and find a new living arrangement.

He doesn't like living in England, in fact he doesn't like quite a lot of things, and in particular he doesn't like my idea to live on a yacht by the coast.
He wants a piece of land to grow food and animals and generally live off the land as much as he can, having lots of "things" spread around him. Basically he needs space and a boat doesn't give him that luxury as there is absolutely no room to store any amount of crap you might want to hoard. and hoarding makes him very very happy.

I on the other hand am perfectly happy in a boat, the compact spaces, the odd shaped beds, cubby holes, ingenious methods of storage, the noise of a diesel engine, the clank of rigging on a mast, the sound of birds pattering over the roof, the plink plopping of the water on the sides, the watery reflections on the ceiling, the sensation of movement as you move around, the fact you can just untie and move on to another place, using a fraction of the water and electricity than you would in a house, not being tied to a piece of the earth someone has laid a claim to, yes living afloat on a boat is right up my alley, street and watery driveway. it tickles me pink, makes me go all warm inside when i think about it and doing it just puts the cherry right on the top of that cake that sits on the sliding hatchway i enjoy trying to avoid hitting my head on or swinging from when its open.

When I say boat, I mean BOAT, not a narrowboat. A narrowboat (In my opinion) is basically a caravan on water and the water is more of an inconvenience. I think I prefer mobile homes to narrowboats. at least with a mobile home you can really go places.

Its not often you read of someone saying they dont like narrowboats. I tried a google search to see if there was any more disillusioned people out there who put their thoughts down on an internet forum or blog for people to read.
There's nothing, I've found zero articles, jack schit, bugger all about people NOT liking narrowboats or canal boating.

What is it I don't like about narrowboats? It's hard to put my finger directly on the spot but I think mostly it's their limitations. They can't maneuver quickly, they are heavy, slow, cumbersome, ugly narrow metal boxes replicated over and over again, yes some have lovely paint jobs and I applaud owners who find new and interesting ways of painting things on their boats, but generally speaking they don't give the most pleasant of boating sensations.
it's an entirely limited boating experience.

So it seems I am alone in my dislike of the long metal boxes. perhaps that makes me a snob? I don't think so because, in fact the yachts I've looked at for a guide to price are roughly the same price or cheaper than most 57' narrowboats like Honey Ryder. That could be due to the fact HR has been kitted out from it's original build as a liveaboard and has liveaboard luxuries you wont find initially on a yacht? maybe a steel hull is more valuable than GRP hull? that doesn't explain why grp motorcruisers are so flippin expensive.. apart from if you count the engines.... narrowboats have this odd heritage appeal and perhaps that is what keeps their prices relatively high?

I'm not sure about that, I'm not sure about a lot of things, but there's one thing I am definitely sure of, and that is, I love living on boats.

I think narrowboats are a bit like marmite, you either love them or hate them, but you will never know unless you try it.

doggies got a brand new bag

doggies got a brand new bag

Email this entry | Print this entry Nov 3 2007, 10:11 AM

so on the theme of bags and how people of the south wear theirs...

papas got a brand new bag.. or more precisely Mr B.

ok, its pink and feminine but Mr B is an effeminate dog and doesn't much care.

I shall be parading like a proper prissy dog owner now. actually he will be more secure in his car when he's in my car... thats the main point of it.

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