On Schedule !

1 March 2011

Apart from a brief visit to the boat some while after the severe cold snap at the end of 2010, when R did basic winterising - opening taps and draining the Attwood shower pump sump - our boat had largely lain forlorn. Part of the reason for this was that R had his hernia operation just before Christmas and was on light duties for the next six weeks or so whilst he recovered. Another reason was that R doesn't do cold. Anything less than double figures (Centigrade) is too cold and needs only a very feeble excuse to stop R venturing out of the house. Even putting milk bottles out is something to be avoided if possible - luckily we only have deliveries three times a week!

1 March 2011 was on a Tuesday and there were then only five weeks left before we set out on our Spring cruise so R decided that he'd better start to think about getting the boat ready (despite the low temperature). And so it was, on that Tuesday that after his now regular weekly visit to the portacabin to help with office work, he found himself with a little time to kill before adjourning to the café as an invited guest, for lunch - actually an early afternoon tea that had been prepared as part of a training exercise by the café staff.

R opened up the boat before he started on the paperwork and checked the battery voltage levels, which were still sitting at around 12.5 volts on all batteries. Nonetheless and for the first time since the November trip, R plugged in the land-line and fired up the inverter/charger, leaving it connected until he had completed his office work.

The office work was done by 11am, just in time for tea! Afterwards, and now recovered from his hernia operation, R changed the gas bottles on the boat as both were empty because the boiler had been left on low since before Christmas in an effort to try and avoid frost damage to boiler and calorifier.

The first of the day's other two jobs involved refitting the shower pump sump, which had been stripped down and taken home for cleaning. Then with all taps and valves closed the water pump was turned on with some trepidation because we would have a leak in the water supply somewhere if the pump continued to run.

A few seconds later the pump stopped, much to R's pleasure. He pottered around, preparing to dismantle the flooring in the engine room to allow the grease monkey to service the boat over the next few days. Suddenly the water pump started up again and ran for several seconds, despite no water having been drawn. What's more, R could hear running water and set off to investigate.

He found the mixer tap in the kitchen dispensing a small but steady flow of water. These were the one thing that somehow managed to escape our attention when winterising, and the taps had remained shut when they should have been left open. With only a little time before lunch and the engine room still to dismantle, R noted the problem which he'd investigate further on his next visit.

M thinks that the taps have a ceramic insert which may simply need cleaning. The taps were not the most expensive in the world and whilst replacement will not necessarily be easy due to restricted access at the back of the sink, it is a relatively minor problem compared to what we might have found in the way of frost damage (and what we may still find once we'd cleared the current problem). Our fingers were firmly crossed.

The engine room flooring was then dismantled and stowed in the bedroom and kitchen (from whence it can be quickly retrieved). That done - the electrics get disconnected when the floor is removed, R closed and secured the boat and headed for the café to keep his appointment. An hour later and suitably refreshed and because he had errands to do on the way, R headed for home.

8 March 2011

We had a visitor at home so R didn't intend staying too long when he visited the boatyard for his usual Tuesday office visit. He arrived just after 9am and found M was missing (although M returned shortly after) so R headed for his boat. The grease monkey had done the business because all the spare filters that R had left had vanished.

R managed to clamber over the engine - the floor was still missing after the service - and made his way to the kitchen. He opened his toolbox, extracted his adjustable spanner and tried to release the the tap without any luck. He adjourned to the bedroom, retrieved the boat's toolbox and extricated the right size ring spanner. Once again there was no movement on the tap. The boat's small ratchet operated socket set was equally of no use.

M appeared almost on cue, took one look at the tap and had a try himself. He decreed that a deep socket with longer shaft was required with a large pair of Stilson's used to stop the tap body from turning in the work surface's mounting hole. It was a job for later, once the accounts were done.

The accounts were eventually finished just after 1pm and whilst M disappeared for his lunch, R set off in search of the relevant tools which he found, took to his boat and then commenced his lunch. He was soon interrupted by one of the moorer's who stopped for a chat. They were joined by another and then M re-appeared, fully feasted, so R decided against the rest of his lunch and headed back inside his boat, where he'd also managed to replace the engine room floor before lunch.

The drop of penetrating oil that R had applied before dinner probably didn't do much but eventually the tap submitted once it had been introduced to the deeper socket and the Stilson's. One of the washers looked slightly displaced. This was removed, along with one or two other components and then everything was refitted. Apart from inadvertently swapping the hot for the cold, the simple act of dismantling seemed to have done the job and the taps no longer leaked. In addition, the water pump only ran when it was expected, a hopeful sign that we have escaped any frost damage.

The tools were all returned to the rightful places, the electrics turned off, the boat locked and R headed back to his car where he deposited the toolboxes he'd brought from home. He then spent a short while setting up a few spreadsheets on the grease monkey's computer. From there R returned home to spend what remained of the afternoon with his guest who would ultimately head home to North Wales by train later in the day.

12 March 2011

We were on the road just before 9am and had arrived at the boat within the usual thirty minutes as the roads were clear. This might have had something to do with it being Saturday. The temperature was increasing nicely and continued to do so during the day with the result that we were able to have doors and windows open and gradually remove the outer layers of clothes that we'd worn to stop us getting cold.

We started by putting the kettle on, reasoning that if we stopped before we started we'd waste less time! H started spring cleaning after we had our cuppa, for which we were joined by M, taking a break from re-wiring his narrowboat in readiness for our trip in 3½ weeks time.

R decided to start on the paintwork, rubbing down the undercoat that we'd applied before Christmas. However, before doing so he decided to add some sterilising liquid to the water tank and drain off the small amount that was left in the tank before refilling it - a task that we never actually achieved until a subsequent visit.

In readiness for the painting R delved under the front deck to extract the paint and whilst there eyed the chimney brush, so he swept the chimney. Then he tried to open the fire door and found that the handle cum lock had seized so he had to open the door with a spanner (which involved a trip to the car for the toolbox). Copious applications of oil and penetrating oil were not sufficient to make a significant difference so R decided to try removing the handle. He didn't shear the bolt holding the handle but did shear the roll pin securing the handle to the bolt. The door, which fortunately is easily removable, was taken to and left with the grease monkey in the hope that he may be able to both free the retaining nut and replace the pin.

Finally, and after we'd stopped for an early lunch that was taken in the café, R managed to attack the painting. Luckily it wasn't a long job as H had more or less finished the cleaning work, leaving us just to unload a couple of crates containing sundry items that had been taken home after the final trip of last year from the car, one of which was unpacked and the other left on the bed. This contained bedding which we judged would be better left off the bed until we wanted to use it.

With that we collected up the tools, closed the boat down and headed for home where we arrived just after 3pm and put the kettle on whilst we unloaded the car.

15 March 2011

R paid his usual Tuesday visit to the boatyard, arriving a few minutes before 9am. He'd been overcome by a dizzy spell at home on Sunday evening and had spent most of Monday sitting quietly at home. He felt much better by Tuesday morning although he still wasn't 100%.

The paperwork took all morning and the early part of the afternoon but by around 2.30pm M was desperate to take advantage of the dry spell to do some groundwork so wrapped things up. R headed for his boat, set the water tank filling and then transferred a few things that had been brought from home onto the boat. He turned the electric on to power the water tank gauge and realised later, once he arrived home that he'd forgotten to switch it off again. Fortunately, there shouldn't have been anything left powered up that would drain the batteries before his next visit.

The grease monkey had not had much success with freeing up the catch on the stove's door. In fact, although he said that he'd freed it a little, when R checked he found it wasn't any freer than it had been when it was taken off the stove.

R had located the stove's manual which gave the serial number because he felt that the stove may still come under the three year guarantee although we couldn't remember exactly when the stove was bought. He called the manufacturer before he left the boatyard and was told that all warranty enquiries had to be made through the stove's retail supplier. That wasn't going to be a five minute job and would be time wasted if the guarantee had expired.

R asked if the guarantee could be checked and the firm undertook to call him back within 15 minutes. Nearly thirty minutes later, with no returned call and with the water tank now full, R secured the boat and headed for home.

He called the manufacturer from home and was advised that the stove was about eight years old according to the serial number. Unfortunately, because we bought the stove through the boatyard we don't have the receipt to prove otherwise, even though we bought the stove new and believe that we both completed and despatched the warranty card. We can but assume that the stove had been in the retailer's stock between production and our purchase.

Stove spares are dealt with by a separate company so R called them, discovered that they had (just) one replacement at approximately £27 (a bit less than R thought they were priced). Unfortunately, the value meant that it had to be despatched by courier, which added a further £9 to the bill and tax was added to that. Delivery should be within two days.

The grease monkey knew that we planned to order the new part but we didn't want him to remove the old handle in case the new one didn't arrive before the weekend. We tried to contact him to tell him this but still hadn't managed to do so late the following afternoon. He simply wasn't answering his 'phone.

16 March 2011

Regular readers will be more than aware that we use a Vodafone dongle to connect to the Internet whilst we're on the boat. We've had the dongle for over 18 months and have only had to top it up twice, such is our limited use of it. Anyway, that dongle had a built in antenna which isn't too brilliant inside the steel tube that is our narrowboat and we've tried several ideas to try and improve performance.

The latest idea, adopted following a recommendation from a fellow boater, was to buy another dongle that has an antenna socket and physically connect an antenna to that socket. After several abortive bidding attempts we finally secured a relevant dongle and planned to unlock it so that we could use it with our Vodafone SIM card. The new dongle had arrived on Tuesday and R had managed to open it up quite easily and soon realised that it was probably fairly similar to the one that we already had, save that the case provided access to an onboard antenna socket.

So R opened up the original dongle's case - a more difficult task because of the case's construction - and found the mechanical parts of the dongles were effectively the same. He swapped them over, re-secured the recently obtained dongle's case and tested it out (minus the external antenna of which more shortly). The original case was left opened on the desk with the more recent dongle's components resting therein.

R soon realised that it shouldn't be too difficult to modify the original case to provide access to the antenna socket and decided that that was what he would spend the first part of Wednesday doing (which is why this information is buried under Wednesday's date, rather than Tuesday's).

The band around the middle of the case (which is fixed to one of the two halves when they are separated) was cut with a fine tooth modeller's saw in the appropriate place. The two halves of the case itself were then marked and attacked firstly with a round needle file and then with a half round needle file. The result, once the case was re-assembled, was that the dongle's on-board antenna socket was exposed for all to see, as the picture attempts to show - the access point can be seen to the right of the white patch on the upper edge of the body, above the red lens.

The more recent dongle was re-assembled and went back on ebay. It still needed unlocking to allow it to be used with Vodafone and that would cost more so we decided that we might as well recoup a little of our (small) expenditure and see if anyone else wanted to give the dongle a home.

We needed an external antenna to get any benefit from the modification to the dongle. The same source that recommended the dongle also recommended an antenna. R set about trying to buy one at the time that he started looking for a dongle but the sole supplier was out of stock at the time and new stock was not due in until 24 March. This would just be in time for our trip if the supplier's schedule was adhered to.

In the meantime R had been researching options for making the previous antenna usable with the modified dongle just in case the new antenna didn't arrive. Everywhere that sold adapters did so at a higher price than the new antenna was going to cost. R then started investigating making his own patch lead and eventually ended up back on the website of the company that sold the new antenna. A quick check on the relevant page and R was pleased to find that new stocks of the antenna had been obtained as it was now on sale again.

R placed the order and opted to pay that little extra for next day delivery so that we could be sure of having the antenna before the weekend's planned trip. He also opted to pay by bank transfer rather than credit card in an attempt to escape the surcharge that is increasingly being levied when credit cards are used for transactions. You can image his surprise when, having placed the order and gone to his bank account to make the transfer, he discovered that his bank were stating that transfers could take up to four days, information that didn't become evident until after the transfer had been initiated. Ugh!

R contacted the firm by 'phone (his email was not functioning at the time) and found out that they would not despatch the goods without pre-payment so the only way to get the antenna the following day was to pay by card (including the fee) and have that money refunded once the cash payment had been received by the supplier. So that's what he did and kept his fingers crossed that the antenna would arrive in time for the weekend's trip.

We failed to mention that the carriage on the antenna with guaranteed next day delivery was just over £5 but for the fire's door handle it was £9 and next day wasn't guaranteed! Both arrived within about an hour of each other on the Thursday morning. The antenna was first and an attempt to test was made by connecting the dongle to the laptop, placing it in a metal biscuit tin (the nearest thing that we've got at home to our all metal narrowboat) and seeing what signal strength was reported. The antenna was then connected, with the dongle still in the tin, and the signal strength again checked. Alas, we live in an area with a good signal, so good that the signal hardly varied even with the dongle in the tin! We'd have to wait until we got to the boat to really see if the antenna made any difference.

The door handle arrived about an hour later. Much to R's dismay when he opened the package we'd been sent the wrong handle. We'd contacted the supplier who initially dismissed the existence of the part that we wanted. However, upon checking they did find it but didn't have them in stock. Fortunately, the two look similar and as we probably only need a replacement spindle we may be able to stick with what we'd been sent but won't know until we next go to the boatyard. R attempted to contact the technical department to try to establish if the spindles were the same size. Although the department had its own special phone number, the phone wasn't being answered although we were able to leave a message asking them to contact us (which they never did).

18 March 2011

R had paid a flying visit to the boatyard at lunch time on Friday to get the grease monkey to swap the spindle on the stove's door. It didn't take much to shear the old spindle and we soon removed it from the shaft. We inserted the new spindle which we'd visually checked for length against the old one beforehand, and also opted to leave the different shaped handle on the spindle, at least for the time being.

There was a little bit of excess play in the assembled fitting but this was better than having no play and no scope for easement if any stiffness arises in the future. The down-side of the new handle is that it balances the catch in the wrong position, enough to snag on the rope gasket around the door edge. If it gets too bad we'll try and fit the original handle again.

It had been raining since just before R arrived at the boatyard with the consequence that the ground where some digging had taken place was soon quite muddy, mud that not surprisingly found itself on the floor of our boat when we walked in and out whilst taking the door back to the stove or transferring a few things for the weekend from the car. As H had only mopped the floor the previous Saturday R decided that he'd better mop it again before he left otherwise he could be in trouble on the morrow when H arrived.

Friday's visit also enabled R to turn off the battery master switch left switched on when R left on Tuesday. Luckily there had been nothing left on that had caused the battery voltage to noticeably reduce.

19 March 2011

We were on our way to the boat before 9am on Saturday taking with us the last few items that had been home for the winter together with food for the weekend's jolly. R had previously just taken things to the boat and almost left them where they were first placed, still in the crates in which they'd been transported.

We decided that other than light the fire, we'd transfer the rest of the items that we'd brought from home straight onto the boat and then set off, stopping after a couple of hours for tea/lunch and a general tidy up. We'd move on a bit further afterwards to where we planned to stop for the night and complete any remaining tasks then, like making the bed.

We'd not been at the boatyard long before we saw the stern of a boat just disappearing out of sight, heading the way we were planning to go. Oh well, all the locks would be against us. What's new?

R soon had the ropes in place and the boiler alight and H had managed similar with the fire. We started the engine within thirty minutes of arriving at the boat and gingerly reversed off of our mooring and into the main channel, chatting to a fellow moorer as we did so. We learned that the boat that we'd seen was someone that we knew so we were hopeful that if they saw us they would wait for us.

H hopped off at the railway bridge and walked to the swing bridge which she opened with greater ease than usual. British Waterways must have done some maintenance work on the bridge since we last used it the previous November.

Our first lock came into sight as we cleared the swing bridge and there, despite having passed us some twenty minutes earlier, was the boat that we'd seen, They'd just entered the lock and having seen another boat approaching (us), decided to wait. God bless them!

We appeared to be following another boat as the first few locks were against us with all the gates closed but with a bottom paddle left in the raised position. As a result it took a little longer than normal to work through each lock. We arrived at our third lock just as another boat heading towards us was leaving the lock. Then, at the fourth lock a further boat, heading our way, had just opened the bottom gates of the lock to enable them to leave. We closed the gates behind them and filled the lock for ourselves.

This other boat had emptied and cleared the next two locks by the time that we arrived at them. We were mooring below our sixth lock so bid our fellow travellers farewell and as they left the lock R could be seen at the back of his boat casting a magnet into the water in the vain hope that he might locate the side fender that we'd lost as we vacated the lock heading home on our previous trip. He had no luck with the fender but managed to extract a very muddy teaspoon out of the water with one cast and then a short while later he hooked a loose magnet that was lying on the bottom of the canal devoid of a rope and covered in mud.

We moored up about midway between the two locks in an area where we've moored before only this time the farmer had cut his hedge and we had a more pleasant view across the towpath as the sun shone down upon our boat. We spent the first thirty minutes or so tidying the boat and then settled down to a sandwich and cup of tea, tea made from water boiled in a recently purchased kettle that gave the water an unpleasant tang, so much so that H couldn't finish her drink.

It came as no surprise when we both nodded off after lunch, to be woken by the phone upon arrival of a text message. We dealt with that and decided it was time to move.

We started the engine and had partially cast off when another boat came into view so we held our boat in whilst they passed. We had intended to follow them to the lock and hopefully work down through the lock with them. However, as the boat passed, without slowing down, we took an instant dislike to the somewhat mouthy crew and decided that we'd let them go ahead on their own.

We re-secured the boat, took one look at the roof and decided that it needed a good mop so R spent the next thirty minutes doing just that whilst H continued spring cleaning inside.

We then had a further cup of tea prior to setting off again, just as a boat came towards us and a boat following them decided to turn in the winding hole and return to the lock so we were able to join them in the chamber and work through this and the following lock with them. Whilst they were proficient working the locks, their cruising speed was somewhat erratic causing R to continually adjust his throttle as we cruised the two miles between the locks.

We saw one dead sheep in the canal between the two locks and a further dead sheep just outside the next lock. We allowed the other boat to precede us out of the lock as they were mooring at the marina just above the next lock. We were also stopping above the lock but on the towpath side.

A further cup of tea followed and then we tested the new antenna for the computer and found an improvement in the signal that we obtained. It appeared to be money well spent. We hoped that further tests when we stopped on Sunday would confirm this. We then made the bed for the first time this year and then with just over an hour to go before we were to join our friends in the local hostelry, R settled down to write up the day's story on this page prior to getting changed and heading for the pub just before complete darkness fell.

Seven people joined together from seven in the evening for a very pleasant time with nice food and good drink so those who consumed the alcohol advised R, who along with three others limited their intake to the non-alcoholic variety of drink.

We finally left the pub around 10.30pm and having wished our colleagues a pleasant rest of the evening, we walked across the top of the top lock gates and the short distance along the towpath to our boat where with temperatures feeling several degrees below (but actually being just above freezing), we were soon inside our boat with the doors secured behind us.

Fire topped up and tablets taken we were soon in bed. Despite the relatively close location of road and rail and an adjacent field of sheep, it was surprising how quite it was. Alas this did not make sleep any easier for R for within the hour he'd popped next door twice and taken a couple of pain killers, such was the discomfort in his legs where he has recently been experiencing problems from the nerves in his left toes. Fortunately the tablets eventually took control and R managed to sleep through until 6am. H on the other hand was asleep almost before her head hit the pillow. She did wake for a while when R made a cup of tea around 6am but she was soon back in the land of nod again.

20 March 2011

We had originally thought about continuing northward as far as Leighton Buzzard on Sunday morning before turning and making our way back south with the intention of eventually returning to the boatyard on Monday morning in time to head for home so that H could attend a funeral during the afternoon. We were to moor somewhere on Sunday where R could attack the scratches on the starboard side of the boat, the side that is both away from land where we normally moor and exposed to any sun for far longer than the port side.

We eventually rolled out of bed around 8am. The sun was making a brilliant effort at putting in an appearance but the clouds were gradually winning the battle. The outside temperature was reportedly around 6°C when we got up and according to the not very accurate thermometer that we have at the rear of the boat rose to over double that during the day. Despite there being little wind and what there was coming from a generally southerly direction, the infamous wind chill factor made the temperature feel like what ever the thermometer said times minus one - for those who find maths a problem, multiplying anything by minus one yields the negative of a positive value!

We had our usual light breakfast and having fed the fire and cleared the grate, we soon had the engine started and were reversing gently away from our towpath mooring. For some reason it always seems as though the wind strength more than doubles in the immediate area where we were moored whenever any kind of manoeuvering is being undertaken. And so it was on Sunday morning. Well versed with this phenomenon, R opted to turn in a clockwise direction with the stern leading, taking the stern away from the towpath bank first rather than the bow. He reasoned that he had more control over the stern in mid channel than he would have over the bow some sixty feet away from where he was standing.

We nudged the towpath bank a couple of times as we shuttled back and forth in order to execute the turn and we didn't use the bow thruster until we were almost broadside on to the towpath and facing the way we intended to travel. Unlike Saturday where we had travelled in the company of another boat for much of the time, we were to spend Sunday running solo. We could speed up (within limits) and slow down at our leisure and we took full advantage of the situation to make our way south. We arrived at our first lock within a few minutes just as a northbound boat was leaving. Whilst the steerer of that boat probably saw us quite quickly he appeared to have failed to communicate this fact to his lock worker who closed the bottom gate of the lock behind him. We then had to wait whilst this boat made for the bank to embark said lock worker before we could make for the same bank for H to disembark to work the lock for R. T'is a pity that this should happen at this particular lock, which is the only lock on this stretch of the canal where the bottom of the steps up to the top of the lock from the waterside is probably about two feet above gunwale height making their use somewhat difficult for the less nimble amongst us!

We found the bottom gates at each of the next three locks wide open so we were able to cruise straight into the chamber with H alighting onto the normal height bottom steps as we did so. The walls of each chamber were generally dry, indicating that the locks had probably been last used on Saturday as it wasn't warm enough for the bricks to have dried out on Sunday morning.

H had made a cup of tea between our third and fourth lock and whilst she had delivered his to R, she had left hers on board when she alighted to work our fourth lock of the day. R went inside and retrieved said drink as the boat rose in the lock. R climbed off the boat to take the cup to H as soon as it was safe to do so. The boat was edging slowly towards the head of the lock, a not uncommon practice. We stood and talked on the lock side noting the boats slow but onward forward movement. It eventually came into contact with the top gate allowing the front button (fender) to ride up on the gate.

Alas, this lock has a steel top gate and the button became wedged in the framework of the gate. With the front of the boat now held in one position as the water in the lock continued to rise, the stern of the boat gradually began to rise out of the water until the weight of the boat proved too great for the top chains by which the fender was fastened to the boat and the chains snapped. The bow rose, the stern lowered and the boat took on a more horizontal position. Meanwhile the button, luckily still secured to the boat by its two side chains, dropped to water level.

R had suddenly became aware of what was happening and was making his way rather rapidly to the back of the boat in an effort to try and reverse the boat away from the top gate. Unfortunately he wasn't quite quick enough and was still several feet away from the controls when the chains snapped.

We cruised on to the next lock where the bottom gates were closed against us giving R time to locate and retrieve some short lengths of chain and some shackles which he hoped to use to repair the damaged chains. And so it came to pass that once the boat had risen up in the next lock R was to be found perched on the top of the top gate, replacing the broken links with shackles and temporarily reinstating the button in its normal position.

We met a further boat heading north as we arrived at our sixth lock so we could once again almost cruise straight into the lock. We'd seen this boat heading in the opposite direction on Saturday afternoon. Our seventh lock was against us, having partially filled in what was probably no more than the thirty minutes since the other boat had left it empty. We moored for the day, shortly after midday, in the pound between this and the final lock before the boatyard and where we have moored several times before if we haven't wanted to return to our mooring immediately.

We had lunch and made a positive decision that we would resist the temptation to doze after lunch. We would tackle the tasks that we'd set ourselves first and then, if we felt so inclined, would take the rest of the day easy.

R had tested the water, so to speak, before lunch when he checked several of the places where he intended to complete the patching up of the paint. None felt as though they required rubbing down so he decided to wipe them over and then apply the second coat of gloss without further ado. H in the meantime was finalising the cleaning inside the boat where the Venetian blind had taken on a decidedly unpleasant spotted appearance during the winter months.

The blue top coat was soon applied and the brush cleaned thereafter. R had also intended to start re-coating the damaged cream paintwork of the stern band, another area where we'd got as far as undercoating in the autumn but had then been delayed by the weather and after effects of R's hernia operation just before Christmas. With his usual brilliance in planning R had failed to realise that once he had applied the blue to the stern deck he'd be unable to reach the area where the cream wanted attention so the cream lived to wait for another day (which he decided later might be on Monday morning before we left).

With the blue paint almost successfully applied (one area could still do with at least one further coat), R turned his attention to the green, where there were some scratches that could do with covering. The paint and brushes were prepared, including several long spells of stirring the content of the tin but when he came to apply the paint it seemed to defy the fact that it was from the same tin as had been used to originally paint the sides of the boat and where, when offered up to said side of the boat, the colour seemed a reasonable match. But once applied the paint took on a distinctly lighter shade.

Despite numerous attempts to improve the colour match R had no success. Although he was sorely tempted to stop there and then he eventually decided to complete the patching up on the towpath side of the boat and to leave it overnight to see whether the colour darkened once the paint dried. With little else to do, he cleaned up behind him, ready for the relevant items to head for home on Monday and was about to return to the inside of the boat when he noticed that the boat with whom we'd accomplished the first part of Saturday's trip was now in the lock behind us.

R collected a windlass from inside the boat and set off towards the lock to help the boat through the lock. He then walked to the next lock and helped them there before returning to his own boat, discarding the overalls that he's donned before starting the painting, picked up a magazine, started to read it and promptly nodded off. Finally, he stirred around 5pm, set up the laptop, checked the Internet connection with the new antenna and then spent the next hour or so completing the day's entry on this page whilst H latterly cooked the evening meal.

We ended the day as we often do on a Sunday by calling the family, watching one or more television programmes and/or sitting and reading. We made the bedtime drink around 9.30pm, stoked the fire and retired pondering that despite being physically further from the railway than on Saturday night, the moving trains were a lot louder.

21 March 2011

Nature woke us both briefly around 3am. Luckily we managed to drift back to sleep afterwards. We then both woke again about 6am and by dint of H repeatedly drifting back to sleep we managed to stay horizontal until 8am at which time nature was beginning to interfere again so we got up, had breakfast, tidied up as much as we could, including packing most of what had to go home and then cast off for the half mile plus one lock trip back to the boatyard. The green paint applied on Sunday had darkened slightly but was still evident to those who knew where to look.

We arrived back at 9.20am. We connected the land-line and the inverter/charger roared into life suggesting that the batteries were in need of a goodly charge not having been charged much by the engine over the previous couple of days. We left the charger running for as long as we could whilst we did the final clearing up and transferred what was to go home to the car. Eventually, about an hour after we'd arrived back at our mooring we headed for home completely forgetting that we had intended to delay our departure long enough to touch up the cream paint.

There wasn't too much to unpack once we got home and having done so after a slightly early mid-morning cup of tea, our attention turned elsewhere for the rest of the day save for a short while during the late afternoon when R updated the computerised boat log and wrote up the day's brief entry on this page. During the evening he undertook some research into hot water cylinder jackets for the calorifier in a further attempt to reduce the heat loss that we continue to experience overnight. Apart from a couple of Tuesday visits to the boatyard by R for the weekly administrative duties with M, we'd probably not be near the boat again until the day we depart on our six week trip or the day before that.

25 March 2011

In a slight change of plans R called in at the boatyard very briefly on Friday afternoon as we was in the area. The main reason for his visit was to collect a parcel that should have been delivered containing a night latch for the rear doors. We'd been meaning to fit one for some while, had postponed it as soon as the cold weather arrived at the end of 2010 and had only recently got round to ordering it, having managed to corner M for a few minutes for some advice in the hope that we'd avoid buying the wrong type.

The opportunity was taken to deliver some clothes for our upcoming epic voyage to the boat as well as to do a little bit of work for the boatyard and to laminate some River Trent charts that we'd just bought. We don't want to risk getting the paper copies wet if it rains whilst we're on the river as the charts show important information about shallows and the channel in general.

R overstayed his time at the boatyard and headed out of the gate without his parcel, the content of which he needed to enable him to make some spacers to go between latch and door as the boat's doors are only about half the thickness of a standard house door. He had to give way to a delivery van that wanted to enter the car park as he left. It was lucky that R decided to check whether said van had the parcel as it had, so R collected it, signed for it and climbed back into his car and departed.

Fast forward about eighteen hours. R has now unpacked the latch and realised that fitting may not just be a case of drilling one large hole in one door and a couple of smaller holes in the other. The lip on the keep is much deeper than we might have hoped and, at first glance, tended to suggest that we may have to have 25mm thick spacers between latch and door.

A few more measurements, primarily of the barrel and we hit upon the idea that if the gap between the doors is sufficiently wide enough instead of the lip on the keep being secured to the spacer, we could use a thinner spacer and fasten the keep through the folded metal edge of the door and into the door's wooden liner. This would make for a much more secure fastening.

A quick call to M generated the offer by him to measure the gap on Sunday morning and let us know.

Fast forward to Sunday morning and the measurement arrived via a text. The keep's lip is 3mm thick, the gap between the doors is 7mm. It looked as though it would fit provided that once fixed to the door the keep didn't foul the lock as the door closes - it should be remembered that booth doors open on the boat so the latch fixes to one, which must close first and the keep fixes to the other. They also have to be fixed with the latch facing the right way. Swapping the two components to the other doors would mean that the latch would rub on the paintwork as the door closes, not a good idea when we're trying to minimise the paint touching up that we do.

As an aside, when we touched up the paint on the back deck we were surprised to see that several new rust spots had appeared in the relatively short time since we'd applied the undercoat. Worse still, along with the scratches in the green, there was now at least one rust spot to deal with on the side as well.

Another job that we were keen to try and tackle before we set out was providing a more permanent fixing for the marine band radio's antenna so that we don't have to worry about trailing co-ax leads which will invariably get damaged and probably so just before we need to seriously use the radio. Although we'd probably use the radios as a means to keep in touch between the boats whilst we're cruising along, their main use during the upcoming trip would be to keep in touch with the lock keepers on the River Trent and to monitor the whereabouts of the freight vessels that ply the river so that we could keep out of their way.

The biggest problem with addressing this task would be routeing the co-ax between roof mounted antenna socket that we'd install and the radio. We'd also been advised that we'd need to electrically isolate the antenna screen from the boat's metalwork because of potential problems with corrosion below the water level if we didn't - something to do with setting up strange current paths through the radio, where the ground connection for the antenna and the negative power connection are in direct contact.

There was the slight problem of cutting a 16mm diameter hole in the roof as well, the hole needed to accommodate the fitting into which the antenna would be fixed. R's drilling accuracy never has been brilliant and he neither wanted to introduce scope for water ingress through the hole nor scratch the paintwork if the drill slipped. We'd also need to be careful that the nearly cut hole, which would expose bare metal, didn't provide a meal for the infamous tin worm, better known as rust.

Tentative planning involved the grease monkey being approached to drill the main hole plus the smaller holes for fixing the connector. These connectors usually have four fixing holes but R was lucky to discover a couple with only two fixing holes when he rummaged through his draw of connectors. One would be given to the grease monkey to use as a template, the other was used by R on Sunday to affix the co-ax cable to, with the screen of that cable being connected via a capacitor which was soldered to the metalwork of the connector as well. The joint, which would need to be handled carefully during installation, was covered in insulation tape as much for protection as to reduce the amount of freely exposed metal that might attract condensation in the future.

The partly assembled co-ax was put to one side to go to the boat. The connector for the radio wasn't fitted as this would allow the cable to be fed through a reasonably small hole in the bulkhead between wardrobe and engine room. Although we knew we should, we doubted whether we would modify the trim so that we can disguise the cable's route. There wasn't time to do the job properly so it was probably best not started. We'd still take the relevant tools on our next visit just in case we decided to change our minds.

29 March 2011

We were due to depart on our trip in nine days time so things were beginning to take on a bit of urgency both for us with regard to getting our boat ready and for M in getting his boat ready as well as leaving the boatyard in reasonable order in the hope that the outstanding jobs pile wouldn't be too high when we returned.

M had spoken to R on the Monday evening and asked him to collect a few things from Screwfix and Toolstation on his way to the boatyard on Tuesday. These items would enable M to organise finishing off a few outstanding jobs around the boatyard before we departed. With a bit of alternative shopping when one item was in short supply, everything M wanted was obtained but the 16mm hole cutter that R wanted to make the hole in the roof for the antenna fixing wasn't.

As it turned out, it was well after 3pm by the time we'd finished the office paperwork. R had a couple of crates, generally containing clothes, to unload onto the boat and had hoped to get on with fitting the door lock with a bit of help from M. We did get as far as checking the fit of the keep relative to the moving doors and R left just after 4pm to return to Screwfix to order the hole cutter and buy some further items for both M and the grease monkey. He also took home the keep and the lock together with their respective spacers.

By evening meal time R had filed the lip of the keep which he hadn't previously noticed was tapered. He'd also cut a further spacer piece for the keep which, because the doors don't line up precisely will need to a little further from its wooden door liner than the lock will need to be from its door liner. The position of the fixing and barrel holes had also been marked on the lock's spacer just before time ran out when the evening meal was ready.

The only boat related tasks for the last two days of the month were to spray paint some undercoat on the keep's bare metal, finish drilling the wooden spacers and then varnish them, get the outstanding items from Screwfix, go shopping for the antenna and spend a large part of Thursday sat at the computer attempting to produce the latest version of the schedule for the trip - differing only in so far as it takes in the Macclesfield canal instead of the north end of the Trent & Mersey. This diversion which wasn't set in stone, would add a further half day to our overall journey time. Because we ideally wanted to adhere to the original return date we'd cruise for a few minutes longer each day rather than get back late. The schedule update wasn't totally complete by evening meal time and as R was out during the evening no further work was be done on it during March.

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