Leaderboard

Morning ladies and gents, I just wanted to post a little light hearted story about my dad. He lost his wife (my mum) to cancer last year and he was so impressed with the work that Macmillan do that he decided to raise money for them. He has no previous boating experience and cannot even swim. But he has taken it upon himself to tour the uk canal system for a few months on whats little more than a man made raft. I think he's mad but its what he wants to do. He started at Selby boat yard in North Yorks 2 weeks ago and has made his way across to Lancashire. Today he hits the 21 locks at Wigan! This is not an appeal to ask people to dip in their pockets. Its just a heads up to let people know he's on his way so if you see him, give him a wave. He loves a chat! No doubt some of you on here will have met him already. He has been completely overwhelmed by the kindness and generosity of the people on the canals. Pubs, have offered him free beer and meals. He's been invited into numerous narrow boats for tea and biscuits and a chat and has met many people who have been affected by this terrible disease. I think he's already getting a name for himself as he's now arriving at destinations with complete strangers coming out with comments like "we knew you were coming, word has spread!" Its going to take a hell of a lot of moral support for him to complete this (you'll see why when you take a look at the pics to see what his vessel is!) Hopefully, if I've done it right, there'll be a few pics below. Theres also a few on his Macmillan fundraising site. Take a look and have a giggle! https://macmillan.tributefunds.com/CarolWonfor Happy boating everyone and thankyou for taking the time to look!

Or maybe they want it to be a fascinating and historic transport system, not a social housing scheme?

I think some people just hear what they want to hear and then put their own interpretation on it. The change in contract was the introduction of annualised hours that was negotiated with the Unions and voted on by the members. With regard to volunteers once again CRT have assured the staff via the Union that there will be no redundancies as a result of volunteering and the Union have accepted that. There is enough work to be done by all staff and volunteers for the next hundred years.

I hope you have some money in the pot for some new batteries soon Dean boy ETA: Its going to take a lot of engine running to recharge them from that low. Also why is your laptop on 24/7? If you are going to be living out of the marina you need to look at ways to reduce your power consumption or budget for changing batteries a couple of times a year. They wont stand up to the abuse you are giving them for long before giving up the ghost.

This is why when my husband was an Independant financial adviser he didn't call the company Dyer Financial Services!

Dear OP, I know this is not your take on things, but I once bought a boat which ought to have been CE marked, RCDed etc, and I thought I'd just get it done myself. After investing about twenty or thirty hours of my time simply getting to understand what needed to be done, I decided not to bother. I decided to waste my time living my life and getting on with boating instead. When it came to selling time, I found no shortage of private buyers totally unaware of the RCD and who didn't give a toot when I explained what they might be buying. I suggest you just flog it to someone who doesn't care about the RCD and get on with your life... MtB

Agreed with everyone else's comments. You (o.p.) been pretty rude to several people since you joined the forum, as evinced by both this thread and the "cruisers" one. I'd have been put off helping you around the time you used the phrase "half breed canal boat user" in the midst of a losing debate, and yet despite asking people you've never even met to go out of their way to do something for you, you again start flinging shite when things didn't go your way over a boat sale. Nobody owes you a favour, and nobody owes you a boat. If people choose to help you then that is nice of them, but there is merit in the 'do it yourself' school of thought, particularly if you have trust issues or feel that people are trying to con you. A boat for sale is for sale to everyone, you do not reserve it by expressing an interest in it. As my Da said to me on several occasions in my yoof, "Go away and think about your actions, and come back when you're ready to stop being a gitbag."

Sue there comes a time when you have to stop looking back and either look forward or maybe even in the present. Harping on about what has happened in the past does not move anything forward. Yes things are not great and plenty needs to change both from boaters and CRT lets try and work on that and leave the past in the past.

If you attach your solar panels to big Sunflowers they'll track the suns path implicitly.

My word this thread takes some twists and turns. "within a few generations" lets think about that. Statistically a generation is aprox 25 years give or take a few could mean 3 or 4. so covering maybe 75 to 100 years. Someone from 1913 may well regard our society today as unrecognisable when I think about what it was like as a child in the 1960s it seems very different to now. The folk in 1913 only had a short while before the horrors of WWI was to begin. So I agree it is likely to be more differnt in the future. I do not agree it means a downturn it will be just different. The only thing one can be reasonably sure of is that anyones attempt at forecasting the future beyond the short term is doomed to be wrong. This country has a very long way to go before it comes even close to the freedoms we enjoy being eroded away and become bad enough to require violent resistence to a regime such as that in Egypt just now. Against what is going on there and other places in the world such comments as yours starts to look like the screams of a spoilt child unaware of how priviliged a life it leads. Interesting to see on the news this evening a piece on how violent crime is a decreasing trend in this country even in the big cities like London. In anycase if it all goes wrong it will not be the mysterious "them" that did the deed but it will be the fault of the society and its citizens that let them do it.

I don't have, (and have always said I don't have), an issue with mooring restrictions that can be justified as necessary, (and, I'm now thinking, which may benefit as many people as they inconvenience). I do however have a major issue with restrictions being imposed when no valid case has been made for them, and no enforcement of rules for which CRT does actually have powers has been consistently carried out. If CRT are allowed to introduce widespread 1 and 2 day limits, with £25 per day overstay charges, why should those "rules" be considered reasonable for us to adhere to? And if they then go for 1 day max, with £100 overstay charges, do we all still have to be reasonable and stick to the latest "rule"?

Strikes me that if all boaters made an effort to adhere to the guidelines, instead of sticking two fingers up at CRT and doing what we feel like, then none of this would be necessary. Mind you we would then have nothing to argue about. Which Is what is happening on GU south and already people are crying foul!

You can get into trouble anywhere, although in the past 3 years I personally have only had problems at Broadway Market (Cambridge Heath) and certainly there have been spates of break-in in Victoria Park every year/6 months which is just down the cut. Generally i will stop in Victoria park, but not Broadway market. Mile End park, which is just down from Victoria park is nice and i would stop there if you want to break up the trip from Islington to Limehouse, but i wouldn't leave the boat unattended overnight. Kings cross has quite a lot of mooring space and is relatively safe. Camden you should avoid at the weekend (it just gets really busy with drunk people) but if you can find a spot at the Chalk farm visitor moorings then definitely stop there as there are gates that get locked overnight with BW, sorry, CaRT keys on them which gaurd the moorings. The last 3 times i have been there its been full though and there is no double breasting. The Islington visitor moorings also get locked up overnight and you can double breast there (even triple if you want to) so there is a higher likelihood of you finding a space. Little Venice/Paddington basin area is great, if you can put up with the soulless high rise buildings and high winds then i recommend Paddington basin, look for the moorings on the opposite side of the canal to the pontoons (there is no thoroughfare on the towpath so no one walks past the boat and it feels quite private). West out of the center: I would recommend Perivale (lovely meadow, woodland and park by the canal and only a short walk to the central line), greenford is ok, there's not much to see but you do get to smell the Indian food and bread (depending on the wind direction) from the factories nearby, handy for the pub as well i guess. Between there and bulls bridge i would only stop in the park just east of Willow Tree Marina anywhere else can be touch and go. If you go north of Bulls bridge then definitely try and stop by the Slough arm the lakes and nature reserves round there are beautiful, but there can be problems with kids down the slough arm when the schools are on holiday. South of Bulls Bridge Southall is nice and Hanwell at the bottom of the Hanwell flight is lovely (very peaceful and much more like a little village than a suburb - the Snooty Fox pub does markets at the weekend). East: Hackney Wick, behind the ice rink just after Lea Bridge Road, just north of Springfield Marina and Stonebridge Park are absolutely fine and you shouldn't have any problems. 3 Mills way a bit dodgy the last time i was there, there were kids throwing stuff into the canal and having bonfires in the Tesco's car park opposite my boat every night and it made me a bit nervous. Saying that, i've never had any actual trouble and there are nice things about being there. I'll leave the Filter beds up to your discretion. Personally i'm not going east anymore as the drains were overflowing "partially treated" sewage into the canal below Tottenham Hale lock when i was last there and i saw stuff floating past my boat that would put you off your dinner. Some people seem to love it though and can't seem to tear themselves away.... Sorry that's a bit of an essay but there it is such a diverse place even 100m can make a difference. My general rules of thumb are: only moor where other boats are moored, if you're unsure about leaving your boat the leave an LED light on somewhere inside, chain everything down that you wouldn't want to loose and stuff like don't leave lump hammers n you deck (or anything that could be used to smash a window. If you are really being cautious then find out a postcode of where you are moored to be able to give to the emergency services quickly (this did prove very useful to me once). These are all just precautions though as i've had very little trouble at alland generlly its a great placeto visit and most of your problems will be finding somewhere to moor where you plan to so have a plan a and b and possibly c. p.s. is not that clear on the Nicholsons but there is no mooring in Regents park at all, so if you are leaving Paddington and heading east be prepared to go to Kings Cross (below St Pancreas lock) before being able to moor..O and avoid doing the Locks in Camden at the weekend if at all possible.. Good luck and happy cruising!!

Albright are next door to my office, if you can take a picture of the existing one I can go and ask. Ken

"How Not To Move Forward With CaRT" vol 2 by ,nick brown