Leaderboard

Something they could legally do - make all moorings 24 or 48 hours. Plenty of time for 'visitors' to have a look around, and then move onto the next attraction.

If they cannot legally refuse boats access to the city (refuse to licence) then a simple remedy would be to make being there as unpleasant as possible. Remove all water points. Strictly enforce stopping times. Ban 'breasting up' as causing a potential restriction to navigation. They could do a lot of things if they were really motivated to, but undertaking an 'exercise' cum consultation to get boaters to come up with suggestions absolves them of responsibility if they implement unpopular actions. "We only did what boaters themselves suggested". If no actions are the result then they can say "we asked, we tried, we couldn't come up with any legal means of restricting boats in London".

I've moved lots, of both, and on narrow, shallow canals, narrowboats move far easier than widebeams, even of a 10 foot width. There is a couple now living happily on a narrowboat who had the worst 18 months of their lives on a 9ft Wincham (Collingwood shell) widebeam launched on the K&A and came to the GU. Why when so many brokers cant get enough narrowboats are record numbers of widebeams on Apallingduck?? On wide rivers, there is no doubt that widebeams make sense for liveaboards that dont want to go too far afield and want luxury, but to enjoy Englands waterways, narrow is the answer.

Also bear in mind that a lot of people commenting on widebeams have very little or absolutely no first hand experience of them. I've been living on a bog standard 57 x12ft Liverpool Boats NB-style widebeam for the past 15 years. I've also punched Thames on red board from Laleham to Reading in 2 days by myself. Been up and down the tidal Thames between teddington and limehouse a couple of times including going downstream & the difficult turn into limehouse. Been all the way from Reading to Bristol on the K&A without a problem, done parts of the river Severn. Crossed the Bristol channel from from Bristol via portishead to sharpness, the warks Avon, etc, etc. I've moved my widebeam more than most narrowboaters that I know. My boat may seem unwieldy to the inexperienced but I can assure you it isn't. It steers and swims very well and that was also the opinion of one of the Gloucester pilots and also the opinion an active and respected forum member who's steered it on a couple of occasions. Unwieldy is all relative anyway. A 60ft narrowboat may seem unwieldy compared to a 20ft grp cruiser. So bear in mind that some narrow boaters like to put down widebeams even though most don't really know what they're talking about.

I think the opposite would happen, once the landlord realises that you can drink several pints he turns the current down so that you have to stay there longer. A couple of years ago we and Goliath spent some time on a pub mooring. After a few days the landlord knocked on the boat and asked how much longer we planned to stay. I was expecting a telling off and sling yer hook warning, but he said "if you plan to stay much longer i'm going to order in an extra barrel". ...............Dave

I'm not going to say what I think about your reply because it'll get me banned.

Dunno about that, I'm only 63 so If I really cut down on the drinking I might just make it. ?.

We have a Sydney onboard. He loves being on the boat and around water in general but does fall in on a regular basis. Fortunately he is bright enough to swim to the back of the boat where we can scoop him out, and his legs are not long enough to go anywhere near the props!! He is a bit of a speed freak and prefers it when the boat is going fast.

I like diesel. By the time the tree huggers have their way....I'll be dead and buried ...

Burner pot pic.

The Screwfix drill bits break well before their breaking point, that's why they sell them in packs of ten ? ...................Dave

Some of the most settled weather is in Winter when a nice high pressure sits over the country, cold, still and great boating weather. A well written & interesting story of crossing the Wash in a NB https://www.pressreader.com/uk/canal-boat/20190901/281621011984372

Actually it *is* obvious that central generation of electricity and BEV are more efficient than diesel IC engines, the "well-to-wheel" efficiency is about double -- so even if the power comes from fossil fuel sources this is a good thing (about half the CO2 emissions), if it comes from renewables than obviously much better. People don't *want* to change because vehicles (and boats) powered by fossil fuels are cheap, powerful, quick and easy to refill, and don't have range limits. Unfortunately this attitude is what is screwing the planet up (not just transport) so we *have* to change, and cars (and boats) are an obvious target because they're a big culprit. People will just have to put up with the disadvantages (which are rapidly getting smaller) as a price to save the planet. Now for things like stopping green beans being airfreighted from Chile... ? Anyone who sees change like this as going backwards needs to wake up and look at the consequences of carrying on as we are... ?

I had a girlfriend with dimples, she could run everso fast against the wind. And if she ran for a bus, never failed to catch it.

Why? Because he was getting a kick out of controlling you, and then you went and spoilt it.

If you are aware of the travel limitations of a 'fatty' and can 'live with them' then there is absolutely no question "GO -FAT" Comfort and space will be much. much greater than you could imagine. The difference between 6' 10" and 12 foot is huge. You can now get two rooms side by side (ie Kitchen & dining room) instead of being 'in tandem' ) one behind the other like train carriages. Like 'living in a 6' sewer tube'. I have had both 'narrow' and 'fatty' boats (current boat is 14 foot beam) and given the choice 'fat' wins every time for comfort, 'anorexic' wins every time for use on the narrow canals. With a 'fatty' you can always have (say) 1 year down South, & when you get to around Birmingham, have her lifted out moved a few miles North and dropped back in then you can have another year doing the Northern waterways.

Some friends of mine started married life in South London, living first in St. Ockwell, and later moving to St. Reatham.

We had a Mikuni ( similar to Eber) and using that as the sole purpose of overnight heating was quite power hungry - if the batteries were not in good shape, it could lead to power failure during the night. The pump feeding the Bubble was some kind of very low powered pulse pump that used very little power. Comfort wise, the Bubble was superb - during the very cold winter of, I think, December 2000 through to the following February, the Bubble was on 24/7 on its lowest setting, and the boat was perfect.