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There's an annual 24 hour challenge event on the BCN. I'm quite surprised you haven't heard of it before ...

I actually appeared in "Flower of Gloster" for about five seconds. When you get to the section where they were broken down in Stoke Bruerne, I am the scruffy bloke in denims walking along the towpath. I never did get payed for my cameo part!!

Watch out for tearaways riding motorbikes on the towpath

Clarrie at fazeley mill marina watching Rebellion live on YOUTUBE

Sprout is enjoying her first BCN Challenge lounging. She has single-dogged up the 21 because the humans were useless. Now enjoying a rest in her Liberace-themed domain.

Good luck everyone! As has become traditional, we're live streaming from the camera on the front of Rebellion: https://youtube.com/live/cnj3Dqkl84g?feature=share

For anyone interested in watching a fantastic series featuring authentic canal folk from 1967, I plan on uploading, eventually, the entire serial from my own archive of British Television and on to my Major Dolby's Cat YouTube channel The Flower of Gloster is a children's serial produced by Granada Television in 1967 that was loosely based on E. Temple Thurston 1911 book of the same name. The series is a heady mix of nostalgia and tradition that offers a unique insight in to the history of the inland waterways, the surrounding geology and wildlife around the canal and also a swan song to the old boatmen and canal workers who still worked commercially on the canals at the time of filming, and before the canal became what its used for today, primarily by leisure cruisers. The cast, alongside the two main actors Richard O'Callaghan and Annette Robertson are their real-life siblings Elizabeth and Mike Doherty who play the younger children while many of the extras were actual real-life canal folk and its screenplay combines a mix of script and ad-libbing. I made this teaser trailer of what you can expect to see. Happy to be a Patron here, I do own a Narrowboat and will be permanently living aboard it in the next couple of month, I have used this forum in the past and found it to be helpful. Kind regards Major Dolby's Cat

This is you?

I have a VSR that connects my domestic batteries to the starter battery. When solar is on all get charged When charger is on all get charged When engine is on both alternators charge both sets of batteries. When domestics deplete then starter is isolated. It's not rocket science.

It should be fine, we are only teeny tiny in every aspect so we are hoping to give it a go!

I always feel for the bolts holding the rail to the armco and put chains or piling hooks there so that they don't get trapped. It does mean that the 45 degree angle gets compromised sometimes but the angle isn't that critical.

I average 3mph and the boat is happy at that speed. Much less and I get huge vibration until I drop right down. This means, I think , that if I'm really catching someone up quickly, they are going about half my speed, which is fine for them, but not me or my old engine. So I see no reason why I should sit behind them, get shaken to bits and take twice as long to get to where I want to go. Nor can I see why they should want me to. Mostly I avoid such folk by starting early before they get up. Sometimes I stop and make tea, but if we've ended up in a convoy, that's not practical, so I bully my way past them, assuming I'm second in the queue. If not, I just get bad tempered.

Why aren’t you at Tipton, watching the mighty Coventry City in the Old Bush like wot I am? Which boat is Sprout single-dogging (that’s a dubious term and I’m not sure it’s possible 😲)?

Hello Aston, my old friend

I saw her tied up in Milton Keynes in the early 80s, I have recollection she was wearing a steel nose!?

If I had RCR membership I definitely would have called them. I don’t. Time to look into it again. So far I’ve managed to fix anything myself 😀 Very grateful to Wyvern, who have always been helpful and friendly. And probably could have charged me much more than they did! Recovery, dry-dock, repair…

I hadn't noticed the not available bit. I bought mine on the day they first released it. Cheers Graham

Look at section 2 Interpretation.

Mind you, right at the beginning we have this, which basically says "inland waterway" includes the towpath and other land associated with the waterway:

When you are several hundred yards behind, you are going to slow them down a very small amount, not detectable. If you are1/2 boat length behind then it might be noticeable. I realise that if everyone held identical views and values to you then no doubt your world would be a better place. But the thing is, in fact people have a wide range of views and values and the world is better when people accept that and are considerate towards those diverse views and values.

The boat used as Flower of Gloucester belonged to Mike Sampson from Liverpool, who also operated a converted Appleby's short boat, renamed Peace, as a trip boat in Liverpool shortly after. The photos show Flower of Gloucester at Dutton in 1972, where it required almost continuous pumping to keep afloat. The next photo shows Peace descending the locks at Liverpool for a quick tour around the North Docks.

All the boats are on the Engine Arm. Goliath, Atlas, Tamar No 2 and Vulpes all at the same time. Two others? I know Misty Blue started there. Who else? In other news Melaleuca made it to the Titford pools. 2’ 10” draft too. Unfortunately a prop foul has halted their return.

Do they take away your old mattress? If so, it's tempting to try them!

I believe surveyors can/do "resell" their survey, probably at a lower price, to prospective buyers. With that sale comes some kind of colander-like guarantee that the survey is a true/accurate account of the boat, for which the surveyor pays for insurance, so in a business relationship he has to pass on that cost. Of course, its a very 20th century industry, completely unregulated too, which is hopelessly out-of-date for things like the internet or email.

My take is that the original purchaser of the survey has used it for his own use - to help him sell the boat, so he passes it to the OP. To aid the sale, the OP posted it here for more informed opinion. Again, to aid the sale. Unless there is something fishy with the survey, I don't see what the surveyor is complaining about, he has been paid.

On this day 2018 Bardney Lock Last night 2023 Shardlow

Obviously if we have caught them up from far behind, they are going more slowly than us. How much slower can be assessed by the rate of closure. The effect you mention is going to slow them, but only by a very small amount. Something like a trough aqueduct is of course going to make the effect more significant, but most of us spend less than 0.1% of our time on such aqueducts so you point is an exception not normality. The obvious indications of a boat ahead at or close to tickover are virtually no sign of prop wash and virtually no discernible ripples from the bow. But surely you know this? If we are only very slowly catching them up, eg we are doing 3.5mph and they are doing 3.4 mph, then I am not fussed about overtaking and we will reduce from say 1300rpm to 1200 rpm, no big deal. It is the people who you come up behind rapidly with their boats barely making a ripple from the bow or the prop, that are the issue. Our boat does about 2 to 2.5 mph at tickover (depending on depth etc) and any slower, we have to go into neutral. I can’t help feeling that if you put more effort into thinking about how to considerately let others pass you, and less effort into thinking up reasons why they shouldn’t, the world would be a better place.

Dotterel is home again. Not many photos on this stretch as it is home water. Hillmorton locks Final stretch 307 miles, 3 furlongs and 234 locks completed in 19 cruising days. Cheers Graham

Welcome, we need another gas bod on here as I usually get shouted down in the gas threads so nowadays I steer clear of them. Like you I found it astounding to discover this. I'd have thought given the surveyor gets fully financially compensated for producing his report, the paying customer should be free to do with it as he wishes.

Regardless of whether it contravenes the BSS, I think it would be foolhardy to run a diesel heater exhaust through a locker storing petrol.

He said RNLI, not RLWP...😀

Good luck to all this weekend, cracking weather for it. Well done to Captain Pegg for jumping in at the deep end. Sad we cant be there, but work, ailing parents and Kathy's illness has made us take the time off we get to slow down at present.

Daft nonsense. It's a bit like the Stenson Lo k half paddle because of the boats moored below nonsense. Problem is, unless someone challenges these rule makers, it becomes the norm.

Great series, even got Chocolate Charlie in it. Love the yobs as well

Just get a new one, these deliver.

A wig-wag is the traffic signal with the soild amber warning light and then alternate flashing red lights used to denote a location where you must stop because to pass puts you in immediate peril, railway level crossings being the most common usage, but also moving bridges and fire station exits.

Oates is an odd boat in respect of this discussion. On a relatively deep stretch it is very fast. The question was asked earlier about what is the fastest you have gone - I am not going to declare that but suffice to say it was probably a smidge over 4mph (we can break fairly thick ice at 4mph...) However, it draws a surprisingly large amount so on a shallow stretch or through a bridge hole it will suddenly slow right up. This can confuse people, but we aren't generally being followed as we are faster on the deep stretches. I don't think we have ever held anyone up at locks either - the crew is not the most efficient, but it does know what it is doing and most roles are interchangeable, including steering between three of us at least. Where we run into problems following very slow boats is that we do need to run to a bit of a timetable and there are consequences if we don't. We might go out for a weekend, or up to a week but at the end we have to get back as the children have school and my wife and I have work. It's not optional. We will have contingency built in, but not enough for an extra day. On the last day, we might plan to cruise for 6hrs and would be OK if that became 8. From the bottom of Audlem to our mooring is normally 3.5hrs. We are fine if that becomes 4.5hrs and OK if that becomes 5hrs (and the world won't fall apart if it's longer) but when, for example, the person on the boat ahead of you decides that he won't bother doing the locks because you can do them for him while he stands chatting to the two guests on his boat, that is galling. On one occasion, the four of us worked both our boat and the two boats ahead of us up the flight - that's pushing it. If we didn't get the boat back, someone would face a long walk to the car, followed by a 3hr drive back the following weekend, boat it back and another long walk back to pick up the car and drive it 3hrs home. It's not a trivial consequence. If somebody has chosen a slow dawdle through the countryside then there is no reason they shouldn't have one, but the impact of adding more than about 3hrs to our journey is that we will still be driving home at midnight with work the next day, when they are comfortably moored up for the night. Everyone should be free to enjoy their boating the way they want to, but not at the expense of others who may have different needs. Alec

By judicious use of the Peril Sensitive Spotlight. MP.

It was 04.30 we set off, in the middle of a humongous thunderstorm. We had dropped down the flight, emptied a pound and removed a 110ah battery from behind an gate and reconnected a paddle AND reached Walsall basin by 7am.