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I went today and enjoyed myself, had a chat to a few people, bought a few books. Pete Boyce's Tess Wharf was also open, which was interesting. Here's some photos:

So I happened to be cruising up Oxford canal and arrived at bridge 221 Aubrey's lift bridge (Thrupp services). A nice friendly boater grabbed my key and opened the bridge for me noticing I was solo. Other side of the bridge there's a gaggle of people, a cameraman and lots of pointing up the left hand bit of the 90' turn. Turns out some local representative was on a pedallo bike surrounded by canoeists doing some spot to promote himself on the beeb. I get approached by some woman stating " did I not know there was an event going on?" You can imagine my private thoughts right that second although I politely stated "no". I then get asked to stop and switch off whilst they finish filming, which being polite I do. Now the wind is broadside to me, I don't have a bow thruster and I'm alongside the right-hand wall next to the service point. The canoeists all park in front of me and around the corner not realising I need the space they've taken to attempt to get out of a wind trapped basin trying to turn left without a bow thruster. "Oh can you not go round us?" Comes the comment. I bite my tongue and growl out loud " I'm 16t, solid steel and can only steer when moving" Yeh they moved out the way eventually. Moral of this story, don't stop for MP's run the buggers down 😁

You should be ok at Nantwich for a few days, the embankment slippage has "been very minor" over the past 3 months according to CRT.

West India Quay, today ..yes, it’s a floating hot tub and a BBQ boat

What a nasty foul. We find a sharp bread knife for fabrics, hacksaw for tougher stuff/ thick tubular plastic or metal or the thick metal borders of mattresses. Possibly useful for car tyres. Stanley knives can have their use too. Then these Knipex cutters for metal wire or springs probably thicker metal. Brilliant for mattress springs. https://www.knipex.com/products/cable-and-wire-rope-shears/wire-rope-cutters-forged Ditchcrawler is spot on, bolt croppers are fairly hopeless for most weed hatches as the arms don’t open sufficiently before the hatch restricts opening further to actually get the cutters around the metal. Knipex do smaller ones but I’m not convinced they would open enough without fouling. The problem is that some cuts need to be across the width of the weedhatch. The arms are long and unwieldy underwater too. Some elastic around the arm and tied to the tool can help avoid loss of them during work... Watch out for Weils too if working under water and wash carefully afterwards. It’s surprising how many put the results of a foul back on the towpath only for it to dry and blow/ get chucked in again. Keep under deck by the hatch and bin!! Lastly look after other boaters and please carefully yank out floating coats fabrics plastic bags and potential problems if possible when passing or at locks and bin too.

The problem with bolt croppers down the weed hatch is opening the jaws due to lack of room, maybe hop in the canal to do it.

No you aren't and no you foooking don't, else you would fix them during the winter. #Replace Richard Parry

"We're very sorry for any disruption you may experience as a result of these works. We understand how disruptive stoppages are outside of the stoppage season". The stoppage season? A useful concept. Maybe CRT has four seasons - WinterMooring, Boating, Water Shortage and Stoppage. The boating season runs (or rather hiccups) from Easter to July. Rather like the old BW response to queries as to why boating was almost impossible for singlehanders ("We don't expect people to do this on their own"), CRT don't expect anyone would be daft enough to want to take their boat out the rest of the year. That's not what the licence is for.

"Landlord, do you think you could fit a double scotch in there?" "Yes Sir..." Well then, bloody fill it up with beer....

This afternoon 2024 Tarbert, Kintyre, Scotland Compare 3Dec2012 25May2020 28Jun2024

I believe two of the organizing stalwarts from previous years were not involved this year. These two did a brilliant job, perhaps their skills were missed? Also both these gents were critical of the £20.00 parking fee levied by Mr. Coughlan, but their observations fell on deaf ears. There were a few reasons I was unable to attend this year but the parking fee and the general decline of the event over the years the £20.00 parking fee has been charged was also a factor. ETA. I also thought there was lack of advertising of this year's event in the media, certainly nothing I could find on the Braunston Marina web site. CRT had an advert on their site.

Well things didn't quite work out for us either, Ray. Other things going on in our life meant we could't get both boats there, but until the middle of last week we had hoped to attend with just SICKLE. Alas it was not to be, so we ended up there just by car for the Sunday afternoon. I don't know if it was just me, but it felt a poor imitation of Braunston shows of the past. I admit it's not great to pay £20 for half a days parking in a very rough field, and the food we had from the "burger" van was overpriced and downright disgusting, so perhaps I was put into a poor frame of mind before we even got near the boats. I know that by Sunday lunchtimes many "historics" have already departed, but even allowing for that, boat numbers seemed surprisingly low. Please may Alvecote be (much) better - frankly that shouldn't be hard to achieve!

Oxy-Acetylene works under water,

This afternoon 2024 Crinan and Loch Craignish

This afternoon 2024 birds .... ... and seals ... island, Sound of Jura, Scotland

why they can’t fill a pint up I don't know,

50yrs, well before my age for drinking. That’s back in another century. what I will do is go this evening and see if it still tastes the same as it did the other day. Can’t say fairer than that.

Thats understandable if you ask the marina to organise the work there is bound to be a cost

I'm curious about how you knew was unlicenced. Meanwhile over on a crayfish fishing site, there is probably a post saying "Damned unlicenced narrowboat drove over my expensive crayfish trap and ripped it up into little bits and destroyed my catch. How do I stop this happening again?"...

No I meant it sounded ridiculous to me that the marina to would have added £10 to the cost of the BSS examination carried out by someone approved by them simply because it had been arranged directly. I have no problem with marinas checking insurances and wanting to know who is working on their site.

I met John through CWDF and from there we worked closely on a number of projects in France. John was a well respected voice and absolutely revolutionised the way aid was distributed throughout the camps. He went on to set up a charity in Greece as well as numerous other endeavours. We spoke a few months back and he was enjoying taking a bit of a break and spending time with his Grand kid. I remember one meeting I had with him in Calais where we discussed building a fire engine for the camp, we had to get a shipping container sited in the jungle to act as the fire station, John was my man on the ground helping us sneak it in unnoticed… I had a frantic phone call one afternoon from John, ‘it’s 40 f’ing foot’ how the f… are we going to hide that! 😂 But he did and we got the engine in a week later! John was an incredible human, full of love and compassion and who used his skills and time to do nothing but good. RIP John, you made the world better, I shall miss you mate.

What absolute rubbish. There are plenty of fit and alert people over the age of 62 being payed to work on construction sites, all well within the law.

Thanks Ange, I had much time for him a real gentleman, I missed his input when he left

And where did I say ANY of that? I am questioning the appropriateness of fine in this circumstance. My personal view is personal prosecution and a criminal record for the managers would be a more suitable action. But you obviously think handing out fines willy nilly is all that is required.

Yup, I'd concur...

12v and 240 ohms is 0.05A so I think 1.5mm^2 will be fine.

So you think it is ok to moor on a water point/services/lock landing, and people shouldn’t object to it? Are you a historic boat owner by any chance?

The irony being, the dredger is an actual, working, boat, and is fully entitled to being given priority in your situation. While the "historic"* boat owner is just pretending and is no better than any other boater. *They're not even really historic, they're just old. They're not that rare, and the canals started out and ran a long time with horse drawn boats. They are just a point in time some time after the invention of the diesel engine but before the canals stopped being used for commercial traffic.

If you are actually looking for an already-good boat to improve, I'd suggest a budget of £35-40k will be necessary as its a popular length in demand by solo boaters. Or did you have in mind a unicorn boat, i.e. one that is run down and neglected so cheap, but with a good hull and engine? The two requirements are mutually contradictory if you think about it... I'd suggest looking at 65ft and longer as everyone thinks this is too long and they can be desperately difficult to sell. Consequently they tend to be cheap for the sheer amount of boat you get and much more comfortable to live on.