Dave_P

I always get a sinking feeling (no pun intended) when I read posts like these! I'm sure I'm not the only one. Even a cheap boat is a huge investment, in money and time, not to mention the way boat ownership ends up dominating your life. Yet time and again, we get newcomers asking questions which should have been asked at the very beginning of a long period of research and education, but they've already bought the boat! However, in the spirit of helpfulness, to answer your questions: 1)what do I need to do to ensure the boat will pass? You can't ensure it will pass, and you should have got a valid BSS before buying. Why didn't you get the previous owner to have it tested? Right now, your best bet is to simply get it tested as soon as possible and then attend to anything it fails on. 2)how do I proof the boat is mine? This is a question you need to put to the person you bought from. If they haven't even provided you with a receipt or any paperwork then not only do you not have any proof it's yours, but you also don't know that it was their boat to sell. 3) is there any canal were i csn keep my boat until i get everything ready? Once you have your BSS and your licence and insurance, you can legally keep your boat on any canal which is under the control of the Canal and River Trust. (This includes most of canals around London, except the Basingstoke Canal. You will need to comply with the rules for boaters without a home mooring. See here : https://canalrivertrust.org.uk/media/original/633.pdf or you will need to pay for a permanent mooring. Permanent moorings are run by Canal and River Trust and by private businesses. Around London they are in very short supply with people waiting many years to get one. In other parts of the country you can usually get a mooring quite easily by ringing round a few places. Try googling moorings in different areas. Again, you should have researched all this BEFORE you bought a boat. I appreciate that it's all a bit late for you, but hopefully other potential buyer might read this thread and learn from your mistakes.

What's wrong with an oar?

Fridge is feasible. Just install a gas fridge.

Lovely pics and amazing to think that some of the same boats are still in Gas Street Basin, 50 years later.

I can't help but disagree with this. For around 8 months of the year, I get enough power from my solar (500w) to provide pretty much everything I need. I then get another 1-1.5 months where I'm still getting a decent top up from solar. So actually it's only about 3 months of the year when solar isn't providing a useful amount of energy.

Does that mean that in Australia they all aspire to having food, water and air?

You win the internet today. Especially for invoking Maslow!

Well it's taters out there today. Bit of snow blowing around too. Personally, I blame Mr Smelly for jinxing the weather.

I'll treasure him always

No hobbits that I know of on the challenge. There generally are moomins though.

The amount it cools the boat is directly proportional to how desperate you are for it to work, based on how much you just forked out for it.

The hard hat would have been in case you banged your head on something. Not to prevent a crushing injury, irrespective of what anyone there told you.

An ecofan spinning backwards cools the boat.

To be fair to Halfords, pretty much all car spares shops work from reg numbers these days. There’s a lovely little car spares shop near me, staffed by humans. Trouble is they don’t actually open anymore. They’re in there, door locked, putting together online orders for shipping. If you hammer on the door long enough, eventually they will come.

I remember asking one of my tutors at Bicton College many moons ago, about why taxonomists keep shifting the goal-posts. Her answer was "well they've got to justify their jobs somehow, haven't they?" Stuff taxidermy. That's what I say.

I'm not wrong. I don't know where you looked that up but there is no longer such a thing as the Corylaceae family. Hazel, Hornbeam, and Birch are all in the Birch family Betulaceae. Beech (Fagus Sylvatica) is in the Fagaceae family. Tree Monkey knows a bit about trees I'll admit, but as a former National Trust head gardener, Horticultural Advisor to Europe's largest Organic growing charity, Horticultural college tutor, City & Guilds horticultural examiner and exam question setter and researcher for BBC Gardening output, I know a thing or two myself.