Tony1

I don't have any experience of them but I agree with you that they are a truly lovely sight to behold. Its a matter of personal taste of course, but I find their lines much more appealing than any narrowboat. The ones that will be capable of a channel crossing (in mild weather) will be those with a V shaped hull, like this one: https://www.dutch-barges.net/katherine.html The dutch barges that have flat bottoms like narrowboats will be just as unsafe as a normal narrowboat in a channel crossing. I tend to think of the flat-bottom ones as narrowboats (or widebeams) that are styled as dutch barges, and for some reason that limits their appeal to me personally. The ones I think of as dutch barges are the ones with a more V shaped hull. But with a draft approaching 3ft, there might be issues cruising some canals.

Indeed. In many states women are trying to come to terms with the fact that abortion has been made effectively illegal, and it appears the court's next target is gay marriage. I think that humanity tends to stumble forwards in a generally progressive and positive direction, and our progress is certainly not linear or smooth. One can only hope that the US emerges from this dark time with its democratic systems renewed and strengthened, but at the moment the malignant elderly white politicians, and the billionaires who pay them, seem to have the initiative.

I still maintain that the 70s was the richest musical decade, for the sheer range and innovation. The problem is that there were a few TV shows that portrayed the cultural values of the time regarding race, and things have changed a lot since then. There were phrases used in some TV shows that would not be considered acceptable today, and some comedians (like Jim Davidson) portrayed stereotypes of different races in a way that people would not be comfortable with today. Societies have tended to develop and often to improve over time, and in my personal view we are a more open-minded, understanding and progressive society than we were 50 years ago - and we are all the better for it. And in turn the 1970s were better than the 1920s- which were better than the 1870s- and so on. I think older people sometimes struggle to fully realise that some of the attitudes that were fine in their youth are no longer acceptable. They resent being told that language/attitudes which were totally fine 50 years ago are no longer acceptable, and in fairness there have been a few cherished values and ways of life that have been lost since the 1970s- but maybe that's always the way progress just has to be? Whether the ongoing progression of society is ultimately going to be a good thing for humanity on the whole is where the debate lies. Personally, I'm all for progress.

So you're going for the more traditional steptoe and son vibe, circa 1975? Be still my beating heart 😀

Apologies if this has been mentioned already, I haven't read all the posts- I use portable/rechargeable fans. They're small enough to fold down fairly small and pack away for the rest of the year, but they have I think 7 inch diameter blades, and they give off a half-decent breeze on maximum setting for about 3 hours. On heatwave days I have a fan within 3 feet of me at all times, set to maximum. There are always two spare fans recharging, so I'm never without a breeze. They're great on the very warm nights to set on a low speed and keep the air moving in the bedroom whilst you sleep. And at the risk of getting the ladies over-excited, I must confess that I don't wear a shirt indoors on heatwave days.

It's a challenging and absolutely fascinating process trying to spec out what your priorities are for a new narrowboat, when you haven't yet spent time aboard one. My ex partner was probably an extreme example. We both liked the look of narrowboat liveaboard life based on TV and youtube shows, but as soon as we tried a hire boat she went off the idea completely. So do bear in mind, it is always a possibility that one of you will simply not enjoy it as much as you hope and expect. Assuming you're both still feeling ok with the general idea of boating even after you've had a couple of holidays (in boats with different layouts), then you're in a position to do some more serious planning. One thing that struck me was that usually, boat decisions involve a compromise. For example, one of the biggest initial decisions is whether to go wide beam or narrowbeam. Most of us go narrowbeam for the extra travelling range it provides, and I'll assume- since your emphasis is more on travelling than comfort and space- that you'll probably go for a narrowbeam. Another big decision is boat length. I initially thought 45ft would be great, as its a bit easier to get around tight and narrow bends, and you can find mooring spots that might be too small for a 70 footer. So there's the compromise between having greater length and space, versus smaller length and less space, but the boat being easier to get about in general. I got that one wrong, putting more emphasis on the boat being nippy and easier to navigate in smaller places. The reality is that you just learn to handle a longer boat, and it turns out not to be much hassle at all. It's easy to imagine yourself living in a small space, but the reality can be much more challenging than you ever expected. I bought a 50ft boat, but even for a single person I find storage space is a big challenge, so I'm assuming you'll be looking at a minimum length of 58-60ft, which gives a good compromise between decent length (and thus space), but still allowing access to most of the canals. 70ft would be great for a couple tbh, but that will bar you from certain waterways, so there's a priority to be decided there. These are just a couple of very obvious examples of how you can think you are assigning the the right priority to a given issue initially, but the reality of boat living can totally change your opinion. I would guess that about a third of the things you currently think are going to be an important issue or a problem, will probably turn out not to be any concern at all, once you have some hands on experience. But on the other hand a number of brand new concerns will arise that you didn't even foresee. Another question is how much solar you would like to have, bearing in mind that filling the roof with panels will leave little room for things like storage boxes, bikes, etc. Will you go for the once-per-decade purchase of lithium batteries, or the cheaper and simpler to manage option of lead acid batteries, which may have to be replaced every 3 to 4 years, and which will not take in the solar charge as efficiently as lithium batteries? Fortunately the forum members, as you no doubt will have seen, have collectively gathered a vast amount of knowledge and experience. I would advise some caution in assessing the wide range of opinions you will be given. My sense is that some people try to champion their particular/favourite solution, to the extent that you may be slightly misled about how cheap/easy certain solutions are. If you proposed the idea of pulling you boat around with a horse, you'd probably find someone who would respond that horses were really simple, no worries, a great option, and that you couldn't possibly go wrong buying a horse, and that diesel engines were very overrated. Taking advice can be a bit of a minefield! 😄

Are the hire boat numbers down at the moment? The cost of living increases might not be squeezing those folks who can pay £1000 or so to hire a narrowboat, but you never know. I wonder if the price of diesel is a factor in some boat owners cruising fewer miles/hours than they normally would? I usually get about 6-10 boats a day passing me, but I have a feeling that's a normal summer between Chester and Ellesmere Port.

They did send an officer over to try and get fingerprints from the door, after an attempted burglary at my house almost 20 years ago, but that's not going to happen these days - there are nowhere near enough officers, and in fairness maybe chasing local scumbags isnt an efficient use of their time. If you think a water pistol or salt gun might deter a burglar, I can only suggest that your understanding of these people's mindset is significantly wide of the mark. I actually have one of the Bug-A-Salt guns, and a large water pistol, and neither of these objects are in the least bit frightening. Even in poor light, there is no mistaking them for anything other than plastic toys. As a deterrent, and for when I am near urban areas, I've fitted a fake siren to one of the doors (from a well known alarm manufacturer), plus a real siren to each door, and one siren inside. I have alarm contacts on the doors and windows, and in the saloon I have a PIR. I even have a PIR covering one of the door sirens, in case someone tries to smash it. I reckon a very, very loud alarm siren, plus you filming the scumbags, is a much better deterrent than a salt gun. If you want something cheap, you can get one of these super loud bike sirens, put it on the roof , and lead the wire through a mushroom vent so you can trigger it from inside in case of a threat. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Hornit-dB140-V2-Worlds-Loudest/dp/B006TDEV20 There are also a variety of more professional/dedicated 'panic button' style alarms that are designed to make a lot of noise and will trigger remotely. I think the thing to do is to put the siren on the roof somewhere, so that its sound will not be muffled by coming from inside the boat. There are also a range of very loud personal alarm/attack sirens that you could buy, those will put off a potential mugger much more than a salt gun.

And bear in mind the official response time target for a cat 1 call is 7 mins. https://inews.co.uk/news/health/ambulance-response-times-region-new-data-nhs-postcode-lottery-south-sest-1690746 There is a vast and almost hidden crisis in our A+E provision, but it very rarely makes national news. How the mighty NHS has fallen.

Whether you get an ambulance I think partly depends on how well you can tell your tale. In many cases if its possible to get yourself to A+E, you will stand a higher chance of surviving than if you wait for an ambulance. There have been multiple cases during very busy periods of people suffering strokes or heart attacks and dying during the hours they were waiting for an ambulance. I read an account by a sunday league footballer who said a teammate severed an achilles tendon during the game, and then waited 4 hours for an ambulance, even though the hospital was next to the playing field. Even after they got him to A+E he had to queue for hours before he was seen. I had no idea how bad it was until I gave my ex-partner's son a lift for a hospital outpatient appointment. There was a line of people queueing for A+E on trolleys, stretching from the entrance door and going along the side of the building, so God knows how many people were also queueing inside. When things get even a bit busy, it resembles the sort of A+E service that a decade or two ago, we would have expected to see in a third world country.

Tbh I've been a bit put off trying the L+L. Over the winter and spring I looked at the stoppages map often, and the L+L seemed to have lots of those red markers (canal closed). That said, I just had another look at the current situation, and now there seems to be only one actual closure in its whole length (forge locks)- and even that's only for a week. Can this be true? Is the L+L almost fully open? I've also read a few reports about low water levels, and that's slightly off putting, but my boat seems to be 'normal' draft, so probably no serious issues. The real reason must be that I'm not ready to mix it with all those rufty-tufty northern types 😄

Well that's certainly a pioneering new approach to treating chapped lips Mr Riley. I can see a snag, which is the additional cost of treating the PTSD that the children would suffer from, as a result of having dog faeces on their lips. The real trouble is these wastrel youths have no backbone. All they want to do is make youtube videos and attend gender studies classes. I doubt there's one of these 7 year old that could do an honest day's work down t'pit, like we used to do back in my day. But on a more serious note, I did get some canal water on my little finger the other day. I considered having the entire hand amputated as the only way to be 100% sure that I wouldn't die from rancid stinky water poisoning (or RSWP, to my fellow medical experts). But half a dozen cans of Fosters administered orally (and promptly) treated the poisoning so effectively that I made a full recovery by the next day.

Blimey, I hadn't considered there might be an actual real risk, but of course that is a thing. It was in the winding hole before the locks at Ellesmere Port, which looks as if it collects a lot of crap from the Shroppie, and might well harbour a few rats. Unfortunately the GP I'm registered with is 20-odd miles away, and in any case their current waiting time for an appointment (even if you think its pretty serious) is between 2-4 weeks. Some people have been quoting 6-12 hour delays to get an ambulance in recent months, such is the parlous state of the NHS. So even getting treated in A+E is going to be a major exercise- if, God forbid, I ever need it. To be honest I can't be bothered trying to argue with a receptionist to grant me an audience some time in the next month or so, as I'll know anyway before then if I've got a serious problem.

I'm not a fan of canal water, especially given all the extra effluent that's been pumped into canals in the last couple of years. To my horror, a few drops of canal water touched my lips the other day- my stern mooring rope flicked slightly as I was pulling on it. I screamed and fainted, as any normal person would. In fact I fully expected to be dead by morning. By a minor medical miracle I survived this poisoning, which incidentally proves my theory that Wainwright's beer (which I use to treat all medical emergencies) does have significant medicinal qualities.

It seems me going on a diet could become a matter of life and death. Since I started shopping at Waitrose I've grown to Henry VIII proportions. There's no chance of me fitting through a paddle hole 😱

, This could easily be a case of someone pulling my leg, but if its was, the woman was a very good actor. I got talking to a woman at a lock, probably on the Llangollen I think, and she was warning me to be careful. Perhaps I appeared to be a bit cavalier in my movements around the lock. She said that she had once fallen into an emptying lock, and had been sucked through one of the paddle holes in the lock gate, and came to the surface again out in the pound. I had no idea the holes were large enough to allow the passage of a person, even a small and slender person, but she seemed deadly serious about her story. Was I being gullible, or could this happen?

I've done the iron lock a few times over the last year, but only twice singlehanded. The first time I was going down, and tbh I didnt even cotton on that there was no ladder until I started watching the water level go down. Seeing there was no ladder, I realised I'd have to tow the boat out, but of course there is the little footbridge close to the bottom gates, that prevents you doing a simple haul out. On my first go I lay down on the footbridge and passed the centre line underneath it from one hand to the other, but an experienced boater showed me an easier way a few weeks later. When you have those footbridges over the bottom gates, you stand on the 'lock' side of the footbridge, get the boat moving by pulling it, and then let the boat drift out of the lock. As the boat passes underneath the footbridge it takes the centre line under the bridge with it, and as it moves further away the centre line starts to rise a bit, until it becomes reachable from the other side of the footbridge. So at no point do you let the centre line go. You hold the end of it and as the boat passes underneath and starts to move away, you cross to the 'outer' side of the footbridge. And with the end of the centre line still in hand, you can reach down on the outer side of the footbridge, and grab the centre line as it is passing underneath. The family crews and the couples don't need to know these sorts of things really, but for a singlehander these tips can be really useful.

A retired cop advised me that if you want to help solve a burglary, place the cameras inside and well hidden. If you can offer the police some film showing the items and surfaces that the burglars touched, they might consider sending a SOCO person over to check for fingerprints. But lets be realistic, the police are not going to be any help with a burglary unless the financial stakes involved are high, or the incident is high profile in some way. Solving small scale crime is just not their job any more. For me the cameras are a convenient way to have a look at what's going on outside, if you hear an odd noise or a commotion. Sometimes taking a quick look can put your mind at rest without having to risk climbing out onto the stern, and possibly getting into an escalating discussion with people that you would rather not get into a discussion with.

Just in case anyone is thinking of getting security cameras at the moment, I thought it might be worth posting this. It seems that for the next 3 days, Amazon are selling two blink cameras for £77, which is a big discount. https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B088CX996D/ref=ox_sc_act_title_3?smid=A3P5ROKL5A1OLE&psc=1

As a singlehander, it seems to be different every time I share locks with another boat. About a month after I first got the boat I shared a flight of double locks somewhere near Braunston with a full time pro boat mover. I admitted I didnt have a very clear idea how to work double locks efficiently, and I told him to just direct me to whichever paddles or gates needed moving. We got through that flight faster than I think I've gone through any locks since then, and whilst I appreciated sharing the workload, and making quicker progress, it was a bit like a military exercise, and all done at such a pace that I didn't really learn very much. The ideal is a family of hire boaters with older children manning every gate and paddle before you even get a chance to offer. Sharing with a couple is a variable experience, although I've never come across anyone so taciturn or downright rude as this couple. My personal take on it is that whatever happens, I'm probably going to save some time and effort by sharing, and at least I have some company in my labours. So if going up a flight of double locks, my baseline assumption is that they'll want me to climb the ladder and work some paddles and gates- and I think that's absolutely fair. I never want to appear reluctant to do my share. I always offer to work with whatever procedure they might want to use, and I always offer to climb up and work the paddles, as I would have to do if I were singlehanding the lock. And if they prefer me to climb up and help with just one lock, or with six locks, its still better than doing the lock alone, because at least the other gate is being looked after by someone who knows what they're doing. I've joked about not sharing with couples because they make me work too hard, but the truth is I'm always very willing to do whatever level of work is required, because I'm conscious of not wanting them to do any extra work due to me sharing with them. But to be honest, if a pair were that uncommunicative and ignorant of my attempts to say hello, I'd be tempted to stay put, let them go through alone, and perhaps share with the next boat. Don't give me those negative waves man, as a great actor once said.

I've no idea whether the guy gives a toss about your opinion, or what you say needs to be recorded. I certainly dont.

I'm not here to be the guy's defence lawyer, but I will say that he is a semi-active member of this forum, and I personally believe him to be honest in giving his account. He would have required hospital treatment, so assuming he told the truth in A+E, there should be at least one hospital not too far from the Thames which did indeed record a case of a broken arm caused by a swan.

I had hoped it was clear from my narrative that I only squirted water as a last resort, after the swan had already bitten me, chased me out of the basin, and behaved aggressively numerous times. I'm sure it wasn't trying to cause me any serious damage, but sometimes you just need to be able to get on with a job, without being interrupted every five minutes by a bite on the leg. I must stress here that I was very much joking by saying that I showed that b*tch who was daddy of the basin. I'm just trying to see the funny side of it, that's all. I took no pleasure at all from squirting water at such a beautiful bird, but I had stuff to do on the boat and I didnt want to be shooing away an aggressive swan all the time. And since I was the only boat in the basin for 4 days, the swan was swooping over every time I stepped out onto the stern. I would have loved to be able to calm it down and establish a relationship with it, and I really hope someone does that, because these birds deserve all the kindness and love that the human race can give them. I should perhaps make it a bit clearer on the occasions when I'm just joking or being silly.