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So the plan was to repaint the roof before winter - scrabbler, rust treatment, primer, anti-slip topcoat and all. All of this beautiful paint is now staring me in the face. Unfortunately, as you may have noticed, the long-awaited summer never quite happened. It's just so cool and dewy - not what Craftmaster recommends for painting! Any bare metal quickly oxidizes in this weather, and even on clear sunny days, we're getting dew! And, of course, if you're painting outside without cover, you take what you can get. I'm definitely aiming for practical, not visually perfect. (After all, it's quite hard to get a Shiny Boat look on anti-slip paint... ) In a perfect world, I guess I'd just wait 'til spring. But we live in an imperfect world - what's the consensus?

Thanks everyone for your input, Edible pets are great ideas and I'll consider those suggestions carefully, but technically, ALL pets are edible. @Fatboat, thanks for your very detailed and relevant information! I'm glad to hear that you felt confident letting your ferret play on the boat with supervision, which is what I would want to do. And I would probably want to walk it along the towpath just for the joy of it. Beautiful image! @NB Watersnail, thanks for this - I admit I've been concerned about the temperature fluctuations & my first instinct is that budgies wouldn't do well on our boat. Cockatiels are awfully attractive, though, and that information is very useful! thank you! @Caprifool, Rats do make lovely pets. Sadly not the right pet for our situation, but I think they'd do beautifully as narrowboat pets and would recommend them in the future. @Nulife Micro pigs are a lovely idea @Starcoaster Thanks for your informed source-cited opinion, I do appreciate that! I think ferrets would do well, especially as they are suitably narrow. Ferret-proofing will definitely be interesting. @Chop! WELL DONE CHOP! That is a really interesting and unusual solution. @patty-ann Chipmunks are wild animals where I come from - I've never understood the attraction of keeping them as pets! They are terribly adorable, though @Doodlebug/Starcoaster Thanks for the input on hedgehogs; I'd considered them but am not attracted to them as pets, though I think there are many valuable reasons to promote awareness of the animal and conserve its genetics! Very educational conversation, though. (Also Doodlebug - thanks for understanding about fish; people say "Get a fish!" and I'm like, "Oh, I love fish! I used to raise and breed rare fish and was involved in a very cool zebrafish genetics project! Do you know how much constant 240V power, space, filtration, heat, maintenance and care they require, and would you like to see the spreadsheet in which I worked out how that doesn't factor into our current power audit? And how fish need to be protected from temperature fluctuations and rocking and woodstoves are very dehydrating, creating a high-ammonia - you were talking about keeping a half-dead fish in a teacup, weren't you.") @Bunny, thank you so much for these useful tips about keeping Bunnies! The temperature tips are particularly useful. (I would love chinchillas but feel that I couldn't keep them cool enough... but I LOVE the image of your Bun with his fan!) Other suggestions that I haven't responded to: it's probably because they were so good I was embarrassed not to have come up with them myself.

greenie awarded to Ray for psychically divining my favorite animal - sadly I think a capybara needs more space than I can offer, but that is a truly inspired suggestion. ROUND OF APPLAUSE.

Hippos would be brilliant indeed, did you know that in the 1900s America was going to import them into the swamps to halt the spread of waterweed and solve "The Meat Question" ?? But sadly I think local regulations hate Fun. Thanks Nulife but I'm allergic to footballs :/

Perhaps I should have clarified that a pet swan is meant to be a joke - although mute swans and I are very fond of each other and I wouldn't object to having one if I had a pond! (You CAN buy swans, should the necessity ever come up in your life - http://www.ukwaterfowl.co.uk/category/bird/12/ - I can attest that black swans can become quite tame!) Hmm, the engine room is indeed a warm place that isn't too drafty.

Dear ones, Despite my best attempts to smuggle American wildcats onto the English canals over the summer, it looks like I am petless. My husband is allergic to cats, but that particular cat was an unusual creature that he was willing to make an exception for. Now I am desperate for a small friend to live on my boat. A lovely animal that I enjoy very much is the ferret, and I am pleased to see that they appear to be cheaper, healthier and better-understood here than in the States (possibly because they're still working animals here.) I would enjoy one/two as a pet very much, and believe that I could give them a good life, but a lot of the best and most appropriate cages won't fit on the boat! Caging is an interesting issue, and I'd be very interested in hearing from boaters who keep caged pets on their boats. As floorspace is always going to be at a premium, I'm expecting there might be some interesting modifications and self-build ideas from handy pet lovers who found clever solutions. And I'm interested to hear about how non-standard pets do on boats. There are some that I wouldn't consider (rabbits, for example) because I feel like they wouldn't be able to play or exercise properly when taken out of the cage - am I right or am I wrong? Does anyone keep pets on boats other than the old traditional cat/dog/small child trifecta? What animals do well on boats? What solutions have you found for them? And would I be really better off by raising my own swan? Thoughts warmly welcomed.

We purchased a secondhand boat and renovated it, which is not helpful for your exact situation. But I can say that for using power tools and equipment it was very, very nice to be working in a boatyard/marina. Things like soldering irons are kind of unfair on your batteries. You could also make it one of your first priorities to absolutely sort out your power management - engine, batteries, control panels, all that good stuff. Perhaps a partially finished sailaway is an attractive prospect, the kind that has ballast, a floor and an engine but nothing else (maybe insulation)? My other advice is to look at a lot of boats, at boat shows or online or whatever, to figure out the layout; make a scrapbook or draw it out on paper to figure out if you can get what you want into the space you have with the money you've got. An L-shaped dinette will take extra time and money, and are you going to make the cushions yourself or throw down cash for a new set? A train corridor style boat is cheaper and easier to work out, but will it make you happy? I am definitely in favor of self-fit-outs, but there are a lot of clever uses of space that boatbuilders have refined over generations, and a lot of ways you can go wrong. I saw a really upsetting boat that someone had self-fitted-out in an open-plan layout with IKEA furniture and emulsion paint - it was pretty embarrassing. I'm sure you'd never do anything like that, but it's a good idea to start with a vision. Then you can work it out with on a spreadsheet (add 20% to all cash values as you'll want a slush fund.)

any kind of toilet! you are a bad person if you have ANY KIND OF TOILET! Pull over to the side of the canal and put your hands in the air! you should ONLY use the toilet blocks at specific marinas.* *there are no toilet blocks.

I write/mod for a blog with 7x the readership of CWDF. Based on this information I will be gathering them into an army. Sign-up sheets will be provided, admission open to all, uniforms mandatory... Our first major attack will be running a profitable drive-thru movie theatre marina for narrowboats. In all seriousness I'm really into politics and volunteering - would adore to get in touch with others in the southwest who are interested in coming up with productive ways to address their problems here.

@Athy, you're thinking of someone else, possibly - I have Bobbybass's boat. Due to other commitments I only visit the forum a few times a month - hope you've all been well. One thing I've been up to is studying for the exam that will allow me to remain in the same country as my husband. The exam is called "Life in the UK." Did you know that the UK's values and principles include a strong sense of democracy and political tolerance, and that among the responsibilities of UK residents are volunteering and community work? It's on the exam and must be true! Therefore a clear solution to frustrations is fostering political tolerance through volunteer work and community engagement with a charity...?

@Carlt, I do agree that the current boating groups do not really speak for me, nor do they provide particularly impressive/eloquent/articulate arguments for why they should represent my voice. I know and love at least one charming CRT representative! They're not deliberately malicious. They're simply listening to what appear to be the most vocal, best organized voices - who also happen to garner the most clicks, media attention and sympathy. It's like how the Tea Party in America or UKIP here have seized a lot of media attention, when in fact they have relatively little political power. The classes of "People Who Hate Liveaboard Boaters" or "Old Dinosaurs Doing Favors For Old-Dinosaur Friends" are vocal, visible, well-organized and have a lot of ears. The most productive solution is to remove the ears or replace them. To be completely frank, the big boating-interest groups are for representing interests and they are being abysmally poor representatives. A potentially constructive solution is to form a more coherent grassroots group with better-articulated values, or to pressure the existing groups into providing better representation.

Almost all of the boats we viewed had their manual, folder and (sometimes) logbook available for immediate view, often on a kitchen counter. The "folder" will ideally have receipts, maintenance records, user manuals for equipment, etc. The manual will be the owner's notes for operating the boat. The logbook, if kept and available, will have notes of where the boat has been. State that you would like to take a few minutes to examine these documents, or ask to see them if you don't spot them. If the owner is present, ask politely if you can look through them; if you are being shown the boat by a dealer, again, ask politely if they mind waiting while you check them. It's a very reasonable request, but they are also personal documents, so it's better to be respectful. Green flags include well-kept manuals and maintenance folders, neat electrical wiring diagrams, receipts of engine service, etc. - get an idea of what the boat has done and what they've done for her. Red flags include manuals full of spiders, folders that bleed as soon as you open them, and excesses of £20K spent on vintage engine maintenance...

Ally, if vintage is your thing, we had a viewing and test drive of Damselfly, who was SUCH a sweetheart, with the shiniest chuffiest engine in the world, the dearest owner you could wish to meet and still for sale: http://narrowboats.apolloduck.co.uk/feature.phtml?id=299322 Every single bit of brass was polished unto gold and the owner had kept the most careful log of all of the pounds he had tossed into maintaining the engine. In the end, Damselfly didn't tick our boxes but she was so adorable that we nearly forgave her out of pure affection. An older boat, though, and needing a wee bit of updating. And you have to really want a Russell Newbery.

Mobile phone users who don't want to load content-heavy posts can press the "stop" button on their browsers and look at the static images instead, if they so choose.

(The "What Should We Call..." series of blogs feature descriptions of an everyday occurence followed by a .gif of the usual reaction. I've put these together purely for fun!) WHEN YOU'RE BUYING A SECONDHAND BOAT WHEN YOU THINK IT'S A GOOD IDEA TO PAINT YOUR BOAT WHEN YOUR IN-LAWS JUDGE YOU FOR BEING A "BOATIE" AND WHEN YOUR FRIENDS DON'T KNOW WHAT A "BOATIE" IS HOW BOATERS ACT IN REAL LIFE HOW BOATERS ACT ON CANALWORLD AND WHEN YOU MEET THEM IN REAL LIFE "IS YOUR BOAT COLD IN WINTER?" WHEN YOU'VE RUN AGROUND AND SOMEONE HELPS YOU OFF

I'm a scientist, not gonna condemn an entire race of boats with a sample size of just one!

Hudson boats piss. me. off. I am sure they are lovely in their way, but I have cracked my head in about three of their stupid twisted little pissant engine rooms, and as a result of operant conditioning I now spit blood at the sight of them. I have only ever bought one boat, but apparently good and fancy pedigrees don't lose value as quickly, and some that are a bit too common and un-flashy won't attract people on the name alone. Like, Sea Otters have shells that are made out of aluminum ( aka aluminium), which is very attractive and interesting to certain people, because they aren't in danger of rust and they don't need to be blacked. They start off stupid-expensive and by the time they're secondhand they're still stupid-expensive. They often look like a cafeteria inside, for some reason? Les Allen is a fancy name who made/makes respectable shells, and on that basis we checked one out, but the owner had lengthened it - literally chopped the boat up and welded a piece into it to make it longer - and it ruined the steering. But we were advised that they are usually nice boats. New Boat Company makes the pretty polished-looking off-the-peg ones in Poland, but they don't appear to hold value at all. Possibly because they are a bit cheaper to begin with, possibly because there are a lot of them, possibly because they are still "new" and people don't trust them yet? Anyway, we didn't look at any of those; maybe it's our loss...

I've gotta say that I'm not best pleased by their naming their boat a racial slur... but other than that they look like a reasonable family. There's no shame in getting rid of TVs and downsizing; more families should do so. The only problem with this article is that it was written by the Daily Mail (i.e. a bunch of desperate hamsters trapped inside a human suit) and is pitched to whip!people!into!a!frenzy!!!of!OUTRAGE!!ABOUT SOMETHING!!

As a child I was told to avoid wooded areas because of the way that the trees explode when hit by lightning. The sap and fluids inside the tree superheat, causing the explosion of woody shrapnel. for children this is often considered more dangerous than being exposed to direct lightning. There's also the risk of side flash, ground current, etc: From NOAA's Five Ways That Lightning Strikes People. Here is how NOAA recommends staying safe indoors and outdoors! If you are absolutely completely trapped in open country when a thunderstorm hits, then strip naked, tip forward hold onto your ankles and stick your bum in the air. The strike will travel the resulting pathway from bum to legs to feet and safely into the ground, bypassing your delicate insides and brain. It turns out Stephen Fry endorsed it on QI.... ETA: Thanks Mike! You're the best! <3

You have no idea how much you have made me want a sugar-pink boat crewed by wolves and miniature leopards.... sounds like a most excellent fairy tale!

So to recap: Poster 1: Would a person inside a English narrowboat on the water survive if the boat is struck directly by lightning? General Consensus: Yes, because it will act as a Faraday cage. Actual Poster: I have actually survived a lightning strike in my English narrowboat! General Consensus: Hurrah for the Faraday cage! You: No it won't because it isn't a Faraday cage. "electrical stuff" will get through the holes in the boat and things. Me: Actually, you have a Faraday cage in your house full of holes and things that electrical stuff doesn't get through. I myself will feel safe in a boat. You: BUT WOULD THE ELECTRICAL SYSTEM OF A CAR SURVIVE A DIRECT EMP STRIKE. I think that in the next thunderstorm in the West Country (probably 2016) I will feel safe enough in my little boat.