TheBiscuits

See, I don't understand that Martyn. If there's a chuffing great hole in the edge right where I want to moor, I pull the boat forwards or backwards six feet and I can then easily get on and off. It only matters where you want to step on and off the boat.

Nah, it's got locks. It's got the longest lock free pound though. If you're on the Lancaster you're a Muppet if you don't at the very least go down to Glasson Basin at least once. Or of course you could also cross the Ribble and get on the main connected system.

Bottom gates, Shirley. As for the camo, I used to have a bright yellow roof and it's too bright and attracts too many insects. Netting is faster than paint to alter this!

The pub? 🍻😃

How big is your cup? I get more than one cup out of 1.7 litres/3 pints of water ...

With only a guess at the time taken, the maths gets flaky. My electric kettle uses around 0.2kWh to boil 1.7 litres of water at room temperature, measured with a power meter plug. 0.15-0.2kWh is probably a reasonable range for an electric kettle - or a penny a cup give or take at 35p/unit.

My hob and oven do exactly the same thing ...

Did they raise the topic or did you? When I meet someone who starts frothing at the mouth about their pet topic, I usually nod and smile and start backing away from them...

What's your budget? It may sound like a rude question but it's very important. If it's twenty grand, buy a GRP (fibreglass) cruiser and get used to a 15 foot living space. If it's thirty grand, you'll probably find a tired old steel boat that needs major work to the interior and/or the hull. If it's fifty grand, you can get a good but old steel boat and upgrade the interior as funds/DIY skills/time allows. If it's under ten grand, forget it - you'll be buying expensive heartache!

That'll do it. Get a competent boat fettler to replumb your entire cooling system. If you say where you are based, someone here will know the best person to contact near you.

I disagree. Many old goats singlehand narrow boats, and significantly more of them used to. 😉

There was a comment last week on the forum that insisted that any Labour government wouldn't do anything for the canals. There was one name that instantly sprang to mind ...

Mea culpa, it was my careful editing of your post I referred to - deliberately stopping the quote just before the " /rivers" That's because I'm a Master Debater. I know this because many people have told me this previously. I'm also partially deaf 🤣 Nonsense, they go through the tarmac on the shiny new towpath where there's no mooring provision for boats. 😁. Allegedly. (I did send photographs, full contact details and an offer to reimburse any damage, but for some odd reason CRT never responded!)

No, I can only go on what you write. Even if there was a very careful, deliberate edit to your quote ... That said, I think based on current forum etiquette (or lack thereof) I'm now supposed to personally attack you enough to land on your naughty step 🤣

You're not supposed to use an anchor on the canal, they break the bottom puddling and cause leaks ...

By phone? You were talking to a random person in a call handling centre who are only allowed to read the script in front of them. They don't work for CRT, they work for a different company that gets paid by CRT. Use email to enquiries.{CRT region}@ usual if it's region specific, or one of the national email addresses if not regional. It takes longer, but it usually does end up in front of the person you need to get a decision from.

I once had a chap of a certain age row an inflatable dinghy straight into my boat then proceed to give me a foul mouthed tirade. I let him vent as long as he wanted, until he told me I should have given way to him. Which was when I pointed out I was moored on a lock landing and although the engine was running I hadn't actually moved at all ...

So about 1.2% of one year's budget, spread over the last 12 years, or around 0.1% annualised. Yep, that's clearly the problem. The other 99.9% of spend was obviously wisely spent on critical lock repairs and not worth mentioning ...

Well yes, buoyancy aids are the correct thing to use when using anything expected to get you wet - dinghys, canoes, paddle boards. Automatic inflatable lifejackets would be a fairly stupid thing to wear in/on one, and a cheap foam lifejacket (with a fixed collar - they're a different design to buoyancy aids) would make it very awkward to paddle or sail. If you don't get why that is and blame it all on "elf n safety gone mad" then you're not assessing the risk quite as well as you think you are.

And scrubbed clean with a wire brush so they can work. If they're caked up they don't do anything as they can't react.