NB Alnwick

My boat will be out of the water this Winter so I can get it surveyed at the same time. Just to add: GJWDirect were not the cheapest but with membership of RCR thrown in and no extra charge for paying monthly by direct debit they are clearly ahead in most respects and look to be saving me at least £200 a year.

Thanks - did an online quote request with GJW and it has come out £200 cheaper with no additional cost for paying monthly by direct debit!

I have just receieved our renewal quotation from Towergate at just under £450 - an increase of more than £100 on last year! We have owned the boat since 2005 and have never needed to claim - I am therefore wondering if anyone can suggest a less expensive alternative?

Ah! the famous Montagu's Harrier On some builds, the oval plate at the bottom is fitted with a dipstick tube for a flexible dipstick.

We usually cruise at 180 rpm on canals - less when passing moored craft and anything up to 350 rpm on rivers and estuaries where we have a decent depth of water. That said, I doubt if this is of any help or interest to the OP.

Pram hoods on boats should be banned!

The price of progress! Why is anything that we used to do rather well now regarded as too expensive or too complicated? For example: Despite massive opposition from landowners (nothing new there), plans for the original London to Birmingham Railway (now part of the West Coast main line) were approved by Parliament in May 1833 and the line opened throughout on 17 September 1838 - the actual construction works taking less than five years! With the benefit of modern technology and mechanised earth-moving equipment, HS2 has already taken more than five years to build and as far as I know they haven't laid any significant length of railway track yet. And just look at the mess they are making . . .

We used to get our pop delivered by Corona in re-sealable bottles but that was in the good old days when our railways were still British . . .

Well there were two with the boat when we purchased it in 2005 - one could therefore argue that we did buy them as part of the package. We also hired two more from Calor at the then exhorbitant price of £57.95 each. That said, I have no idea how they managed to multiply over the last 18 years but aftyer many many exchanges, we now have five and only have room for four!

Why would you want a IC powered outboard anyway - electricity is the way to go . . . https://www.promarinestore.co.uk/epropulsion-spirit-10-plus-electric-outboard?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=ppc-epropulsion-plus&gclid=Cj0KCQjw0IGnBhDUARIsAMwFDLm6cmKT1Hpf3vYRG7TeDXb4FvyqVYzxpw5ZSUOwuZAuhlXm1PHYiA8aAiPAEALw_wcB No connection - just the bl****** obvious!

I understand that these items have become scarce but we have acquired a spare one too many. I know that they go for a premium on eBay and similar auction sites but if any forum member is in desperate need and is willing to collect it from our boat, currently moored at Cropredy Marina, we would happily exchange it for something more useful (like a beer or red wine)! Please pm me if interested.

I worked for Courage when Directors Bitter was still being brewed on the home ground. These days it is brewed by Marstons at the Bedford Brewery previously operated by Charles Wells. Thanks to the wizardry of modern science, clever chemistry, and the right ingredients, a pint of Directors, as served today, tastes exactly the same as it did in the old days. Using a small proportion of my Courage pension, I was able to enjoy an excellent pint of Directors at the Peacock Inn at Tysoe in Warwickshire on Wednesday evening. A little story about my early years at Courage: We had a management dining room on the first floor of Seven Bridges House (near the River Kennet in Reading's Bridge Street) - the directors had their dining room on the floor above. Although the directors always enjoyed wine with their lunch, those of us in the dining room below only had draught beer. However, a tradition had been established where if one of us happened to be celebrating a birthday during the preceding week, the directors would send down a case (or more) of wine to be consumed with our lunch on Friday. By the time I joined the "manager's mess" there were only about a dozen of us but somehow, we managed to have a birthday every week!