carpet wallah

Mathematicians out there? If it takes about 5 minutes to get a boat through bridge 102 (as it did yesterday). ... how long does it take to get the same boat through a twisty 2,000+ yard tunnel? Perhaps it has already been achieved? Anybody know? Anybody waiting? And Blisworth? Seem to remember it being rather unfriendly to high cabin edges. ... that’s gonna take an awful lot of bow thrusting in the process?

Just speechless. .....

It's now about 4ft deeper than shown in the photo

Should make for an interesting discussion on Friday evening - folks reviewing six entirely different episodes at the same time

Precisely. We went through (both ways), three weeks ago. There were elderly folks (some even older than me), who had to be gently shepherded off the foot-bridges, away from the lock gear and even out of the arc of the balance beams, just to be able to work the locks, bless 'em. Perhaps some signs on the bridges, keeping visitors to the towpath side, would help. The odd stray gongoozler could then be rounded up by the volockies.

Sorry, are you seriously suggesting that the casualty was NOT airlifted to hospital? If so, I would suggest that you are mis-reading the article.She was treated on the scene by the medics and then taken to hospital in the air ambulance. This is clear from other reports. Given the circumstances, I cannot imagine any other outcome.

How tragic. Bobbybass, you describe the situation most eloquently. Unfortunately, with huge capital investment in these inappropriate boats, the hire company is stuck where it is. Maybe they could be prevailed upon to change their advice to hirers on the use of the thrusters, but that may involve educating the company themselves as to the problem in the first place. Sadly, they don't appear to be in strongest of financial health, so they may have other things on their minds.

"Running Scared", directed by the late, great David Hemmings. Starred Gayle Hunnicutt (his wife) and Robert Powell. Mrs C W and I were a couple of days into our honeymoon on a hire boat out of North Kilworth in September, 1971, when we were held up, with a lot of other peeps, by a sports car (Austin Healey?) in the cut, just before the bridge. It had a dummy at the wheel and was held up by flotation bags. There was another, identical car on the bridge, together with the ramp they were using to launch the "speeding" car into the canal. The film crew claimed that there was an explosive charge in the car, but after the mood amongst the waiting boaters started getting ugly, a diver pulled the floating car to one side and allowed us to wiggle gently past. As a boater of 2 days experience, I was rather proud of my manoeuvre actually. I read that someone found a print of the film a few years ago and it was shown in Braunston community hall (?). Gayle Hunnicutt was the guest of honour!

Tim and Pru are in London. Bless you Pru, you've fogotten the ground paddles, dear and you're trying to drown Tim.

Water saving, possibly. If boats start from top and bottom at midday, more chance of one up, one down, less boatless locks being emptied into the Monty, more water into Hurleston Reservoir.

Can there really be two of these guys out there? About 6 years ago we were cruising up the Macc/Peak Forest when we "caught up" with an OwnerShips boat out of Heritage Marina. If I were to describe his activities and the situation, I could just have cut and pasted WV's exact words - well under 1 mph, never once looked back. It was the end of the day and, after half an hour or so, I assumed, wrongly, that he was looking for somewhere to moor. Eventually, when there was the opportunity to pass, he blanked us. B*gger me, if, on the way back to Etruria a few days later, we didn't get stuck behind him again, going even slower! This time we decided to stop for lunch and passed his moored boat later, the occupants having gone Into town. I eventually concluded that the guy had mental health problems, his behaviour was that bizarre. Could he still be out there???? Did you notice if it may have been an ex OwnerShips boat, WV?

I think the situation is that PLM Ltd are still doing the day to day running of the Marina. PL is still the sole Director of PLM.Roy is the sole director of PLT, who hold the Marina freehold and the NAA and therefore CaRT would deal directly with Roy in respect of the NAA

Lovely work, Dave. On the subject of your post, I have to say that your experience is much closer to my recent observations of being passed whilst moored. I simply don't recognise the picture painted by many of the contributors to the recent "What's the Hurry?" thread, which gave the exactly opposite view. With the inevitable exceptions, I feel that general courtesies are as well or better observed than in the past.

Business Rates - About £25k - not exactly covered by the Petty Cash methinks

There are no courts, there are no court fees or lawyers fees. There is no administrator. There is nothing to sell, because the only asset is the freehold, which goes back to M Steadman under his mortgage. There were no tradespeople, as these deal with PLM, which is still trading. The only other creditors are CRT and the long lease holders, who will be satisfied if the successors to the title of the freehold (PLT) honour their leases. ....and if I was a millionaire, I would pay the IP out of my own money, to make sure that my interests were protected.