alan_fincher

........And if there is a bloody great warehouse in the direction you are pointing it?....................................

No, but it is obvious from the pictures that OP has left it open for the canal Boat Club boat approaching from the opposite direction. It would have been rude, and bad practice to close it in the situation pictured!

To be clear, I don't think it likely that the person Betty has encountered is a fake. He is, however handing out a message different from the one given to some of us as the official CRT line. So I would love to know if he is doing this off his own bat, or whether "somebody" in CRT is telling him that £25 charges do (or will) apply in Berkhamsted. Someone, somewhere must be being "economical with the truth", and this is a difficult enough topic to try and bring some sense to, without dishonesty being added to the equation. If anybody can get a full name, I'll follow it up, although I'm starting to think nailing jelly to a ceiling is far more likely to succeed.

There are barely signs that say 14 day moorings, (for that is what the entirety of Berkhamsted towpath still is). Those that exists are defaced, and in many cases illegible. CRT produced a map showing which bits they currently consider to be visitor mooring, (14 days) and it was only the bit near the station, (arguably the worst bit to moor in). Previous data gathering was said to establish that there was after all no need for shorter time restrictions - the response from the volunteers was that they wanted to continue to gather data - looks like they have their own agenda to me, and CRT certainly didn't rell them they wanted them to stop! I have been expecting the next problem to be that, because it is mostly NOT a formal VM, (according to CRT), people on winter tow-path moorings could legally stay here over last winter, and many did, (paying, of course). This did make it quite crowded, and I feared data gathered then would then be used to make a case for short stay moorings and overstay charges. Am I getting two suspicious and cynical? I would love to think I am, but fear I am not. People are continuing to play games, and I fear ultimately things will happen for no valid reason other than that some people feel they should.

Can you please find out his name, and PM it to me Betty.

It doesn't. Somebody is telling porkies, because in Berkhamsted their role should be recording only. If they are saying CRT will invoice £25 for overstaying, then that is not what Matthew Symmonds is saying. I'm happy to challenge this, but to avoid what happens each time I do raise a challenge, I would need to know the name of this volunteer. He should have a badge and an ID card, and should be prepared to show you. Can I suggest that each time someone decides they are going to post on here what a volunteer has told them, they only do so, if they can supply their name. Don't forget we are being told some people posing as volunteers are known to be bogus!

Here we go again - this is disgraceful, IMO. He has absolutely no right or authority to tell you that. The £25 charge, (which many consider unlawful), only applies at a small number of short term visitor mooring on South East Waterways, and Berkhamsted most definitely is not one of them< (there are no moorings here resticted to less than 14 days). CRT cannot even make up its mind about how much of Berkhamsted is recognised visitor moorings at the moment. When Matthew Symmonds produced a map for us, it did not include any of the more popular parts, like the "Waitrose" pound. CRT might want to introduce short stay, and £25 charges in Berkhamsted, but it hasn't happened yet, and some of us will continue to oppose it. Think about it though - the type of people volunteering for this role are going to be the type of people who wish to see this introduced, aren't they. Incidentally they continue to monitor the wrong thing in Berkhamsted, if the aim is to establish whether mooring restrictions are required. They are recording what boats are there, but not how close to full it is - what they need to be recording is how much free space there is there each time. It doesn't matter if somewhere always has 40 boats moored, if there are always at least another 10 possible mooring spaces not being used, does it?

Surely it carries the goods for their shop?

"Raymond"?

OK, some further comment on the Aintree boat.... That also only has 8mm bottom - not a problem, but only encountered now on the cheaper builds. Short hull seems to imply short swims - not sure it will be a pleasure to take boating. 3.9Kg gas cylinders are a real pain - you pay nearly as much for 4Kg of gas as you might pay for 13Kg. I think a solid fuel stove is a far better option in a small cruising boat than diesel fired heating, which will cost more to run, and potentially be less reliable. A 4 square foot skin tank seems extremely stingy, even given the small 16HP engine size - I wouldn't want to guess what might happen pushing hard against a strong flow on rivers. My advice is find a decent second hand boat that suits - it will be a far nicer prospect to actually go boating in, and if after a few years you get the bug, and want to upgrade, you will get a far higher proportion of your money back if you sell it on, IMO.

For the first boat, an 8mm bottom plate on a 2000 build sounds highly unusual, unless it is one of the types built to a tight budget, which it doesn't look to be. By then on a "standard" build a 10mm bottom was an almost universal minimum. I wonder if the boat is really "as descried"? The 50 foot boat we recently sold had no central heating - just a solid fuel stove, and was regularly used at colder times throughput the year, including January surrounded by ice. It was perfectly warm enough, and provided insulation is OK, you don't really need central heating in boats as short as you are considering.

I have just found what Derek R said about "Sentinel" some time ago in a former post..... I thought I had seen something about use for carrying, but this does sound a bit strange. Perhaps Derek can clarify?

They are interesting enough engines, that if new ones were being fitted to boats with any regularity I rather think one might get to hear about some of the examples. This what a 2013 entry in their blog says..... No clues given if the situation has changed since then though.

It would be interesting to know if this genuinely is the case. I wonder how many, (if any) new engines they have sold in the last couple of years. Even if parts are available, my understanding is things like new pistons are eye-wateringly expensive.

There is no standard time, I suggest, nor probably any sensible average anybody might suggest. If you are having a survey, often getting a dock/crane/slipway booking that coincides with surveyor availabily will be far the lonest part - could easily be a month in some cases. We just went from offer to cash in our bank within 2 weeks, I think, but the broker has their own crane, so there was noi delay on getting the boat out of the water. The boat we have just bought without survey went through completely in about a week, from memory.

This is the first time I think I have seen anybody suggest that getting soaked in muddy water is worse than nearly getting killed! Nearly killed, though? Honestly? You have to work quite hard to kill a fit person on a towpath with a push bike, surely? Badly injured - yes easily. - I couldn't deny it. Nearly killed, though, sounds an overstatement. Not many people are killed by bikes on towpaths, are they? Not even that many fluffy kittens, despite an increasing number of headlines suggesting it. Yes there are idiot towpath cyclists, but exaggerated stories about them tend to weaken any valid argument, in my view.

Maybe they played out the yarn that Hemel and Ronnie spin to Eric Sykes in the "Bargee".... ........ "Lovely blaze, he made!".

No, why does my post suggest that?

You can't say a Northwich uilt town is the same type of boat as a Woolwich built one! It's just not done! Alvecote is always the Bank Holiday weekend, because it is a three day, rather than a two day event. We hope to have at least one of our boats there.

I'm kind of surprised the owners of this have described it as Josher style, as they do actually also own an immaculately restored real unconverted Josher, so will certainly know exactly what one looks like! Curious though it may sound, I think Sentinel's hull may originally have been built to carry, rather than as a leisure boat. I have some distant memory it had something to do with the potteries, possibly carrying goods between factory sites. However I may have that completely wrong! Certainly an unusual boat though, I agree, but not a Josher!

Although there seem to be no forum references to "Jimty", both "Jimpty" and "Jinty" find some references to this chap. I've got to the stage where I'm unsure if there is a correct spelling of his "name"! EDIT: This article refers to him as "Jinty Golby"

Belmont was in comparatively good condition then though, compared to recent times! does anybody have an update on current situation, please. Roger and Raymond were reunited as a pair briefly at the recent Braunston show, although I was suitably lax in taking any pictures. It's well before my time on the canals, but don't pictures show the Iona as the butty the Whitlocks had before the Lucy?. Fairly certain they operated the Iona with the Ian?

With Sickle, I've been egged on by the commentator, (a certain Mr Bennett), to do one outside the Samuell Barlow pub, where there is a fair bit less water than at Tixall!

Despite the Black Country Metalworks cans apparently using a special type of Teflon non-stick solder, the blank cans are not exactly bargain basement. If the one I ended up with is typical, the one thing you can't do with them is use them to store water. Dreadful things!