roland elsdon

Pensax ‘fitted out several years ago’ I should cocoa. Magnificent boat though. I think its as it was in 1988 when Don left it with us for a week.

Just gave Thaxteds old primus, and Atalanta’s old tilley light away. Not taking them home to Australia junk shops there full of such things. Digitising 1981 slides. Cowley lock with only our boat there and Colonel and Hazel above. Things have changed!

Very few now can commit to toys like that. Our old boat only worked because it was ok to live on about 8 months a year. I would have shuddered at a full winter with no where else to go. The other thing is short old boats are disproportionately expensive to repair. They have all the tricky bendy shaped bits, but not so much of the flat bits, and licences and moorings are the same. We were lucky we ran a pair of boats in the 80s and 90s on a shoestring budget. Cant do that now

And if you look in the items for sale bit of the forum….

Or you could simply put on a decent silencer. I have had 3 aircooled h series listers. They have all had different levels of noise abatement from straight pipe to double silencer.A thick heavy exhaust stack also damps the crack, rather than a thin bit of tin.

Ashby has just been dredged from battlefield to bosworth. 2 weeks after we sold our deep draught boat For some reason they spent a lot of time outside the marina. From the hole they filled they took out a lot of silt. 4 wide beam hoppers 2 tug drivers for 3 weeks working all day.

We struggled , but Fenny is a hard boat to live on 365 days a year. Few have the commitment such boats require. we found good new owners. Fortunately we can look at the cost over 13 years and accept the depreciation. You cant financially measure the fun we had.

Its part of the reason why we have sold up. Australian resident from sept this year ( was uk resident) but british citizen. Insurance company will no longer cover us from next renewal. Given difficulty of insuring 80 year old boat anyway this added to the decision on selling up. Was not a problem until brexit, from 2011 to 2019 we were aus residents and insured the boat here with certain clauses.

Well Fenny passed survey and has gone to new owners. End of our second era of boat ownership,1981 to 2005, then 2012 to 2025. It feels strange.

Our deep draft ex working boat was surveyed on monday. in 2016 it was blasted and 2 packed. In 21 sides re 2 packed. Since then its scrapped down the Llangollen, the Stratford, and many other shallow canals. its been bounced over shopping trolleys, rammed through bridges with the counter 8 inches out. Aground on the trent on a gravel bottom. i expected the surveyor to say it needed the bottom repainting. No paint on underside intact. some paint loss on sides above the water but minimal under. An ultrasonic hammer was used’ to good effect’ paint stayed on. if the bottoms good 2 pack and blast appears to be the way.

with the right front and back ,shortened and re engined , for working purpose ( and unique), and with being still capable of carrying a cargo how does she lack cred. She was working till 2010. We bought her exactly because of her cred rather than the alternative which at the time was a new brinklow replica.

Err we had a potential auction about to happen. When the price got more acceptable we had to beat people off with windlasses.

A broker informed me last week that 30% under offers are the norm. We settled on offer 20% under last week. Our asking price had been put at 10% over what we had hoped for. Its a difficult market

I think that is Eridanus outside Capella. The roof gives it away. Our boats and Bootes ( colin hill) were round the corner, if I remember. I think its 1985 heading for Stoke. Probably moored up for the Indian where it was so dark diesel smutted foreheads could by wiped on the hot towels and compared. Might have to dig out the log.

If I remember rightly renown is a turn of the century bantock boat and therefore a horse boat. She had a sr 2 or 3 in her, and went like the clappers.