Tam & Di

That may be in part its effect, but that was not the reason for it. It was the "British Waterways Act", not "Local Councils (avoidance of nuisance by boaters) or something Act". It was an attempt by BW to regain control over the proliferation of unofficial and unpaid for "moorings" being taken up by boaters along the towpaths and to the detriment of people who wished to cruise in what was accepted as meant by cruising. RBOA and others successfully objected to the Clause requiring all boaters to have a home mooring on the basis that some people wished to cruise steadily around the system rather than just in the locality of one particular mooring, and all problems stemmed from the ill considered amendment to the Act at its Bill stage.

The canal system is different to e.g. National Trust or Forestry Commission in that it cannot be ring fenced to exclude commercial activities that exist on it. Arguably users could be said to be represented by John Dodwell with his ex-IWA hat on, but there is no one from e.g. British Marine Federation or APCO (Association of Pleasure Craft Operators). Despite BW publicity to the contrary, it was not BW that led the upsurge in popularity of canals since the 60s; it was the group of entrepreneurs who invested their time and energy in building up hire fleets, marinas, chandlery shops etc, without which the canals would still be a secret world enjoyed by the very few. There is no way this group can be excluded or taken over by the new charity, and it would have been sensible for them to have some say in the running of it.

I've also seen a narrow boat which was brought to France by low loader and dropped into Calais harbour and which then had its rudder bearings smashed by waves from a passing tug. Also one that broke the shaft coupling to the propellor as the prop raced when waves lifted the stern, and another which lost two of the bolts holding the engine down. I've not looked at the link in the previous post, but it is probably the one where a barge was towed in when the cooling water hoses split and the barge was rapidly sinking. Most modern narrow boats are not engineered to a standard that is designed for work at sea. An additional problem if you start with a secondhand inland craft - barge or narrow boat - is the likelihood of sediment in the fuel tanks being stirred up and blocking the fuel line. So in addition to the above you'd want to clean the tanks thoroughly, and if not possible then to do the sea passage with a separate drum of diesel to feed the engine. Maybe double Racor type filters in the line so the fuel supply can be switched from one to the other if necessary, but that does mean you have a crew person inside the steel coffin boat who can take care of things like that. It can all be done, but there is considerable risk. Much reduced if you have the money to build one with all the safety aspects dealt with at that stage.

Chris does not have a wheel option as far as I am aware. We did join Chris and a couple of small barges just off shore from Dunkerque on one of the small ship events, and the square chine of Progress did seem to make it more stable than some of the other craft out there. Another aspect of this though is do you go alone or do you have crew? If you have crew, where are they? Not stood on the gunwhale I trust, but I for one would not like to spend a crossing inside a steel cigar tube which is rocking and rolling and where the only exit is from the stern (as the front end has to be sealed very securely to prevent waves breaking through). Chris crosses in company with a safety boat, and so did Darlington as far as I could understand what he wrote. I believe Chris works on the principle that he can afford to write off the cost of Progress should it sink, as insurance would be prohibitive. At Twickenham market on Saturday we met a woman who said she and her husband were planning to cross to France in their narrow boat, rafted up to another one. She was absolutely adamant that they would have no trouble at all like this. Now that really is a recipe for disaster. I've been out from Limehouse with an empty pair a few times, and on the first occasion very nearly came a cropper by being breasted up pretty much as if we were on a canal. We started with the fore ends tied conventionally with a line from the tee stud of one to the stud of the other, but once we were out on the river we found we needed a line from the mast of each boat to the stud of the other as well to reduce the sawing motion between the two. After that and having talked with various boatmen who had done it we always put tyres between the boats to allow crud to float down between the pair and minimise the risk of it building up between the two fore ends. We also took a line from the back end rail of the motor, under the two boats and back to the rail to prevent them leaning in towards each other and slamming back each time we met a wave. But that was just the Thames - a 15+ hour Channel crossing and meeting waves from ferries and such other craft with two little modern narrow beam pleasure boats does not bear thinking about.

I've not got anywhere that I need to do quite that, but I do use the wooden wedges provided by a dismantled wooden peg to stop occasional vibration noise on sections of my wheelhouse roof.

I don't want to be drawn into the rights and wrongs of it, but I couldn't understand your maths either. I've no idea what AC planner default cruising means, but with your further explanation I think you are saying you cruise 2-3 hours every fortnight, with sometimes an extra "day" or two over a weekend which pushes the total "movement days" up from 26 to 35. Is that right?

There's certainly nothing wrong with the idea. We did exactly that for a guy with a 70' x 14' steel lighter in the 80s. It had about 12" of concrete in the bottom as he was having it done as a floating puppet theatre for use on the London canals and the river Thames, so weighed some 80 tonnes. We powered it with a BMC 2.2 mounted across in the very stern using standard Volvo hydraulic parts. It is still operating with no serious problems since we did the work. As the thrust from the propellor is directed exactly where needed rather than having to be deflected by the rudder blade it means the craft is very ewasy to steer, even in reverse.

The shackle is standard equipment. A short strap goes from here backwards to the tunnel hook on a butty when breasted up. Another line on an equivalent shackle on the butty comes back to the motor dolly so the two don't saw backwards and forwards against each other. The shackle on the butty has a "draw pin" that lifts out rather than the threaded version usually found on a shackle. Once you've mastered that perhaps you can find a hopper to bring on down with you - it gets to be fun then.

Perhaps my arguments during the consultation stage did bear some fruit then. I certain don't recall any mention of "relevant experience" in the original version. How though is "12 months relevant experience" gained? To get a passenger boat skippers ticket in France a trainee has to serve as deck crew for a minimum of 28 days for each of four years on a relevant craft. I realise the skills are rather different, but the question I am asking is how is 12 months experience defined? Is it one day in a 12 month period? One week? One month? What does a trainee actually do for the experience? Lock-wheel? Steer the boat under the watchful eye of a certificated person (the two of them on the counter together!)? I couldn't find the answer on the MCA site.

I objected to that in the recent MCA consultation, on the basis that the IWHC as it stands is an "attendance" certificate. Although schools do occasionally fail an attendee there are no published guidelines from the RYA (or MCA) as to how bad a person would have to be to fail. The aims of the IWHC are simply to give (new) boaters a basic grounding in steering a canal boat, and I argued that there should be a higher level certificate which had a specific "pass/fail" level if it were to be used for steering a passenger vessel. My argument was unsuccessful though. edited for spilling mostokes

The casual nonchalance of John Duddington and Alfie Best should be a mandatory photo to include in any of the numerous threads that pop up about travelling at tick-over speed and passing on-coming craft. Not sure of the authenticity of the cabin, but do you have any idea of where the bed throws came from? We still have two identical ones from a set made by Tim Wood's mother when he operated Vanguard and Ilkeston as a camping pair for a bit.

That was my point, really - dangerous for them, and dangerous for the other craft they might run into. The OP was asking about Dutch Barges for hire. I do know the Thames very well and agree it is a magnificent river - there is nothing remotely like it in France, where the rivers are much more subject to flood and the flood plain has meant far less development along the banks. However its very attractiveness means the Thames is full of (mostly grp) pleasurecraft, whereas French ones are largely empty and you just need to keep out of the way ofthe occasional commercial. Also I took him to mean Dutch barges - vessels built originally to trade in the Netherlands and subsequently converted for pleasure use. I do realise there are some fairly small aaks, tjalks, westlanders and other little barges that could cruise a reasonably wide part of the UK inland system. However these craft will not have been built later than the 1930s, and it is difficult to imagine a hire company fitting out such a hull so it was suitable for use by probably inexperienced hirers. My reply was from the perspective of "is a Dutch barge a suitable vessel to operate as a hire boat in the UK?" I guess there might be individuals who have such a small barge and no longer use it extensively themselves and who choose to let it for hire rather than selling it. I know 4 or 5 people who do this in France, but I don't know of any in the UK. But once you get to the sort of vessel most commonly in mind when you speak of a Dutch barge, one of 20m or more and with a dead weight of 60+ tons, although it can be moved on "wide" canals it can hardly be regarded as pleasure boating - more an an endurance or obstacle course. Also you'd need a very good insurance deal before you let it loose in the hands of novices on the Thames or other rivers of the UK.

Not as far as I know in the UK. Why would they? The cruising grounds for any substantial vessel, Dutch or otherwise, is very limited, and the effort required to cruise (without smashing hell out of boat and canal system) is more than most hirers are likely to want to put in (or able to). In France, yes. edit for typos and elaboration

I agree with the argument that any light amplification from an upside-down installation would be meaningless. Working in the dark was hardly uncommon though. As an example, the limejuice job meant loading at say 7.00 and getting away at perhaps 10.00. It was a 12 hour run Brentford-Boxmoor for a loaded pair, and we were expected at Boxmoor for 7.00 next morning. In the winter it would be dark about 4.30 in the afternoon so almost half the boating was done in the dark - we'd keep going till we got there, but it would not make any difference if you stopped early as you be up and a-going in the dark next morning. Our own experience was certainly nothing unusual, and even on a starless and moonless night you can still see well enough when you are out in the open.

Longer ago than I ought to be able to remember we used to live at Isleworth on the Thames on a converted Air-Sea Rescue launch which still carried the name ASRL2744. We went busking in France for a year and at one point got picked up by the flics, as one does. Unfortunately when they looked at our passports and other papers they thought we must be deserters from the navy and we spent the night in the subterranean cells of Marseilles. I went off ships referred to by a number after that. What made you suggest Richard alongside Luddite etc?

Costs a lot less to signwrite a short name, but if they want a long one, how about "The boat that was called Ohm"? A shorter one could be "Ohm sweet ohm", or even "Ohmless".

Ouch! How painful that must be.

Which is why my standard response if shouted at to slow down on UK canals was always to rev back up so they could hear the difference. On the continent you don't tend to get the same aggro from moored boats, except perhaps on pleasureboat canals like the Midi. I don't go there though, as I prefer the grown up waterways further North.

There are several different styles of thruster that could be used - a transverse tube and motor-driven propellor is only one of these. However they all require some form of motor and supply of electricity or hydrocarbon fuel to power them. So yes, they would take up valuable space that could be used more profitably, and use fuel of some nature that had a cost. But the real answer is simply that they are unnecessary on UK canals, and the "propellor" would quickly get smashed to bits with a loaded boat as it's close to the bottom, and would be ineffectively propelling air on an empty one. Fleet owners are probably less likely to introduce them (voluntarily) than a private operator. "Going wrong" is the only way they could go. ........ or wind, of course.

OK, this has been done over so many times and I should resist! Interesting thought? Maybe, but certainly not original. By the time I was freight boating the golden age had long passed, but bow thrusters were a possibility. Of all the luxuries and modern developments available at that time, fitting bow thrusters would have been about number zillion on the list. They would have taken valuable space, demanded extra power, and conventional cross-tube types would be useless when the boats were empty. There are other designs which thrust through the bottom which could have worked, but boat poles and warps are very much cheaper and do the job perfectly well. As Ditchcrawler knows, we have one on our 80 tonne 80' motor barge that we cruise on Continental waters, but that is because the type of waterway here is very different to UK canals, as is the other traffic you meet. Even then it only gets used once in a blue moon, and we certainly don't allow trainees to use it on our barge handling courses (though I sometimes use it for instructor’s over-ride!). We've had pairs of narrowboats, canal tugs and dumb craft, passengerboats, motor barges, and ultimately little coasting ships, and none of these had or ever needed a bow thruster. I don't particularly decry narrow boat owners (for preference read that as owners of narrow boats) who want or have one, but I do feel they should be able to steer competently before they make up their mind. Certainly a bow thruster does not take the place of rudder and engine. I just get pyssed off with the sophistry that working canal boatmen would ever have bothered with them. If you want one, fit it. Just say "I can't be bothered to learn how to handle my boat and I'm having one". Don't bring honest working folk into the argument. God, you'll have had us waiting for someone to invent a heated tiller bar next! (edited to add snide comment at the end)

But we did choose carefully which bits to use

But did they need a bowthruster to help them pee, or had they just practiced and learned to direct it properly?