Traditional Boats... a sense of entitlement?

[nicknorman]

14 minutes ago, Captain Pegg said:

Indeed. My point was they aren’t particularly different from other boaters which your post essentially confirms. There are references to expectations of ex-working boats in the thread which is what I picked up on.

 

I don’t observe especially different behaviours from crews of ex-working boats compared to any other type of boat. The vast majority of all boaters are at least competent and courteous, many are a delight to meet. There are occasional exceptions but on the rare occasions I have encountered such in recent years I can’t think of one that involved an ex-working boat.

 

When it comes to negative comments - or uninvited ‘advice’ from other boaters - that pretty much never happens when I am out on Vulpes but I’ve rarely done a days volunteering without such on ex-working boats. There is a different perception.

 

JP

Yes, they are just the same as other boaters in most respects. Except ... well there’s no point in me repeating myself!

 

A typical example was at the end of the BCN Challenge a few years ago, over some beers. Me, attempting to be sociable, tries to strike up a conversation with some folk who I knew had done the challenge in a historic boat. Result: I was absolutely blanked and ignored like I was invisible, they turned their backs on me and remained in their superior huddle for the duration. By contrast everyone else I spoke to (not being owners of historic boats) was friendly.

 

Of course that sort of thing doesn’t happen every time with every historic boat owner/crew, but it seems to happen proportionately more often.

Edited June 13, 2019 by nicknorman

[Captain Pegg]

9 minutes ago, nicknorman said:

Yes, they are just the same as other boaters in most respects. Except ... well there’s no point in me repeating myself!

 

A typical example was at the end of the BCN Challenge a few years ago, over some beers. Me, attempting to be sociable, tries to strike up a conversation with some folk who I knew had done the challenge in a historic boat. Result: I was absolutely blanked and ignored like I was invisible, they turned their backs on me and remained in their superior huddle for the duration. By contrast everyone else I spoke to (not being owners of historic boats) was friendly.

 

Of course that sort of thing doesn’t happen every time with every historic boat owner/crew, but it seems to happen proportionately more often.

Yes, they may have a tendency to be a bit anorakky, a bit self absorbed as a group. Kind of comes with the territory.  Not a major issue. The general public would probably find that with boaters as a whole.

 

JP

[noddyboater]

20 minutes ago, nicknorman said:

 

 

A typical example was at the end of the BCN Challenge a few years ago, over some beers. Me, attempting to be sociable, tries to strike up a conversation with some folk who I knew had done the challenge in a historic boat. Result: I was absolutely blanked and ignored like I was invisible, they turned their backs on me and remained in their superior huddle for the duration. By contrast everyone else I spoke to (not being owners of historic boats) was friendly.

 

 

I’ve found that if you happen upon one on their own, in a pub for instance, they’re happy to chat like a normal person. But as you noticed once they’re in a group you suddenly become an outsider, not worth acknowledging. 

[David Schweizer]

.

1 hour ago, nicknorman said:

There is a desire to categorise the majority of steerers of historic boats as hobbyists or middle class folk for a good reason - because they are! With the exception of coal/fuel boat, pretty much all other historic boats are operated as a hobby. And to afford a historic boat you have to be reasonably wealthy, surely (I’ve never bought one, but I’m told so). For most people owning a historic boat, it is not their primary residence and so they must have sufficient cash not only to have a house but also a relatively pointless (in practical terms) historic boat. “Middle Class” was your term and of course it doesn’t necessarily align with “wealthy” so I’d prefer the latter term.

 

i don’t think there has been much expression of an expectation of above average handling skills. That seems to be your invention.

 

What you haven’t mentioned is the theme of this thread - the attitude of a significant proportion of those owning historic craft, compared to Mr Average owning a clonecraft.

 

Is purchasing, and running an historic Working Boat any more expensive than purchasing, and running a fairly new Hudson?

 

 

Edited June 13, 2019 by David Schweizer

[David Mack]

1 hour ago, nicknorman said:

And to afford a historic boat you have to be reasonably wealthy, surely (I’ve never bought one, but I’m told so). For most people owning a historic boat, it is not their primary residence and so they must have sufficient cash not only to have a house but also a relatively pointless (in practical terms) historic boat.

Really? The chip on your shoulder is showing, Nick.

Unconverted historic boats are not expensive to buy compared with purpose built leisure narrow boats e.g Effingham £42,000 ( https://m.apolloduck.com/boat/narrow-boats-traditional/585863), Birmingham £44,950 (https://m.apolloduck.com/boat/narrow-boats-traditional/586858), Dodona, £35,000 (https://m.apolloduck.com/boat/harland-and-wolff-57-tug/606051).

Running costs such as licence, insurance and fuel are broadly similar too. So owning an unconverted ex working boat is no less affordable for a house dweller than owning a clonecraft (or a Hudson). And there's plenty of not particularly wealthy people who do that.

Yes, you get less cabin space, but that's a choice you make, which doesn't impact on the affordability.

[nicknorman]

29 minutes ago, David Schweizer said:

.

 

Is purchasing, and running an historic Working Boat any more expensive than purchasing, and running a fairly new Hudson?

 

 

No. But I am middle class and relatively wealthy. You are not really following the conversation are you!

15 minutes ago, David Mack said:

Really? The chip on your shoulder is showing, Nick.

Unconverted historic boats are not expensive to buy compared with purpose built leisure narrow boats e.g Effingham £42,000 ( https://m.apolloduck.com/boat/narrow-boats-traditional/585863), Birmingham £44,950 (https://m.apolloduck.com/boat/narrow-boats-traditional/586858), Dodona, £35,000 (https://m.apolloduck.com/boat/harland-and-wolff-57-tug/606051).

Running costs such as licence, insurance and fuel are broadly similar too. So owning an unconverted ex working boat is no less affordable for a house dweller than owning a clonecraft (or a Hudson). And there's plenty of not particularly wealthy people who do that.

Yes, you get less cabin space, but that's a choice you make, which doesn't impact on the affordability.

Exactly. In order to have the odd 40k going spare to spend on an unnecessary hobby item, I suggest that by most people’s standards you are fairly wealthy. Which was the point, in case you missed it! But anyway, since your first resort is a personal attack, you have already lost your point.

 

Edited June 13, 2019 by nicknorman

[roland elsdon]

Its not you, we have only owned historic boats since 1981, lived on them worked them, restored them, and got stuck pretty much everywhere on the system , and been helped by an assorted group of hirers modern boat owners and even fisherpeople. However we are not part of  a group nor do we want to be, we are not in any club.

We simply love old boats.

we get ignored by a number of historic boat owners too, so what.

 

as for wealthy ha, most of the historic boat owners i know run a 10 year old estate car or a van. 

[pete harrison]

1 hour ago, noddyboater said:

I’ve found that if you happen upon one on their own, in a pub for instance, they’re happy to chat like a normal person. But as you noticed once they’re in a group you suddenly become an outsider, not worth acknowledging. 

I am very uncomfortable with this thread as I did not appreciate there is such hostility towards 'historic' boat owners, my discomfort being based on my 50 year involvement with these sort of boats and my being the current owner of a 'historic' boat that is undergoing a fairly extensive restoration. Am I wealthy - I do not think so and I am currently working up to 100 hours a week to fund the work on my boat. Am I a hobby boater - yes, just like most other boat owners. Do these make me a bad person - I do not think so, but my interest is soley in 'historic' boats, to the point that I have built my own archive over the past thirty years or so. I have no real interest in waterways or their history and I have no interest in modern boats. This makes my sphere of knowledge quite specialised where the only useful conversation I can have will be with other 'historic' boat owners. Of course I will speak with anybody who is prepared to listen, but the default common interest group is going to be 'historic' boat owners. I will accept this probably makes me a boring b@5tard. 

 

I do not say hello to everybody I pass when walking along a pavement, and I do not say hello to everybody I pass on the canal. Does that mean I have an attitude and turn my back on people - I have been accused of that but I think it has limited foundation as most of these people are strangers to me. If anybody approaches me for conversation in any part of my different lives (work / boats / cars) I always endeavour to be polite and courteous, but you can not win them all, and the lads who work for me might well have a different opinion.

 

I was taught a very traditional form of boating based upon speed and efficiency, and probably about 75% of the boating I have done has been with a motor / butty pair (some professional and some recreational). Several people have told me that things have changed during the years I have been away and I will regret coming back to the boats, and these Forums make it fairly clear that some of the boating practices I learned as a boy are no longer acceptable - but pinching locks. taking a butty through a lock without letting another boat use the water, speeding past moored boats were not amongst these

Edited June 13, 2019 by pete harrison

[MtB]

26 minutes ago, roland elsdon said:

as for wealthy ha, most of the historic boat owners i know run a 10 year old estate car or a van. 

 

That is no indictor of wealth. The property investors club banters we used to hold had members worth well into 8 figures turning up in old junk like 20 year old Peugeot 205 diesel hatchbacks. In fact the ghastly old rubbish in the car park was just like a boater's banter. Highest value vehicle worth possibly as much as three figures. 

 

 

 

[Chris Williams]

29 minutes ago, roland elsdon said:

we get ignored by a number of historic boat owners too, so what.

Wait until one breaks down and asks for a tow.  Go suddenly blind and deaf.

[Momac]

5 hours ago, nicknorman said:

. In order to have the odd 40k going spare to spend on an unnecessary hobby item

Surely boating can never be regarded as unnecessary ?

I do own my own boat and house (together with the chief officer). However I dont consider myself wealthy .

 

 

Money spent on the purchase of a boat is not really spent as it is mostly recoverable. 

 

 

[matty40s]

6 hours ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

....boaters banter....Highest value vehicle worth possibly as much as three figures. 

..and then only until all the fish and chips had gone...

 

[WotEver]

11 hours ago, Captain Pegg said:

I’d be grateful if you don’t test my new found diplomacy by rocking up in a purple Hudson

... from a posh hire fleet...

[Captain Pegg]

1 minute ago, WotEver said:

... from a posh hire fleet...

...and called Meander.

 

It always lifts my mood when I encounter a boat that conforms to a stereotype.

 

JP

[RLWP]

8 hours ago, pete harrison said:

these Forums make it fairly clear that some of the boating practices I learned as a boy are no longer acceptable

This isn't necessarily true

 

You know most of this

 

If you learned to leave gates open and paddles up when leaving a lock (pretty standard in times gone) you'll be unpopular. If you drop paddles by banging the latch up with your windless you'll not get a lot of respect (the only time I came across that was a private boater,not a historic). Ramming gates as was done by some working boats is out. Basically, anything antisocial or damaging is out

 

The rest is fine. I'm a great fan of efficient boating so you'll find us waiting at locks with the bow of the boat against the gate. I'm hopeless at strapping gates closed. Beyond that I have a lot to learn

 

Richard

[alan_fincher]

9 hours ago, pete harrison said:

I am very uncomfortable with this thread as I did not appreciate there is such hostility towards 'historic' boat owners, my discomfort being based on my 50 year involvement with these sort of boats and my being the current owner of a 'historic' boat that is undergoing a fairly extensive restoration. Am I wealthy - I do not think so and I am currently working up to 100 hours a week to fund the work on my boat. Am I a hobby boater - yes, just like most other boat owners. Do these make me a bad person - I do not think so, but my interest is soley in 'historic' boats, to the point that I have built my own archive over the past thirty years or so. I have no real interest in waterways or their history and I have no interest in modern boats. This makes my sphere of knowledge quite specialised where the only useful conversation I can have will be with other 'historic' boat owners. Of course I will speak with anybody who is prepared to listen, but the default common interest group is going to be 'historic' boat owners. I will accept this probably makes me a boring b@5tard. 

 

I do not say hello to everybody I pass when walking along a pavement, and I do not say hello to everybody I pass on the canal. Does that mean I have an attitude and turn my back on people - I have been accused of that but I think it has limited foundation as most of these people are strangers to me. If anybody approaches me for conversation in any part of my different lives (work / boats / cars) I always endeavour to be polite and courteous, but you can not win them all, and the lads who work for me might well have a different opinion.

 

I was taught a very traditional form of boating based upon speed and efficiency, and probably about 75% of the boating I have done has been with a motor / butty pair (some professional and some recreational). Several people have told me that things have changed during the years I have been away and I will regret coming back to the boats, and these Forums make it fairly clear that some of the boating practices I learned as a boy are no longer acceptable - but pinching locks. taking a butty through a lock without letting another boat use the water, speeding past moored boats were not amongst these

Very well said, Pete.

Fortunately in my experience the level of hostility towards historic boats and the owners and operators of them that has been freely exhibited in this thread is not the reality that we actually experience when out boating.

On the whole we are not treated significantly different by other boater when on our "historics" than we were when on our former 50 foot "Cloneraft" - although sometimes I wish we were, because that means other boats assume we can float in the same amount of water, or stop as quickly, which certainly we can't!

I don't see a problem with "historic" (or even "non-historic"!) boaters using techniques from the past to work as efficiently as possible, providing those techniques present no additional dangers, and there s no added danger of damaging fragile infrastructure.

There is potentially a problem when a small subset of the "historic" fraternity, (and in my experience it is a very small subset), try to do things and consistently get it wrong.  Anybody who has been held up by a  pair of boats that has a crew of 8 or more, but consistently fails to open bottom gates with gate-lines for example, can only be frustrated by it, and it gives the rest of us a bad name.  As one member of the Narrow Boat Trust once said to me proudly "This is how they used to do it".  I replied that it was not how they used to do it, because the methods they used to use resulted in the gates swinging effortless open at the first attempt, and the boats to be on their way in the shortest time possible, despite having a crew of the quarter of the size!

[Dav and Pen]

I have not got involved in this topic as my experience of running our narrow boats is nearly 30 years old when we sold them and had a 50footer built on an old station boat hull at WFBC.

When we first started in the early 70,s there were still a lot of boatmen around especially at Braunston and I had no intention of upsetting them by trying to dress up or by showing off. I admired the Brays, Whitlock,Collins etc and they gave advice and help willingly. Some were working for bwb and lock keepers like Henry Grantham at Buckby would soon put you right but also encourage. There were nowhere near as many boats on the cut and certainly not endless moorer’s on the main line so we were able to make our mistakes out of site (usually) except trying to get round Sutton stop loaded when there would invariably be an audience of experts and Joe and Rose. They of course never did it in a motor. Rose Whitlock then told me there was a pin in the bridge that they used to use to strap round! Not much use single handed though. I’m sure we upset people who thought we were speeding or forcing them out of the channel but unfortunately the physics of moving loaded boats on very shallow canals caused difficulties for all parties. We were told that we were to big, sometimes to slow, or just shouldn’t be on the canal at all but usually other boaters then were happy to see us.

we were certainly not rich indeed quite the opposite and the boats had to pay for themselves which we tried to do by humping coal and carrying Scouts etc in the summer. We were still hopeful that some long distance carrying could be brought back following the demise of the Crowley traffic but apart from odd loads and short distance it never happened.

Now I see the majority of old boats in pristine condition and owned by enthusiastic people who are quite a long way removed from the working boats without the pleasure of seeing the Brays working through the Braunston flight or Mrs Whitlock gently admonishing you for the lack of shine on the chimney brass. We were lucky to know them and I hope we never upset them by pretending to be them which I personally never did.

there has always been a perceived pecking order amongst boat owners whether it be whose hull you have, what engine, how shiny your boat is etc. With the thousands of boats now on the waterways some people will always be in a bad fit for some reason or other so if possible it’s best to let them get on with it and get on with your own lives.

[alan_fincher]

I don't think quite a few of the old boatmen and boatwomen still surviving can be too upset about how it has turned out, as they regularly turn up with great enthusiasm at the shows, including two that used to work one of our boats.  I'm sure there must be others who see it as a circus that they don't want to be part of, but there are still a lot f their dwindling numbers who turn up at these events.

While Laura Carter is happy to be going around in the parade at Braunston, and still looking proud and happy to do so, I feel something special of the past is still with us.

It will be sad day when they have all finally passed on, but I see nothing wrong with trying to keep alive at least the boats, even if most are never going to carry long distance loads ever again.

[MoominPapa]

The rudest person I've ever met on the cut was in charge of an unconverted historic boat. He was even ruder than the second rudest person I ever met on the cut, who had a clonecraft.

 

MP.

 

 

[RLWP]

1 hour ago, Dav and Pen said:

Rose Whitlock then told me there was a pin in the bridge that they used to use to strap round

It is still there, I used it once

 

Richard

[pete harrison]

4 minutes ago, MoominPapa said:

The rudest person I've ever met on the cut was in charge of an unconverted historic boat. He was even ruder than the second rudest person I ever met on the cut, who had a clonecraft.

 

MP.

The rudest I have ever met was the steerer of a hotel pair. He gave me a tyraid of abuse for blocking his way - directly after I pulled him off the bottom at Kings Norton stop lock with the unconverted working boat pair I was steering, and it was clear to me that the only reason he had got stuck in the first place was his own incompetence rather than debris in the channel

[RLWP]

3 minutes ago, pete harrison said:

The rudest I have ever met was the steerer of a hotel pair.

I think that gentleman has featured in this thread already. Revving his engine, was he?

 

Richard

[pete harrison]

1 minute ago, RLWP said:

I think that gentleman has featured in this thread already. Revving his engine, was he?

 

Richard

He is the same chap, and everything was revving 

[RLWP]

1 minute ago, pete harrison said:

He is the same chap, and everything was revving 

From observation, not his passengers...

[Dav and Pen]

1 hour ago, alan_fincher said:

I don't think quite a few of the old boatmen and boatwomen still surviving can be too upset about how it has turned out, as they regularly turn up with great enthusiasm at the shows, including two that used to work one of our boats.  I'm sure there must be others who see it as a circus that they don't want to be part of, but there are still a lot f their dwindling numbers who turn up at these events.

While Laura Carter is happy to be going around in the parade at Braunston, and still looking proud and happy to do so, I feel something special of the past is still with us.

It will be sad day when they have all finally passed on, but I see nothing wrong with trying to keep alive at least the boats, even if most are never going to carry long distance loads ever again.

I agree the boating families still love the canals and to see their old boats still going. I hope they continue to do so for many years to come. I am in no way criticising the owners of these old boats I’m only pleased that there are so many willing to devote their time to them.