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Temporary marina moorage as continue trips?


Trawler

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As I want to explore the various interesting canals of the system over several years, taking a month or two on and then perhaps a few months or the winter off, how hard is it to find safe and secure moorage in a marina, perhaps with periodic boat checks to make sure everything is fine?  I’m not sure I’ll be able to plan that far ahead though.  To avoid backtracking, unless it’s part of a loop, I’m not sure an annual home marina works. Does anyone lift and store them on the hard? 
 

is this much worse with longer length boats, say 60’ to 70’?

 

 

 

Edited by Trawler
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Loads of marinas about who will give you a short term mooring, but don't expect them to do much to keep an eye on your boat beyond calling you if it sinks.

 

They will all tell you otherwise but check the T&Cs before believing them.

 

I think you have unrealistically high expectations of canal life over here. Rewind to the 1950s for an idea of the standard of customer service...

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19 minutes ago, MtB said:

Loads of marinas about who will give you a short term mooring, but don't expect them to do much to keep an eye on your boat beyond calling you if it sinks.

 

They will all tell you otherwise but check the T&Cs before believing them.

 

I think you have unrealistically high expectations of canal life over here. Rewind to the 1950s for an idea of the standard of customer service...

But the availability of moorage for a 60’ to 70’ boat should be readily available?  That’s the critical part I suppose. 

 

(Insurance requires  I have weekly checks on my current boat. Different situation though. )

 

 

 

Edited by Trawler
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We often take a temp mooring for say a month while we are out, to break up the trip.  I have only once had any difficulty if finding a marina where we want to leave the boat 5hat will take it, and that was on the Lancaster where there are not many options.  In the end one of the marinas was able to find us a spot.  If you want a winter mooring for say 3 months then you probably want to start sorting that out in say September as they do book up, but the one winter that we had with no home mooring where we did this, there again was no shortage of options if you do it in good time.

 

I would not expect them to really do anything special to look after your boat.  As long as you are in the country of course, you can always nip back to the boat by car to check all is good.  I usually do things like oil changes and other small jobs when it’s in a marina.

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If you are leaving the boat for less than a fortnight you can just moor to the towpath. Common sense checks as to whether the area looks reasonable apply.

For longer stays you will usually have to pay. But some marina groups have reciprocal arrangements so you can stay at another marina under the same ownership as your home mooring at reduced or no cost. Similarly if you are a member of an AWCC-affiliated boat club.

Edited by David Mack
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7 minutes ago, Trawler said:

But the availability of moorage for a 60’ to 70’ boat should be readily available?  

 

 

Have to say with my 68ft boat, temporary Maureens (and permanent) have tended to be difficult. 57ft or shorter is a different story. 

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No worries up to 60', 70' I'm sure most marinas would be no worries either but others might need specific areas which could be full. Obviously, a 60' boat can fit in a 70' space but not vice versa.

 

Regarding regular checks, there certainly do exist friendly marinas who would let you know of an alarm on the boat going off, for example. And don't forget other neighbour moorers too. I am not sure why MTB perceives them as otherwise, perhaps a regional thing.

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1 minute ago, Paul C said:

Regarding regular checks, there certainly do exist friendly marinas who would let you know of an alarm on the boat going off, for example. And don't forget other neighbour moorers too. I am not sure why MTB perceives them as otherwise, perhaps a regional thing.

 

 

Hardly. There is a difference between casual, keeping an eye on the boat and marinas agreeing to accept legal responsibility for its wellbeing. 

 

The former is normal and the latter, hard to find. I get the feeling the OP wants the latter. 

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1 hour ago, Trawler said:

As I want to explore the various interesting canals of the system over several years, taking a month or two on and then perhaps a few months or the winter off, how hard is it to find safe and secure moorage in a marina, perhaps with periodic boat checks to make sure everything is fine?  I’m not sure I’ll be able to plan that far ahead though.  To avoid backtracking, unless it’s part of a loop, I’m not sure an annual home marina works. Does anyone lift and store them on the hard? 
 

is this much worse with longer length boats, say 60’ to 70’?

 

 

 

 

 

'Coastal marinas' offer very different services to 'muddy ditch' marinas.

 

Our Blue-Water Cat A Catamaran comes out of the water for Winter and the marina (for a price) give it a wash down every 2-weeks, and a hull polish every month. They check the inside is dry and mould  free, check and maintain anything needed (last Winter they have surveyed & renewed the standing rigging, replaced fuel pipes as they went out of date, replaced the gas pipes as they went out of date & run new antenna cable up inside the mast, check battery voltages and charge as necessary - the previous Winter they did all the battery maintenance, cleaning and polishing and removed the sails and sent them off for reconditioning)

 

On our 'muddy ditch' boat, we once got a call from the marina that the deck drains were blocked with leaves. Paid for services are not available.

 

If you want to get (in effect) winter storage in an Inland marina you will need to book several months in advance. The last (inland) Marina we were in was £15 per night but discounted for 'winter' 3 or 4 month bookings.

 

 

 

 

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Edited by Alan de Enfield
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26 minutes ago, MtB said:

 

 

Hardly. There is a difference between casual, keeping an eye on the boat and marinas agreeing to accept legal responsibility for its wellbeing. 

 

The former is normal and the latter, hard to find. I get the feeling the OP wants the latter. 

I can't comment regarding legal acceptance of responsibility but the marina in which I moor do regular checks down to whether your outstanding electricity is in credit. On two occasions in the last couple of years I've happened to be on board when either high winds or rising water resulted in individual boat checks, once at around 5 pm the other at 4 am (I was out checking my mooring warps at the time). 

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56 minutes ago, MtB said:

 

 

Hardly. There is a difference between casual, keeping an eye on the boat and marinas agreeing to accept legal responsibility for its wellbeing. 

 

The former is normal and the latter, hard to find. I get the feeling the OP wants the latter. 

I’m not asking someone to accept legal responsibility. In my case they do bilge checks, batteries, and look for anything wrong. 
 

And to check my boat shed is still floating… ;)
 

 

 

 

Edited by Trawler
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Just now, Trawler said:

I’m not asking someone to accept legal responsibility. In my case they do bilge checks, batteries, and look for anything wrong. 

 

Fat chance of getting all that from a UK marina!! 

  • Greenie 1
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1 hour ago, Trawler said:

I’m not asking someone to accept legal responsibility. In my case they do bilge checks, batteries, and look for anything wrong. 
 

And to check my boat shed is still floating… ;)
 

 

 

 

I really dont see a problem. Most marinas are full of boats that rarely get visited and they arent all on the bottom..😀

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10 hours ago, Paul C said:

No worries up to 60', 70' I'm sure most marinas would be no worries either but others might need specific areas which could be full. Obviously, a 60' boat can fit in a 70' space but not vice versa.

 

Regarding regular checks, there certainly do exist friendly marinas who would let you know of an alarm on the boat going off, for example. And don't forget other neighbour moorers too. I am not sure why MTB perceives them as otherwise, perhaps a regional thing.

Some marinas/moorings specialise in shorter boats, especially in areas where cruisers are common. Some are nit near the sea.

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1 hour ago, Mike Todd said:

Some marinas/moorings specialise in shorter boats, especially in areas where cruisers are common. Some are nit near the sea.

 

 

More particularly, whenever I ask a marina if the have space the first thing they ask is the length, and when I say 68ft they look doubtful. I don't get the same thing when I say 45ft. They usually look optimistic and start peering at the mooring chart on the wall and say yes they can squeeze me in onto pontoon X.

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Someone we know from Australia got caught out by covid and his boat was left for 2.5 years.

It was lifted out and blacked and checked by a certain well known marina on the Leicester canal.

He got quite concerned and as were were similarly stuck here we went for a look.

Apart from the rear tonneau cover being full of water ( a good thing) after 16 months it was cleaner than our boat. The yard had been highly diligent.

I believe he wandered back to the uk it was put back in and he’s on his travels.

Our boat is left afloat for up to six months when we are ‘ home’ it’s been fine up til now (10 years), what’s six months when you are 86 years old. Brasses get a bit tarnished.

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