What's it really like to liveaboard?

[Lmcgrath87]

I know this will vary for absolutely everyone, but just so I can gain a little insight ( And I'm generally quite a nosey person..) What's day to day life like on a boat?

 

Do you have pets?

 

How many of you live on your boat ?

 

Is there anything you miss about 'bricks and mortar'

 

Did you take any courses before embarking on this lifestyle

 

If you could impart only one piece of information to someone about to buy their first boat what would it be - (aside from get a survey, test run living on a boat by going on a holiday on one for a few weeks)

 

 

Will there be space for me to keep my beloved Kenwood Chef or will i need to learn to knead bread by hand and use my arm muscles to mix my cake batters?

Edited September 16, 2014 by Lmcgrath87

[RLWP]

Come to the Buckby banter: http://www.canalworld.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=66192&hl=%2Bbuckby+%2Bbanter

 

You can meet some people that liveaboard, and people that don't, perhaps get invited onto people's boats, and generally have a chat.

 

You'll probably get involved in some silliness too, and some good company

 

Richard

[Sabcat]

It depends on the kind of person you are and how you go about things. For me way back in 1999 having spent a weekend smashed out of my skull on a mates 40ft boat I thought to myself. "I could live on one of those". I put my house on the market on the Saturday, had a look at a few boats on the Sunday in various mariners decided what I could spend. I'd accepted an offer on the house by the Wednesday and a week later a boat was advertised (by an estate agent) in the local paper. Went and had a look, spoke to the chap who ran the moorings who agreed we could live there and did a deal with the chap selling it. From initial idea to living aboard in 5 weeks. It would have been sooner but selling houses is a boring protracted process involving solicitors.

 

Everyone and I mean everyone said I was mental, I hadn't looked into it properly, I didn't know anything about boats, blah blah blah. The way I saw it was I'd sold a house and bought a boat and the worst thing that could happen was I decided I didn't like it. That being the case I'd flog the boat and buy another house.

 

15 years later I'm sat on that boat now. It's 12ft longer and a it's changed colour a couple of times, the inside has been completely ripped out and refitted but I'm still here and hopefully will be in another 15.

 

Point of the tale? If you want to do something, just bloody do it. Life's far too short for cocking about.

[Lady Muck]

If there is something you really want to keep you will find space for it, so keep the Kenwood Chef!

[Lmcgrath87]

Come to the Buckby banter: http://www.canalworld.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=66192&hl=%2Bbuckby+%2Bbanter

 

You can meet some people that liveaboard, and people that don't, perhaps get invited onto people's boats, and generally have a chat.

 

You'll probably get involved in some silliness too, and some good company

 

Richard

 

ooo thanks for the invite! About an hour from us so we could certainly take a trip up :-)

 

 

Point of the tale? If you want to do something, just bloody do it. Life's far too short for cocking about.

 

Oh we are, getting rather excited about handing in the notice on my flat (should probably tell my mum about my plans to move me, hubs and the cat into hers until we find the right boat!)

 

If there is something you really want to keep you will find space for it, so keep the Kenwood Chef!

 

hah thanks! I will - getting rid of my library of books will be hard enough!

[John Williamson 1955]

I know this will vary for absolutely everyone, but just so I can gain a little insight ( And I'm generally quite a nosey person..) What's day to day life like on a boat?

 

Do you have pets?

 

How many of you live on your boat ?

 

Is there anything you miss about 'bricks and mortar'

 

Did you take any courses before embarking on this lifestyle

 

If you could impart only one piece of information to someone about to buy their first boat what would it be - (aside from get a survey, test run living on a boat by going on a holiday on one for a few weeks)

 

 

Will there be space for me to keep my beloved Kenwood Chef or will i need to learn to knead bread by hand and use my arm muscles to mix my cake batters?

I live on board on barely offline CRT moorings.

 

In order-:

 

No, but most of my neighbours have dogs and/ or cats.

 

I live on my own on a 36 foot narrowboat. It's the smallest one on the moorings. Most of the boats here are between 50 an 70 feet long and up to 14 feet wide, and are occupied by singles or couples, with a couple of small families.

 

I miss the bath and the err...., no, that's about it, really.

 

I took no courses, but if you're new to the life, the RYA one day inland waterways course is recommended.

 

It will cost you more than you ever thought it would.

 

How much space you have depends on the boat, an what you take with you off the land depends on your priorities. A Kenwood Chef will need either a biggish inverter or a shore supply, which will also give you enough power to work a washing machine if you've got space.

[Sabcat]

 

 

 

 

Oh we are, getting rather excited about handing in the notice on my flat (should probably tell my mum about my plans to move me, hubs and the cat into hers until we find the right boat!)

 

I moved back to my parents while the boat was being stretched. The plan was to stay there for a month. I managed 48 hours.

[Alan de Enfield]

 

 

If you could impart only one piece of information to someone about to buy their first boat what would it be - (aside from get a survey, test run living on a boat by going on a holiday on one for a few weeks)

 

 

Get one of those electrickery monitors (that tells you how much electricity you are using a day) for your house - see how much you are using every day over a period of say one month. - Or look at the amount shown on your elec bill and divide it by the number of days.

 

Ask on here how much you could reasonably(depends on number of batteries and charging regime) use on a boat.

 

Your boat electical supply is very limited, electric toasters, microwaves, hair dryers, straighteners, become things of the past - unless you can find away of replacing the electricity you will be buying new batteries regularly.

 

Tip - learn about electricity consumption and generation as relevant to boats.

[RLWP]

 

ooo thanks for the invite! About an hour from us so we could certainly take a trip up :-)

 

 

Excellent!

 

Richard

[Lmcgrath87]

I live on board on barely offline CRT moorings.

 

In order-:

 

No, but most of my neighbours have dogs and/ or cats.

 

I live on my own on a 36 foot narrowboat. It's the smallest one on the moorings. Most of the boats here are between 50 an 70 feet long and up to 14 feet wide, and are occupied by singles or couples, with a couple of small families.

 

I miss the bath and the err...., no, that's about it, really.

 

I took no courses, but if you're new to the life, the RYA one day inland waterways course is recommended.

 

It will cost you more than you ever thought it would.

 

How much space you have depends on the boat, an what you take with you off the land depends on your priorities. A Kenwood Chef will need either a biggish inverter or a shore supply, which will also give you enough power to work a washing machine if you've got space.

 

Glad people have cats! Our's will be coming with us, hopefully he'll enjoy boat life.

 

 

I moved back to my parents while the boat was being stretched. The plan was to stay there for a month. I managed 48 hours.

 

So long as i remind myself it's only temporary I should be able to manage it!

 

 

Get one of those electrickery monitors (that tells you how much electricity you are using a day) for your house - see how much you are using every day over a period of say one month. - Or look at the amount shown on your elec bill and divide it by the number of days.

 

Ask on here how much you could reasonably(depends on number of batteries and charging regime) use on a boat.

 

Your boat electical supply is very limited, electric toasters, microwaves, hair dryers, straighteners, become things of the past - unless you can find away of replacing the electricity you will be buying new batteries regularly.

 

Tip - learn about electricity consumption and generation as relevant to boats.

 

Brilliant - thank you, thats really helpful.

[Kae]

If you want to live on a boat because you want to live on a boat, you'll overcome any issues and enjoy yourself (I certainly have and do).

 

If you want to live on a boat for any other reason, you will be miserable.

 

 

I have a pet lizard (bought for me when I was a child and it refuses to pass from this mortal coil).

Just me, although two of us lived on here for a while.

Miss nothing really from living in bricks and mortar.

 

One piece of advice? Find someone who really knows what they're talking about and ask their advice on how things work.

Edited September 16, 2014 by Kae

[Lmcgrath87]

If you want to live on a boat because you want to live on a boat, you'll overcome any issues and enjoy yourself (I certainly have and do).

 

If you want to live on a boat for any other reason, you will be miserable.

 

 

I have a pet lizard (bought for me when I was a child and it refuses to pass from this mortal coil).

Just me, although two of us lived on here for a while.

Miss nothing really from living in bricks and mortar.

 

One piece of advice? Find someone who really knows what they're talking about and ask their advice on how things work.

We definitely want to do it because we wan't to live on a boat, we don't want to be in rented any more, but mainly we want to live on a boat - we had anticipated it would take 2 or 3 years to get to a position where we could buy one and still weren't deterred , but my dad has come to the rescue and is going to help us.

[Phil Ambrose]

Forget about books and get a Kindle

Phil

[Lmcgrath87]

Forget about books and get a Kindle

Phil

 

Got one of them...somewhere! Charity shop books are alot cheaper than kindle books though! I guess another alternative would be to join a library though.

[Grace and Favour]

We have our Kitchen Chef - - and keep it in the galley on the work surface.

There's no problem using it to knead bread, (or mix batter)

However, I tend to always make extra loaves when baking (to give to friends), and as it's sourdough, I tend to spend one day a week with four bowls of dough slowly proving, (normally over 6 - 8 hours)

 

Now that tends to impinge on where we can sit during the day!!

[John Williamson 1955]

 

Got one of them...somewhere! Charity shop books are alot cheaper than kindle books though! I guess another alternative would be to join a library though.

It depends on what books you want. You might want to have look at the Gutenberg Project.

 

www.gutenberg.org/

 

All free. Donations accepted.

 

For Science Fiction and Fantasy there's :-

 

www.tor.com/

 

Mostly free.

 

All available for Kindle, Kobo and most other e-readers.

 

A lot of the fiction books I want to read are currently costing me less than £1 from Amazon.

[Alan de Enfield]

 

Got one of them...somewhere! Charity shop books are alot cheaper than kindle books though! I guess another alternative would be to join a library though.

 

You have not quite got the hang of this yet :

 

Its space that is at a premium - unless you get rid of every book after reading it then you will soon be trying to live in a dog-sized kennel.

 

Kindle can hold 100's of books and take up less space than 1 book.

 

Someone gave me a CD with 5000 e-books on it - every genre you can imagine from Shakespeare to Sc-Fi. Just keep moving across a hundred at a time.

[RLWP]

There's a pretty active exchange of books on the canals. Many pubs and sanitary stations have places to swap books

 

RichRd

[David Mack]

 

Got one of them...somewhere! Charity shop books are alot cheaper than kindle books though! I guess another alternative would be to join a library though.

 

Or use the charity shop as the library - pay a little when you take a book out, then donate it back again when you've read it.

[Sabcat]

 

Or use the charity shop as the library - pay a little when you take a book out, then donate it back again when you've read it.

That's a good plan, using the library as a library works as well.

[Lmcgrath87]

I have told myself no buying more books until I have read what I have already. Those already read will go back to the charity shops and then I will utilise my kindle.

 

Aside from my various copies of Alice in Wonderland. They are staying.

[John Williamson 1955]

I have told myself no buying more books until I have read what I have already. Those already read will go back to the charity shops and then I will utilise my kindle.

 

Aside from my various copies of Alice in Wonderland. They are staying.

Of course. The illustrations are fantastic.

 

As an alternative to a Kindle, you can use a tablet with an Amazon reader. Once you register it with Amazon, your Amazon content will be downloaded to both, and if you have Wifi enabled on both and sync enabled, you can put a book down on page 132 on one device, and pick up the other one to find that is also on page 132. I have an Android tablet with a nice screen which will let me read at night, and has over 5 gigabytes of space available. As you can pack well over a thousand books into a Gigabyte, I don't worry about space on the tablet. I've got a couple of hundred books on an old, basic Kindle, and I'm not sure how many thousand I could squeeze on. <Looks> On checking, they come with enough space to hold over 3000 average books. The biggest one on mine is the latest Terry Pratchett, which has big, detailed and zoomable pictures on most pages and comes in at under 10 megabytes. Most are only a few hundred kilobytes.

[tree monkey]

Come to the Buckby banter: http://www.canalworld.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=66192&hl=%2Bbuckby+%2Bbanter

 

You can meet some people that liveaboard, and people that don't, perhaps get invited onto people's boats, and generally have a chat.

 

You'll probably get involved in some silliness too, and some good company

 

Richard

point of order sir, i clearly remember serious conversations about such enlightening subjects as

 

musical genres and how to define the sub genres

 

modern day paint formulations and there uses

 

the textile industry and how emotion will effect what you wear, with a particular emphasis on knitted jumpers, a bit esoteric this but interesting none the less

 

banters are places for serious conversations not frivolity

[Theo]

We have our Kitchen Chef - - and keep it in the galley on the work surface.

There's no problem using it to knead bread, (or mix batter)

However, I tend to always make extra loaves when baking (to give to friends), and as it's sourdough, I tend to spend one day a week with four bowls of dough slowly proving, (normally over 6 - 8 hours)

 

Now that tends to impinge on where we can sit during the day!!

But you are on a wide boat. Perhaps Ms McGrath is thinking of a narrow boat. Space can be a serious issue.

 

But you will give up almost everything and not count the cost if you really want to live on a boat. Kneading bread by hand is much better, anyway.

 

N

Edited September 16, 2014 by Theo

[Grace and Favour]

But you are on a wide boat. Perhaps Ms NcGrath is thinking of a narrow boat. Space can be a serious issue.

 

But you will give up almost everything and not count the cost if you really want to live on a boat. Kneading bread by hand is much better, anyway.

 

N

You clearly have not tried my bread!