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Yes I read it - non-story the Daily Mail of the canal world. I'm also fed up with the CRT baiters in this forum. We're soon going to have a fight for the survival of the canal system and all some people want to do is pick holes whilst the whole edifice (the canals,not those running them) collapses. There you go, battle line drawn.

Your reputation of falling out with tradesmen has never been in doubt

What an absolutely sublime day today in Ellesmere Port. Weather perfect.

I think you've been suckered in by all the clickbait ariticles unfortunately - written to cause a fuss and sell clicks on ads but with very little grounding in reality. I wouldn't be surprised if the 'journalists' had gone out with an agenda and interviewed people until they find someone who matches it. As someone who is a bit older than Gen Z, in my early 30s, I'm a freelancer working with what I think is supposed to be Gen Z (20-25) in the technical entertainment industry. Electrics, video signals, technical stuff which needs one to keep on top of the industry and carry on learning. Hours can be long too. Anyway, when I have my project manager hat on, I'm in charge of hiring other freelancers who can be of any age and usually recommended via word of mouth; it's how the industry works. Gen Z tend to be the ones who are very much into the job for the love of it, and are constantly learning, constantly researching all the time and rarely ask daft questions. There's exceptions but few have an ego; they will be the ones staying late, first to help out and arriving early. Contrast this with someone 45-50 who is jaded, hasn't kept up with the industry for the past decade and despite knowing a fraction of what the 25 years olds do, still act like they're entitled to the same day rates. They'll much rather chase me around and ask a daft question than pull out their phone/laptop, download a manual, do some research and solve the problem. Attitude is terrible too - turn up late, always find an excuse to avoid doing something even slightly physically demanding and if something unexpected needs doing, they'll have gone for a smoke break. My best crews have been 25-35 years old; I took 100 of them out to the middle east with me towards the end of last year for a very high profile event and we only had two bad apples. That's not to say it's not the case in other industries, but I trust what I see rather than a clickbait article on the internet. Bear in mind too that I won't come into contact with the Gen Z failures... There's a similar pattern elsewhere - I also do some boat electrics on the side (yes I have insurance etc!), mainly Victron programming and of course mainly in London as that's where the majority of the boats are. Younger folk tend to have bought a cheap boat which is a bit knackered and needs work, but are willing to learn and most have done a lot of research on forums/youtube etc to learn about the various systems. I know one girl who bought an ex lifeboat never having picked up a screwdriver, and a year in she's refitted the kitchen, fixed several plumbing issues and is working through the electrics with my help. I tend to see less older people, but the ones nearer 50 tend to be very stuck in their ways and will abjectly refuse to learn anything despite the info being out there, and feel entitled enough to constantly call me about the smallest thing rather than do some research first. They're the ones who get annoyed that I don't answer the phone when I'm busy... I once met a nice couple in their 50s who had bought a very shiny boat second hand, and wanted me to go over the electrics. They'd moored up in Leighton Buzzard on the towpath for the first time and were shocked to hear they couldn't just stay there forever, they'd have to move! No research at all. I don't think so - the info is out there online, and it's very easily accessible now; a starter pack isn't going to assist. Any Google search terms vaguely around what you want to know returns good results. Admittedly younger generations are more likely to have done this research, so it might be of use to older folk who are less inclined to go online but even still I'd expect them to do research by talking to people at brokers etc who would hopefully point them somewhere useful. Besides, I think the people who flaunt the rules by staying in one place for too long etc know perfectly well of the rules and choose to ignore them...a little pamphlet isn't going to make a difference.

That's fine - but tell me how your stance will save the canals as the funding dries up. Personally I feel that the CRT baiters have an irrational grudge, and probably had it against BW. That's why they go for issues like this. The big battle is to stop canals closing - that might mean doubling the licence fee if no other funds can be found. The nitpicking troupe have not yet come up with a workable answer to this one. All they can bleat is "mismanagement" without explaining how better management would produce the millions needed.

There's a weird mindset on here that anyone without a home mooring is a tax dodger and mooring up for two weeks at a time is a big no no and you're only in it for a cheap lifestyle as opposed to being a 'true boater' or whatever that means. I've tried living in a marina as that's what everyone bleats on about when you first mention getting a boat and I hated it. Like being double moored all the time and paying for the privilege, and then having to deal with gossip from neighbours you can't escape. I quite like cruising to a new spot and then stopping for a week or two; some of those days might be commuting to work (my place of work changes almost daily) but most are spent exploring the new area, walking/cycling around to look at stuff which I might not otherwise be able to see and so on. I'm the opposite to this; everyone does things differently. Before living aboard I had a little GRP cruiser in a marina - it started to become a hassle going to the boat, getting it ready to cruise and so on just for a couple of days. Living on the boat means I can take my entire home to a different place and have a different town to look around etc without having to think about getting the boat back to the marina and then getting home. I don't have a fixed place of work to commute to - as I'm freelance, it changes a lot and I do some from home too. Again...everyone is different and again I'm the opposite. Living on board for me means that I look forward to cruising, where I'll find somewhere new to live for a week or two and explore the area. I was briefly in a marina and because I was paying to be there, I felt I had to return there which limited where I cruised; plus, with shore power, the incentive to set the boat up for multiple days off grid wasn't there so if I moored up for a few days it was a hassle to keep batteries charged etc.

Orange crayons are the tastiest. Apparently. Slightly more seriously, I own a "boat without a home mooring." (1995 British Waterways act) "Continuous Cruiser" is a BW made up term that seems to have massive traction amongst certain segments of the (home mooring) boating community. It doesn't exist except in Sally Ash's fevered imagination, and she's not there anymore. I once had exactly this conversation with a former chair of the IWA who ended up agreeing with me. Nice bloke, which is my standard definition of chaps who agree with me. 😁 Nearly all the disputes regarding CCers are about those who don't follow the trivial rules - and I can guarantee you that those of us who do comply are much angrier about those who don't than most owners of "boats with a home mooring." As a thought exercise for the frothing at the mouth brigade, if I have two boats - one with a marina mooring and one without any home mooring - am I a "CCer" or not? It's purely about the licence declaration for the boat, not the owner.

This forum has never treated the 'canal' in the forum name as a limitation on what can be discussed. All of us (or at least almost all of us) have boated sections of river as well as canal, and I see no problem whatsoever in this thread featuring the pictures of those boaters who spend more of their boating time on rivers and larger waterways. And if they make the occasional forays out onto coastal waters, and visit harbours, inlets and coastal rivers that most of us will never take our own boats to, that only adds to the forum in my opinion.

Tixall Wide this evening.

Just been told by a CRT guy that these are now open, if squalid! Anyone know more? As an aside, just had to revise my opinion of Bosley vlockies, two helped us all the way up, having first asked if we wanted them to and then checking with whoever was on the boat before opening paddles, every time. In the rain, too.

For me, I'd want to advocate somewhere between you and MtB: neither a fully public utility, free at the point of use, nor a fully commercial operation is really going to work. In the first case, there are just too many areas where sustained reductions in public maintenance have led to situations of near collapse (OK I'm biased having just has a pothole damaged tyre to replace) with canals rather lower down the priority scale, compared with hospitals, schools and roads all in dire need. In the second case, a fully commercial operation would need to find ways of monetising all the non-boating users, including walkers and cyclists, with a real problem over controlling access and monitoring payments/permits or w.h.y. As with most of these challenges, a real problem is a complete lack of a political philosophy that can give a principled underpinning yo the separate decisions. At one extreme we do have the Corbynist approach that really only values publicly owned activities - and is principled in doing so - and at the other we have the 'tax is wrong' brigade of Farage and Rees-Mogg. Until we can find a way that says that the mixed economy - some things are best done for the public good and some better for those who need/can afford it, we will struggle to do anything better than ad hoc decision making that generally quickly fails because it is a fine balance of opinion which changes with the daily winds. But I still lie in hoe that we can find a way of doing this with the canals!

I’m considering a modification to my narrowboat which many of you will be familiar with from your holidays in the med. Glass bottomed boats are commonplace there and it strikes me that the same unique feature might work on a narrowboat. It would be great to sit quietly on a summer evening with a beer and watch the shoals of Bream, Perch and Gudgeon feeding beneath my boat. I would of course need to add underwater lighting but I can’t see that this should be too much of a problem. Before I get too carried away can anyone see any major engineering challenges I’d face installing the glass panel and do people think I’d need to inform CRT?

A map. The mile north of Saul is omitted for being obvious. Red by water, yellow by portage: we're only at the first yellow dash from the top. Someone familiar with the area might foresee the miserable bit. This River Frome, like some of the others, is a very pretty little river indeed. It's deep for its size and clear, tree roots dipping into the water, little fish skittering about in the dappled light. It's not long before the canal resumes on the other side and I get out to see if it's still there. It is. Too Long follows me, a bit reluctantly, over the bank into rather murkier water. Soon a pipe culvert, carrying a farm track, blocks our way. A lone flip-flop was floating in the canal and comes along for the ride. There's almost no litter here, the BCN's a distant memory. The channel continues on the other side, but is more choked with weed. It starts out as floating stuff that trails from Too Long's bow and gets tangled around my paddle. There's a fairly low gas pipe, then a nice arched bridge in good repair. The weed thins out a little, but not for long... Soon after the bridge I have to start slaloming around clumps of standing reeds, which grow and merge until the canal is solid with them. Too Long isn't floating at all now, just scraping over bent reeds like a poorly-designed sledge. It's not far to the A38 stank but this is just impossible. I give up, climb out and lift the canoe onto my shoulders. (this is a little before that point) It's only a couple of hundred yards of walking before a shiny gate gets in the way. Humping a 14ft canoe over it is a little awkward, but there's a lovely new canal on the other side! The channel is perfectly clear, the bridges are spotless, the towpath doesn't seem finished. I wonder if I'm the first boat on this part of the canal? Who knows. Drat, I've run out of new canal already. Good thing they're digging more while I wait! (this was actually the archaeological survey, the main dig still hasn't started as of early 2024). to be continued, again...

I think that there is a general 'dislike' of CMers who moor up and rarely move, and then probably only for water, and then return to the same mooring spot & claim the towpath as their personal scrapyard / storage area. They don't appear to be 'in it' for the pleasure of boating, maybe they have finacial constraints (like those caravanners in Bristol) and are just happy to find somewhere to live with no rent or council tax etc. Boaters who 'continuously cruise' (impossible to comply with that statement) and abide by the rules are not frowned upon, and in many cases are looked at with jealousy because they are able to do something that many folks of working age cannot do. Unfortunately, as always, it is the few that make difficulties for the many and then all can get tarred with the same brush All power to you !

Not going to get in to a discussion on this thread but rules or not, given the subject of the thread that song is not appropriate and in my view tasteless, therefore it should not be a post in this thread.

in other news, local shops are reporting increases in sales of bed sheets and crayons as passive aggressive banners are being made along the length of the the towpath. Local cafes however have reported a drop in takings due to the remaining crayons being eaten........

@nigel carton also moves boats. I always find it a bit sad that someone has bought a boat, presumably to go boating on, yet they can't find the time to move the boat to their new home mooring. Especially as we are about to have a four day weekend which would be enough for most of the trip. And no reason not to leave the boat moored to the towpath for a week or two if the trip can't be completed in one go.

Well, I hope Peter don’t get put off posting. It’s also been good to have a thread where there’s usually little said, certainly no squabbling, just pictures to look at.

Seemed plain enough to me. No need to be rude. PS "cant" and "can't" are different words. Please write correctly.

I let em all live in my garden. Its fabulous. We get the occasional rat who I think ,lives next door but pops over for a munch sometimes. We have lovely squirrels and indeed are oft visited by foxes and most nights a couple of badgers. All caught many times by our Trail cam. The squirrels sit over our heads in the trees and drop nut shells on us when sat out in late summer. We have slow worms as our garden adjoins the Ceredigion slow worm sanctuary lol. No hedgehogs as yet but working on that.

Ahhh, interesting mate - and that makes total sense! Will have a good nosy about tomorrow when not under the influence and hopefully be able to suss out! thank you Thank you so much everyone again! I’ve just had a good nosy and found a loose wire in the changeover switch! I’ve just re-attached and I now have a working travel pack! can’t tell you how delighted I am, genuinely absolutely made up and grateful to you all! thank you all for diagnosing!

Howdy all We're out on the cut again and enjoying the sunshine we were gifted today. Checked my posts and saw that 5 years ago we shared some photos from our canal mini-moon, so we will have to recreate it tomorrow as our anniversary is next week! Leaving Mercia in the morning for Shardlow, then back again tomorrow. Did the opposite on Wednesday heading down to Branston pools, but the river was shut so we turned around to head back this way. If you spot Penelope given us a shout and a wave! Its so nice to see so many familiar names on the forum, we hope you're all doing really well. ❤️

No one had fuel so I asked a local boater. Moored on the rings next to the newish pedestrian bridge at Cromwell Bottom. And walked 5 minutes up the hill to Oilswell. They were super friendly, sold me Red for £1.10 a litre in barrells and gave me a trolley and a hand pump/syphon. Got two bag of coal as well. Obviously the trolley system is not ideal but I've got a full tank now at a good price. Lovely people at the establishment who sold it to me when they were technically closed on a bank holiday.

An update for everyone. It works! Although it’s not a job I will do again in a hurry. It was a nightmare to take apart - a fair few bolts snapped and the angle grinder was needed a fair bit to cut through old bolts and washers. Using a stud remover I was able to take most of them out and I have moved onto the boat and reassembled. No issues with listing - it’s only 400kg so not a crazy amount. The back boiler in the one I bought was leaking - but it is integral to the Rayburn so I have cut a hole in it and inserted a much smaller back boiler which is more suited to boat use anyway. Overall I am very pleased (and very worn out!) I replaced the old insulation with rockwool and have put new fire tiles on everything. Thanks again for the help.

Coming soon to this channel, the Hotchkiss Hydraulic Propeller and the Hunt for Torfrida....watch this space. Or more likely, a new one.

And there was me thinking I'd be able to help a fellow forum member sort of their spreadsheet problems... 😅😂