Early Retirement Web kwavwwlllow Sq

[Jim&Helen]

I hope I haven't missed a similar thread, The wife and I have modified our original plans of retiring to a yacht in Greece, to cc on a narrowboat / wide beam. We are both comfortable on the water and owned yachts for many years.

After some research we have come to these conclusions (are we wrong)

 

1/ minium of 47 ft trad or semi trad stern, 55 ft cruiser stern

 

2/ £8000 a year should cover boating & living costs (2 people 2 puppies) wintering in marina and cc the rest of the year

 

What we have no idea off is

1/what are the opportunities of casual /engineering / hospitality work on or near the cut.

2/ How do you get on with getting medical assistance, prescriptions, insurance, post etc with no address

 

3/ Type of bog ((heads) were used to sea toilets)

 

4/ quietest canals to cruise

 

5/ good winter moorings

 

Again I hope these questions aren't answered elsewhere, and any advice / corrections to our conclusions will be greatly appreciated

[Scholar Gypsy]

I am envious!

 

Others will be much better placed to answer some of these questions (I am an Elsan person myself - many threads on toilet technology!),

 

On the question of size you do need to think about which waterways you wish to use. A 58' narrowboat (6'10" beam) will get you almost everywhere (apart from one lock in Suffolk). Anything longer or wider, and you start to restrict yourself as to where you can travel, as the central part of the network is all narrow locks. For WIDE boats the system splits into four sections:

 

1) South: Thames, Grand Union, Kennet and Avon

2) West: Severn, Warwickshire Avon

3) North: Liverpool to York and lots of other routes thereabouts, plus the River Trent inland to Burton on Trent,

4) East: Northampton and Bedford to the sea.

 

It is possible in the right weather to get between 1) and 2), and 3) and 4), via short sea crossings (Bristol Channel and the Wash). The other transfers require a truck, at the moment.

Edited September 12, 2016 by Scholar Gypsy

[Athy]

Whoops, operator error! Deleted.

Edited September 12, 2016 by Athy

[Tony Brooks]

Not quite sure about the restrictions which you mention. It is quite possible to get from the Thames or the K&A to the Eastern waterways (Middle Level, Great Ouse) without venturing out to sea.

 

How? The MK - Bedford link has not been built and the Northampton arm is narrow beam. Although the Leicester arm was built wide beam the Watford and Foxton locks are narrow beam.

[Athy]

 

How? The MK - Bedford link has not been built and the Northampton arm is narrow beam. Although the Leicester arm was built wide beam the Watford and Foxton locks are narrow beam.

You are perfectly correct. I missed the bit which stated that these restrictions were for widebeam craft. This is because it's still early and I haven't finished my first mug of coffee yet. I'll delete my erroneous post. Thanks for pointing that out.

[Scholar Gypsy]

I have now over-emphasised the point ....

[Chewbacka]

.......

1/ minium of 47 ft trad or semi trad stern, 55 ft cruiser stern - As space is very valuable on a narrowboat, I would not reduce the length based upon the stern.

If you want to go just about everywhere, then 56~58ft is the max.

 

2/ £8000 a year should cover boating & living costs (2 people 2 puppies) wintering in marina and cc the rest of the year

Depends if you want to winter in London or a lower cost area. Also depends upon the food and drink you like to buy and how you will heat your boat in winter.

 

What we have no idea off is

1/what are the opportunities of casual /engineering / hospitality work on or near the cut.

2/ How do you get on with getting medical assistance, prescriptions, insurance, post etc with no address - Lots of advice on other posts on the forum. Use the forum search facility in the top right corner. Don't forget to click on the grey google bit to select this forum to avoid doing a full web search

3/ Type of bog ((heads) were used to sea toilets)

Don't ask that question as boaters tend to be very polarised as to the advantages etc for each type. All I would say is if you go for a posh electric pump out you need a back-up in case breakdown or frozen in and can not get to the pump out. A small elsan in the cupboard would be wise.

 

4/ quietest canals to cruise

Most are quiet, though the 'rings' and city centres can be busy in school holidays. But even busy canals tend to be quiet between 06:00 and 10:00

 

5/ good winter moorings

CRT designate some of their Visitor Moorings (VM) as winter moorings (paid for) and marinas can be available. All depends on the level of facilities required. For example at Sharpness VM the nearest pump-out is about 2 hours cruising with no electricity but beautiful views, but can be desolate in winter. It all depends upon your definition of good???

 

Again I hope these questions aren't answered elsewhere, and any advice / corrections to our conclusions will be greatly appreciated

 

Added - Changed some text colours to make answers clear

Edited September 12, 2016 by Chewbacka

[MoominPapa]

2/ £8000 a year should cover boating & living costs (2 people 2 puppies) wintering in marina and cc the rest of the year

 

From experience (now in year three of the same thing), double that, at least, unless you want your life to be very circumscribed.

 

MP.

Edited September 12, 2016 by MoominPapa

[keith.]

3. What type of head?

 

The sea toilet is prohibited in most inland waterways.

 

The Elsan will last 2 adults 2 days max and then has to be emptied restricting your movements. Obviously spare cassettes can be used.

 

The composting toilet has to have urine emptied daily or so and the poo tank monthly or so.

 

The pump out has to be emptied every 2 weeks or so, costs £15 a time and has the same restriction as finding an Elsan emptying point. Additionally, if you are iced in it is a problem taking the boat to the point.

 

Having tried all 4 I would go for a pump out backed up by a porta potti. Get the pump out emptied regularly at a base that does it for you.

[Alan de Enfield]

There was a post in another thread where a boat owner said they were getting thru' 3x 13kg gas bottles per week with the Alde Gas central heating during cold periods and the heating on 'high'.

 

At 3x £30 each that is £75 per week so even allowing for just a few 'very cold' weeks you can soon rack up £1000 on gas.

 

Consider VERY carefully your heating options, and always have 2 systems so you have a back up when one breaks down, or you are iced in and run out of fuel.

 

Reality check - Winter in a tin-tube on a muddy ditch will be very different to Winter in a much beamier, yacht around the Greek Islands.

 

Try before you buy !!!

[dmr]

We spend about £5000 on boat costs alone, this is without any mooring charges as we cc, maintenance is a big cost if you plan to keep the boat from going downhill, and I do almost everything myself.

 

I think a trad stern is a better option for a liveaboard boat, but cruiser sterns are very popular. Unlike a sailing boat the front deck can be a socialising area as long as its big enough. I would not go much shorter than 57 foot.

 

I like our pump out bog, but a holding tank big enough to go at least 6 weeks is a good idea.

 

Cruising is winter is really rather nice so a marina or winter mooring is far from essential.

 

The ease of finding casual work very much depends upon how good you are at finding work, but I expect its harder in the winter and that's probably when you want it.

 

.................Dave

[Phil Ambrose]

There was a post in another thread where a boat owner said they were getting thru' 3x 13kg gas bottles per week with the Alde Gas central heating during cold periods and the heating on 'high'.

 

At 3x £30 each that is £75 per week so even allowing for just a few 'very cold' weeks you can soon rack up £1000 on gas.

 

Consider VERY carefully your heating options, and always have 2 systems so you have a back up when one breaks down, or you are iced in and run out of fuel.

 

Reality check - Winter in a tin-tube on a muddy ditch will be very different to Winter in a much beamier, yacht around the Greek Islands.

 

Try before you buy !!!

Actually it's worse than you suggest because 3x£30 is £90 not £75.

Phil

[OldGoat]

In no logical order and based on what I would do with your background:-

You've not mentioned electrical needs or consumption. If a new build, then 24V has fewer challenges - I could expand. If a wide beam consider a separate watercooled generator. Use traction or semi traction batteries and lots of them (within reason). (I have 60 NiCd wet cells....)

Loos - pumpouts work the best. I've seen proper sea toilets discharging into holding tanks, but the valves give occasional trouble. Methinks the vacuflush system is a better solution overall. (we have dump through and think we now have a solution to the smell area...)

(sadly) a widebeam gives you a lot more usable room and makes the use of domestic appliances more practicable (we're narrow but we're leisure cruisers)

For heating a central wood burner is good coupled with an ebersplutter style boiler for hot water and overall central heating.