Abandoning bricks altogether

[system 4-50]

After looking after various relatives in care homes recently my advice is Liveaboard until you really can't anymore then take up hang-gliding or rock climbing (for a short period).

The only difficulty is where you are a couple and then you have to have an agreement.

It is not appropriate for one of you to do the hang-gliding and the other to insist on doing the rock climbing.

[cotswoldsman]

I have lived and CCed on my boat for 5 years now, was only going to do 2 when I bought the boat. I have enjoyed every minute. I have kept my property and intend to move back the day I no longer feel like or can manage to cruise. The idea of living on a boat on a mooring does nothing for me, I would rather be back in a property if I do not cruise.

[Roger Gunkel]

Good thread, but anyone know of 80 year old or more liveaboards?

 

cheers,

Pete.

I know a 75 year old, but if you take the number of 80+ people who live unassisted in houses and divide that number by the ratio of boat to house dwellers,, which is about 0.003% that will probably give you about 2

 

Roger

[Guest]

Interesting isn't it?

 

A lot of boats are currently on the market and being sold for the same as or even more than the value of a house in many parts of the UK.

[Roger Gunkel]

I have lived and CCed on my boat for 5 years now, was only going to do 2 when I bought the boat. I have enjoyed every minute. I have kept my property and intend to move back the day I no longer feel like or can manage to cruise. The idea of living on a boat on a mooring does nothing for me, I would rather be back in a property if I do not cruise.

I understand your point of view, but if I couldn't cruise at all, I would rather be on my mooring feeding the swans, listening to the water lapping, feeling the boat moving about and watching the changing seasons, than stuck in a house waiting to die hoping someone knocks on the door.

 

Roger

[cariad]

Good thread, but anyone know of 80 year old or more liveaboards?

 

cheers,

Pete.

 

 

yes, there's an old gent i was talking to at GREAT HEYWOOD last year 86 years of age and saw him sail pass on

the STAFF'S and WORCESTERSHIRE early this year still going strong.

[blackrose]

Good thread, but anyone know of 80 year old or more liveaboards?

 

cheers,

Pete.

 

I knew a couple who were in their late 70s/early 80s and still living onboard at Batchworth on the GU. That was about 14 years ago so I doubt they're still around.

[Guest wanted]

There is a lovely couple who CC in the summer months and take winter moorings down in Brentford, they must be about 70 and show no signs of giving up.

 

It's a bit of an arbitrary question as I am sure we would all like to continue to live our lives in the way it suits for as long as possible. I really hope that I don't ever not do something because of a 'what if' some may say it's reckless but having met a lot of people who for lots of reasons don't realise their potential or ambition I feel driven even more to live a life that is full as possible.

[cotswoldsman]

There is a lovely couple who CC in the summer months and take winter moorings down in Brentford, they must be about 70 and show no signs of giving up.

 

It's a bit of an arbitrary question as I am sure we would all like to continue to live our lives in the way it suits for as long as possible. I really hope that I don't ever not do something because of a 'what if' some may say it's reckless but having met a lot of people who for lots of reasons don't realise their potential or ambition I feel driven even more to live a life that is full as possible.

 

Stan the guy I cruise with is 77 this year, one of the reasons we cruise together is that he would now struggle to get his boat through the locks without help. I do worry what will happen when I give up cruising.

 

I understand your point of view, but if I couldn't cruise at all, I would rather be on my mooring feeding the swans, listening to the water lapping, feeling the boat moving about and watching the changing seasons, than stuck in a house waiting to die hoping someone knocks on the door.

 

Roger

 

I certainly do not plan to sit around the house waiting to die. I have a few Round The World Trips left in me. My Mother is 90 on the 18 April and she lives a very happy and social life. i have to time my phone calls very carefully as she is always out with friends. Nest week a group of them are off to a very nice Hotel to celebrate her 90th Birthday she could not fit me and my children in for the weekend until 29 April. If you chose to sit around and die that is fine but that is not my plan.

[mrsmelly]

Good thread, but anyone know of 80 year old or more liveaboards?

 

cheers,

Pete.

 

YES Would you like to meet them for a pint in the pub someday ?.

[BruceinSanity]

yes, there's an old gent i was talking to at GREAT HEYWOOD last year 86 years of age and saw him sail pass on

the STAFF'S and WORCESTERSHIRE early this year still going strong.

 

Oldest I know of was a 92 year old single hander. When asked how he coped with the locks he said: "If I come to one I can't manage, I just sit in it until someone comes along to give me a hand. It took three days once…"

 

I think we once passed him half way down Hatton. The boat was sitting in the full lock. We were coming up, so I knocked on the roof, and after a long delay, he emerged, explaining that he'd just been having a cup of tea. We worked him down and into the lock below, where presumably he waited for either the next boat up, or one coming down to breast up to.

 

I'm normally irritated by single handers who expect you to do everything for them, but this was an exception.

 

Edited for grammar

Edited April 15, 2012 by BruceinSanity

[Mandy]

I have never understood the British obsession with having to own a property. Everybody seems to want to run headlong into getting their own house and a lifetime of debt and worry. I have owned a number of houses over the years, but never because I wanted to leave a property for my children, nor could I see the value of helping people to get onto the property ladder and perpetuate the debt and allow house prices to continue to rise. As long as we make it possible for young people to get on the property ladder at all costs, then prices will never become more affordable. Many see owning a property as security for old age, but in what way? As long as you own the property then the monetary value is irrelevant. If you become infirm you may have difficulty maintaining it and may even be forced to sell it to pay for a care home. How about the kid's inheritance? They will likely have to sell it to pay for your rest home or fight over who gets what, or just squander the money on things they haven't been able to pay for with their own income. They can just as easily sell or fight over a boat, a caravan or a skiing lodge in Bulgaria. What is the point in working all your life for something if the only point in it is for your children to wait around until you die to inherit it instead of getting on with their own life plans.

 

So some areas of the canals are becoming like a linear housing estate, but that is because many people buy a boat to live on but the life they live is consisent with living in a house in every other way. Change jobs, work for yourself, move to a less congested area., it's not neccessary to live like Rosie and Jim as Britain is surrounded with water and criss crossed with rivers and waterways. Live on a sea boat in a harbour or on a swinging bouy mooring, get away from the canals and on to the rivers.

 

Sometimes a change of life can mean some lateral thinking and making some real changes in your mindset rather than just replacing the house with a boat.

 

Roger

At last I have found my Guru! Rarely have I seen so much good sense written in a single post. I echo everything you said Roger. I too have no land base to fall back on. I am in my 50's, female and a lone boater. If I get to the stage where i can't live on my boat, I'll just go down merrily with lots of whisky and pills!

[Ally]

We have a gent of 76 living on a boat just down from us...he didn't even move onto a boat till he was 74, and we often watch him walk down the pontoon with coal over his shoulder, or a gas bottle. His huge dog takes him for a jog a couple of times a day, and he just got himself a new girlfriend.....what an inspiration he is!

[Roger Gunkel]

I am in my 50's, female and a lone boater. If I get to the stage where i can't live on my boat, I'll just go down merrily with lots of whisky and pills!

Not sure about the pills Mandy but I'll drink to that

 

Roger

[BruceinSanity]

We have a gent of 76 living on a boat just down from us...he didn't even move onto a boat till he was 74, and we often watch him walk down the pontoon with coal over his shoulder, or a gas bottle. His huge dog takes him for a jog a couple of times a day, and he just got himself a new girlfriend.....what an inspiration he is!

 

Brill. I plan to live to be 100 and then die at the hands of a jealous husband…

 

[sueb]

Brill. I plan to live to be 100 and then die at the hands of a jealous husband…

 

Or a jealous wife?

Sue

I know a couple 94 & 96 still boating last time we saw them. Under 75 isn't old!

[Albion]

Brill. I plan to live to be 100 and then die at the hands of a jealous husband…

 

 

 

Or a jealous wife?

Sue

 

It's OK Sue, when you get as old and decrepit as Bruce all you have left is fantasy and hope!

Roger

[stellar]

I'm normally irritated by single handers who expect you to do everything for them, but this was an exception.

 

 

 

I know it's off topic but I see this sort of remark quite often. I am a single handed 70 yr old female. I prefer to go through locks on my own when I can take my time and be careful. If I insist on doing my share when I go through with another boat then they have to wait whilst I go up or down the ladder etc - this is embarrassing and can make me take risks. It therefore seems to be the politer and more sensible option to concur when they tell me to stay on my boat, but I can assure you there is no "expect" about it.

With regard to the main question, I do have the rented-out property that I could return to option but have no intention of doing so, when I can no longer cc I will get a permanent mooring.

[Arthur Brown]

Well as you will suss out I've had a varied career, currently I drive an ambulance transporting people for appointments at hospital. We (the company) and the NHS are typically unable to cope with people who move frequently or who have odd access requirements -locked gates and pontoons for example. SO for the few on here who will develop a condition needing care, for your own sake find a place that you can use where you can be found if needed. If you should need collecting for chemo then please have one place ready in mind where you can be collected every day or so, or the essential treatment will not happen.

[mrsmelly]

Well as you will suss out I've had a varied career, currently I drive an ambulance transporting people for appointments at hospital. We (the company) and the NHS are typically unable to cope with people who move frequently or who have odd access requirements -locked gates and pontoons for example. SO for the few on here who will develop a condition needing care, for your own sake find a place that you can use where you can be found if needed. If you should need collecting for chemo then please have one place ready in mind where you can be collected every day or so, or the essential treatment will not happen.

 

Hi Arthur

I think you will find that those of us that have been liveaboards for many years are more than capable of organising our lives. Scaremongering should be kept for those too frightened to abandon their houses which people like myself and wife are not. If people become ill enough for chemo they make themselves available as do people in houses. At my present mooring you can get an ambulance within inches of my boat. I owned a house in a cornish harbour that an ambulance could not get within 100 yards. Like I keep saying, if you are too ill to be on a boat you are too ill to be in a house. A house is a container made of bricks or stone that doesnt float and people live in them. A boat is a container made of plastic, wood or steel that does float and people also live in them.

 

Tim

[Guest]

Well as you will suss out I've had a varied career, currently I drive an ambulance transporting people for appointments at hospital. We (the company) and the NHS are typically unable to cope with people who move frequently or who have odd access requirements -locked gates and pontoons for example. SO for the few on here who will develop a condition needing care, for your own sake find a place that you can use where you can be found if needed. If you should need collecting for chemo then please have one place ready in mind where you can be collected every day or so, or the essential treatment will not happen.

 

Arthur - I guess you work in PTS (patient transport service)

 

Local to where I worked the local NHS PTS service engaged their brains...

 

Chemo is something regularly required...meaning you will get picked up - stop scaremongering...

[Roger Gunkel]

Arthur, I'm sure your posts are well intentioned, but you seem to be becoming a voice of doom and gloom, handing out advice on a number of areas of liveaboard boating. I notice you don't have a boat name listed, are you actually a boater?

 

It's not particularly important but puts a perspective on things

 

Roger

Edited April 15, 2012 by Roger Gunkel

[cotswoldsman]

Well as you will suss out I've had a varied career, currently I drive an ambulance transporting people for appointments at hospital. We (the company) and the NHS are typically unable to cope with people who move frequently or who have odd access requirements -locked gates and pontoons for example. SO for the few on here who will develop a condition needing care, for your own sake find a place that you can use where you can be found if needed. If you should need collecting for chemo then please have one place ready in mind where you can be collected every day or so, or the essential treatment will not happen.

 

Could always moor up outside a hospital or within a very short distance making being on a boat even better than a house!!! Moorings at Lancaster being one example that springs to mind.

[mickspangle]

Well as you will suss out I've had a varied career, currently I drive an ambulance transporting people for appointments at hospital. We (the company) and the NHS are typically unable to cope with people who move frequently or who have odd access requirements -locked gates and pontoons for example. SO for the few on here who will develop a condition needing care, for your own sake find a place that you can use where you can be found if needed. If you should need collecting for chemo then please have one place ready in mind where you can be collected every day or so, or the essential treatment will not happen.

 

If only it was possible to fit some sort of propulsion device to these boats...

[cereal tiller]

If only it was possible to fit some sort of propulsion device to these boats...

Your suggestion of a propulsion device has set my creative juices flowing!

 

A simple method of moving boats from one place to another,would be to lob baking soda over the stern occasionally?

 

I ,like many others,had a toy boat when i was a child,that was able to move due to the baking soda/surface tension effect.

 

Could the same scientific principles be applied to these narrow boat thingies?

 

Attempted to gain propulsion using soda ,just the other day,but the very place i wanted to pour it the water was cluttered up by a ruddery whatsit and ,nearby was a ruddy diesel engine doodah.

 

May just try a punt pole to get the boat to move?

 

 

Seriously,i think roger gunkel has a valid point regarding arthur brown's posts,they are a little pessimistic at times.