JawsOrca

Thanks Grace.. I'm guessing she's trying to use taptalk so we will let her off! Mum as Grace said or click:

Brian to the forum. Hoping to see pictures and stories of your trips. I've always wanted to do the Irish system.. One day!

Southerner and Proud lol (it really is the best bit!). Hi Maxwellian, we are hoping to do one weekend up the broads and one off worst case (we need to sort our other boat out this year) and every bankholiday plus a good 3 weeks so certainly the invites there if we are there the same times as yourselves (we should be though!).

I think the calendar would be good to use but it's good to know who else is about so whatever people feel comfortable using. I don't think we want to auto delete posts though as this can use a pain for people coming in via search engines (dead links) and it may be interesting to some to look back

I must admit i wasn't quite sure where the border is (I knew it was the waveney but guessed it only went as far as oulton!) Googleing indicates that gorleston is in suffolk too is that right?)... and does this means that I'll have to find a "thesuffolkbroads.net" and leave this forum?

Sod that! I feel sick...

to the forum Rob. I'd say they are only 16amp connectors as 32amp would probably add confusion. Although I've never used one so I'm guessing.. I'm sure someone will be along shortly though with a better guess!

Many thanks, we had the exam last week and failed on a few things .. most of which have been fixed so I'm hoping to get the chap back next week for the retest.. I must admit it's a minefield although we did better than expected considering the work we've done Iain, I did squeeze mum and dads through and thats 8.6 (had an inch spare lol) had a quick beer and ran back .. easy I did wind mum up too.. i got a picture somewhere.. Unfortunately we are hoping Orca sits high in the water so we will see I doubt it's above 8.6 though..

We think the airdraft is about 7.6. we've not floated yet so we are guessing! My folks boat is 8.6 and I got that through beccles though, so I'm confident! I know we wont get through all the time but if we can make it occasionally that will be good. I dont think the berths have electric although we dont have shore power and I'm against installing it because I see the boat as a means to escape, I'm stuck on a laptop the majority of the day so not being able to have electric is perfect for me! The south is the best

Iain! to be honest it's probably the other way round although I need to let the marina know so they can pop in and check on the boat every now and again! We've not actually been to the marina Iain lol but I've been chatting to steve (steveanddeb) and I got good vibes talking to the mark from the marina on the phone. We only been to somerleyton twice (first time last year!!) but again it seems really nice and we had a little peep down the to the marine and it seemed very secure so we walked no further. I think we will be very happy there.. the good thing is that it has floating pontoons so no worries about any flooding worse case it's a foot in door to norfolk and a mooring

Thanks Geoff and Grace.. getting a mooring is always half the struggle (Getting a resi mooring was 10% harder though!).. Thankfully I don't need to pay for it until april too but it's got our name on it now and we are chuffed too.

Lou back

Somerleyton Marina! On the sunny quiet southern broads.. (No where near stalham where we was aiming and no where near the ends of the rivers again where we was looking for)... But impressed with the (price!), service on the phone, pontoon berths, Security seems good, fellow forum members steveanddebs will be there (Sorry guys.. and the location, we do actually prefer the southern broads; all the better restaurants are south and it's a perfect spot for visiting our favourite pub.. the locks inn at geldeston... Now just need to get through the BSC and make sure she floats!! (Although we will still take it over as we will be there sometime this year!)..

Hi Steve, We thought about these although look at the consumption, they seem a bit juicy (although we was looking for the houseboat) for a toy boat I'd guess you wont use that much? For ease of getting through the bsc I'd suggest you get a new unit too. We have a webasto airtop 2000 supplied by JPC Direct in brundall. Tom is very good and worth a chat.

I want one...!!! Although I can't find a price.. guess I can't afford it then lol

Least the cats home mum. The police where there and said it looks like they wore gloves but being stupid they left a screwdriver so they are hopeful they can get prints and dna from that. Although if caught as usual they will probably just get a "good telling off" and back to school they go the next day. As griff mentions get some CCTV, there's a maplins in crayford, get some security lights and certainly get an alarm fitted now. And put it on the market and get the hell out of london...

Thanks for sharing Brendan. Interesting read as you say. I only just remember hearts as I think I was first up in 2000 and as this states they were moved over to Richardsons a couple of years after, I did wonder what happened so this has finally answered (I know little about broads history other than peat diggings lol!!). Those classic 20's timber hulls are amazing! "Proper boats", the broads needs a revival.. (Clive please one day do a classic revival, I'd hire one for certain.. (This 20's style though). )

Such a shame.. I really do see a harvester sign on there though.. I guess though harvester/ beefeaters prefer to be nearer populated areas as so they can act a local to.. It's a tough spot despite the road and river...

Pleasure Andy, a few little changes will finish it off, sorry for getting technical its always the way! Strow the BA's website believe it or not is state of the art and (as you probably know already) is a responsive website, it's a very cleaver art form which I've only looked at briefly although the framework behind it is relatively easy to get around (If you have spare time you may be interested to play with - http://getbootstrap.com/).It responds to the page size and adjusts (show/hides) things depending on the size so you have one page for any device. Very cleaver stuff. It is quickly becoming mainstrem although I doubt will touch small websites unless google take up or it becomes part of html. Despite popular opinion, the keyword meta tag actually does very little to google (I use google as the others follow google and its the most used one). SEO is a very complex and dark art and there's a ton of things on there, some we know about some aren't and as soon as we know about them it changes, so it's a "fun" game of cat and mouse. I followed SEO for about 3 years on one website and I got it's ranking very very high (10k in the UK) or so and it made a lot of money from it! (but then got bored as its a full time job).. The page title and content (and order of content and length of content and the words in the content) are more important than the keywords (in other words google doesn't need to be told what the keywords are it can work it out for itself but e.g if you have a word in your keyword which isn't in your content then you get a black mark.. more black marks and you lose ranking points).. Don't worry though mark your sites not doing anything too bad (although don't go googling SEO and fall in the "Click here for 50 links" etc trap as these can blacklist your domain and you will need a serious pro to get it back) and if the chap changes the bits I've suggested it will help it

Hi Mark, Looks good. Comes across as very professional and very personal too. I'm not sure if you are concerned about SEO Search engine optimisation. If you are then you need to a bit of work. There's lots to SEO although a few simple bits will do a lot of help: For your page titles, Explain what you do... so something like "MBA Marine | Servicing | Fit out | Boat Safety Work | two or three more ect" (Don't repeat marine as it's not needed.. maybe include "boat" though) For your keywords (meta name="keywords" do similar (Here's my clubs one <meta name="keywords" content="My Yacht Club, Mooring, Learn to Sail, Hardstanding, Sailing, RYA Training, Boats for sale, Kent" />). For your page description, you want it short and sweet probably "MBA Marine. A quality friendly mobile service, for all boat maintenance and repair in Norfolk". So do similar on each of your pages. Also on your front page.. you need to grow your text on there at least 3x that amount and include as many words of what you provide as posible. (Use your services page to expand on this.. (if you get me, feel free to pm if not). You also need to add protection to your contact form as it's open to hacking and spamming so put "recapture" on it at least. or a question like "what colour is the sky".. (You ideally should have a address too for legal reasons). Hope you don't take these as negatives.. I can find issues in every website I look at

Mum were have you been? The guys in the hermitage retired and the tapas owners moved there.. Probably a good move for the tapas as I bet the overheads were too much in the other place.. Good news on berney and the nelson. The nelson was a good pub, it will be good to get back in there. One day my harvester restaurant idea will take on stacey..!

Hi Andy, You can get a rubber tank sealer which is used in classic cars (and aviation I think): http://www.frost.co.uk/por15-fuel-tank-sealers.html This one states petrol tanks so I assume diesel will be ok (although you may want to check). But as above, it maybe wiser and easier to replace the tank. We brought our new tank yesterday for just shy of £100 for an 80 litres plastic tank so they aren't overly expensive. I do have a little collection of tanks in the garage which need to go I think theres a brand new 100litre and you can grab for like £60. (I've got a stainless (120l i think) which you can have but it could so with the seams welding up as whoever made it couldn't weld). Message me if interested.

Dear Mr Gracie.. I think Grace spent £99.99 on some shoes? That's along way to a week in norfolk... We had a really really long day today but we need to but we both have man flu to so it's been even harder.. Geez I am absolutely exhausted. Started early with a visit to the chandlers for parts, we didn't quite get all we needed but didn't do too bad. Back to the boat for just gone 10. I quickly mounted the pullpit flagstaff for the burgie. I then installed (in the wind) the boats name and "Rochester" on the stern, it wasn't too bad. I can't take a picture as its not meant to be named until next weekend. I cut a hole in the door for some low vents which the BSC chap advised but annoyingly we had no screws small enough so I couldn't finish it off I put the last timber plugs in the table mount in the dining area. I also mounted the last timber trims. I installed the handles for on the kitchen doors (it was painful! Stupid measurements nothing was a decent calculation). Finally I also completely tidied up inside so it's now all clean (as hopefully it will stay) I also had a good hover inside and varnished all the last bits of triming, bathroom door and table top. I also started to carpeting the bottom of the table and the "v" berth insert. Whilst I was doing this Dave did hardly nothing... He did another good job and changing the "failed" fuel hoses on the engine, thankfully the fittings on the engine where all reuseable once the old pipe was removed. He changed the fuel filter whilst he was there, He bleed the air out and test fired the engine and all good. He also finished off the lock on the bathroom door and made up and installed the cover on the bottom of the dashboard. Installed the flagpole socket on the stern. Then tided up the wheelhouse which took a bit of time as it was a mess! But at least she's all ready for her naming event next weekend (Shame we didn't get a bit more done but too late!).. I'll post a ton of pictures for next weekend

Lol like it paul!! Dave does keep on moaning that his yard shoes leak but boat comes first lol! Thanks Dad, he will only retest what failed so it will pass without any probs once these bits are sorted. Grace, we don't have time to hang around! Need it done but he did do very well to get it sorted in a few hours even at our pace.. it was unusual that things actually fitted that easily though?! maybe the boats getting bored? I'll let dad get mums fenders lol my birthdays after so I darent upset them ! I can't believe you don't trust us all and tell us how much today's shopping costs, it's not like your hubby is going to be reading this boring post? Less than a hundred??

Thanks for your messages all.. all very kind To be honest we aren't overly disappointed we noticed the potential tank problems last weekend but hoped he wouldnt lol! Unfortunately it was too late last sunday to address it This is the first boat we've had to do to met BSC standards (having sea boats before) so to only fail on three things isn't too sad really and we didn't look too close at the engine as it's all vetus parts (so does mean vetus parts aren't up to spec!!). It would have been nice to pass first time but this chap was certainly very attentive so little chance! But we can't moan as I'm sure everyone has noticed we are very safety aware and we prefer to exceed any standards so it's all positive that he's flagged these. But yup we could have done a lot worse (The examiner even mentioned that has issued pages of warnings so he agreed we did alright ). Ok so todays blog: We got over the boat for about 7.30 as the examiner was due for 9am and he asked for full access to the engine bay (which has been full of tools!). Unfortunately it snowed here at 9am so he was a bit late but we managed to get the doors on the kitchen whilst waiting and he turned up just as we was about to put the handles on.. But pic attached the kitchen looks good! So as above the bsc took a few hours and he kept us there to ask questions/grill us! After the BSC we grabbed some lunch then decided to go over to the chandlers on canvey island in essex (a good 2 hour round trip) but I called through and they confirmed they had a tank.. so we got a new tank (and some other bits! (Kid in a candy shop! Bit like grace in a shoe shop I guess?!). Back to the boat for 4pm and dave did a good job at swapping the tanks over in 3 and a bit hours! so the new tank is all in! We/he will try and replace the hoses on the engine tomorrow and I'll get a metal version of the hose ordered so it's here for monday/tuesday and we can get him to come back and do the certificate later in the week,