JennyMorgan

https://mailchi.mp/e8c50b91e738/broads-briefing-may?e=259d8798cf

Intimidate fitting? Tell us more!

Wherry on the Waveney 1935

Ray, seriously, do you really need a bow thruster on a 25ft boat? Useful single handed, I'll grant you that but otherwise maybe not. A boat hook is a far cheaper alternative! Re painting the hull, I do mine when it looks tatty. I use Whithams flexible marine white, lot cheaper than International (what isn't) and it remains white. I apply it with small, foam roller, I can do a 28 footer in less than half an hour per side and it looks really good. One advantage of a roller is that if I do get scruffed then I can patch the paintwork & unlike using a brush you'll be very hard pushed to see where I have made good. Two pot is probably more durable but its far harder to maintain & touch up.

By now, Ray, I suspect you realise that such events should not be taken too seriously! Good to see that MTB 102 has stowed her unused fend-offs, an example to us all!!

Torpedo tubes are not unknown on The Broads!!

It is recommended that boaters make use of hand-signals. There are times when I excecute this one with great feeling and satisfaction! Probably doesn't help but it allows me to let off steam!

Funnily enough comments on that topic have been disabled! I wonder why? You might have thought that Tingdene would have been pleased to know the truth, save them getting it wrong in the future. No helping some folk!

Is that one the of the cow pat variety?

Hemsby moving forward to the 1950's, that's a step in the right direction, might eventually make the 21st century!!

There are thousands of increasingly aged boats on the Broads relying on by now archaic technology, it is they that worry me.

I have to say that I don't know who or what to believe. What I do know is that on a quiet evening that the exhaust fumes that lie on the water, contained there by the reeds and river bank, can be quite unpleasent for those of us in low freeboard open boats. As far as inland waterways are concerned I really do believe that Londonlads's first comment, I think the marine industry will have to catch up, is right.

Just had this circular from my insurers: The MOT test is about to get tougher than ever – especially for diesel cars – as the UK comes in line with a European Union directive called the EU Roadworthiness package. If you drive a diesel car, pay close attention - the biggest changes to the MOT test since it was first introduced in 1960 will see stringent new checks on cars fitted with diesel particulate filters (DPF). From 20 May 2018, as a result of stricter emissions controls, any diesel car that is seen to be emitting “visible smoke of any colour” will fail the test. Testers will also be checking if the DPF on your car has been removed or tampered with. Unless there is a “legitimate” explanation for this, testers are required to refuse to test the car. Could similar, indeed should similar be applied to boats? Anyone who rows or canoes on the Broads will be aware of the unburnt off exhaust that can be created by slow running diesels. That aside how long before the environmental lobby picks up on this one? Is it an issue that has been brushed under the carpet for far too long?

In fairness to WRC their costs for disposing of chemically treated boat effluent are in themselves high, their not being on the mains system. Their pump-out itself has to be pumped out.

I can see the 'old' then going out as far as the new, awful! The presently vacant moorings may well be the result of the ongoing round of fee increases.

Sailing boats don't go straight down the middle, nor do motor boats when the speedboats are out. Re mud weighters in the North Bay, maybe I should prime my cannon!!

Agreed that the bankside habitat is undisturbed, at least on paper, but I suggest that it will pretty soon become devoid of wildlife and inevitably lost as detritus accumulates between the pontoons and the reedbed. That aside it will be lost from view, urban creep, it has to stop, surely.

A clear picture showing the footprint of the proposed marina and its relation to existing Broads use.

Very realistic appreciation of the situation, Chris. Whilst the Broads is not an NP it does have much of the same protection. As far as a marina at Oulton Broad is concerned I don't suppose there would be much objection had the proposal been to flood an area behind the current river wall however Oulton Broad is now surrounded by either expensive residential land or nature reserves. That said there is an area called The Dead End which could be made use of and once again I don't think that there would be much objection. Regretfully the proposal is largely out in open water. I do wonder what the reaction would be if proposal had been on Barton Broad for example.

Rather think that the industry has itself to blame. Too many boats built to attract lottery winners rather than us mere enthusiasts and dreamers.

He was, hugely so, it was his hobby!

It is largely on an undeveloped, unspoilt site, right next door to a nationally important wet-land nature reserve, right next door to if not actually on a triple SI & Ramsar site, in the Oulton Broad conservation area, at odds with the local planning policy and it sticks at least thirty meters out into the Broad, really nothing of any significance!

Hardly surprising, indeed what is surprising is that the London Boat Show survived as long as it has.

https://planning.broads-authority.gov.uk/online-applications/applicationDetails.do?activeTab=externalDocuments&keyVal=P7IPUTTBH0B00 Take a peep at the site map, arghhhhhhh!

But how come people sail past and don't see it?