JennyMorgan

Being a long time regular Lidl customer when I now visit other supermarkets I cringe at their prices so a Lidl in Beccles would suit me well.

Don't worry, John, like a Gt Yarmouth lady's drawers, quickly and easily lowered!

The obvious answer to the ideal Broads boat that will go under all the bridges:

I can't knock the Beko products that we have had but there are better designed alternatives out there. When our Beko washing machine and tumble dryer both expired after about ten years we did switch manufacturers and am glad that we did. Beko products are well priced and the service from our local Beko supplier is first rate but having made the switch I am glad that we did.

The address problem is very real. I won't go into any great details but at one location my daughter had her mail tampered with by a 'petty official' and the subsequent problems were really out of order.

Something about a well tasty power boat! https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=i&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwicjay714fXAhVLIsAKHa3RAhsQjRwIBw&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.pinterest.com%2Fpin%2F359373245239084240%2F&psig=AOvVaw2R9BVOG3ShWp7ilx6LvoGF&ust=1508880307209351

You might well be right!

Move onto a boat and what do you do with all the junk? Well, spread it amongst friends and relatives for the duration.

Pretty good steel work too! Thanks for posting, don't worry about the brick-bats!

Pictures please!

Waving is a deterant to utter boredom! I mean, what else is there to do as you chunter along at five miles per hour between miles of reeds? Yes, I do wave, unless it's one of those boats with black windows and I can't see anyone in the cockpit!

From Gorleston Coastguard today: No casualties, apparently the boats will be towed off at high water tonight.

Kevin, the cynic in me suggests that whilst the Authority must be mindful of corporate liabilities it also spends about 50% of our tolls on non navigational expenditure. In other words the more it spends on providing mooring posts, deck ruining crushed concrete and other fripperies then the more it can demand. The more it gets via our tolls then the bigger that 50% is, a simple but obvious equation in my opinion, a cunning plan!!

The BA took on the Lock, and Breydon, at the height of J.P's empire building, at the same time that I was on the Nav Com. It may well be that ABP 'encouraged'JP but I have no doubt that he gleefully grabbed the opportunity! Don't forget that it would take an Act of Parliament to close the Lock and ABP, being a 'harbour authority' would have been duty bound to maintain the Lock and would only be able to make a 'reasonable charge' for its use, exactly the same as for the Authority. As for ABP, I believe that all they did was to ask for a contribution, understandably so, but it was JP who escalated the deal into the BA taking over the Lock.

A word of advice, find the right boat, obvious really, but be wary of ones subsequently bodged by obsessive DIYers and especially those subject to open planning by out of control house builders who know it all. There are more than a few ruined boats on the Broads, casualties of such ignorance.

http://www.thebroadsblog.co.uk/2017/10/planning-to-live-aboard.html

Does a £444.99 AW toll cover just 120 miles of waterway with just one lock?

No buoyancy? Re pensions, my state pension allegedly keeps up with inflation, my occupational pension certainly doesn't! Over the last ten years tolls have, in many cases doubled, have state pensions also doubled?

It's probably blowing F5 to F6 with a few gusts topping F7 on Oulton Broad right now. Nothing exceptional but neither is it pleasant, unless you are out there windsurfing. 30 mph for a windsurfer is not uncommon but there is one bloke out there and he must be topping 40 mph in some of the prolonged gusts. A slab sided, newer style bath tub came very cautiously onto the Broad, with the wind on his beam. Had he given his engine some wellie then I doubt that he would have had a problem but he was throttled back and the wind took took over and he lost effective steerage, his bow swinging away from the wind as he headed towards where I was fishing and several moored boats, whhoopps, I could see an accident in the offing. Thankfully another gust hit his stern and further round she went, broaching before the wind and a prang was avoided but more by luck than judgement. I rather suspect that he was in awe of both the white horses and the windsurfers as he departed Oulton Broad with much haste. Full throttle now he steered perfectly well, as he could have done when he first came onto the Broad. Sometimes slowly is not the best policy! He lost control, blaming the wind I suspect, but all that was needed was confidence. Easy to say, sat there fishing!

What various other public service CEOs are paid is largely irrelevant. Some are grossly overpaid, maybe some are not. What does matter is whether their salary offers value for money to what are effectively their customers. There is a ridiculous situation where the more folk a CEO employs then the more that that CEO is paid, hence the number of non or unnecessary jobs in the public sector. The police are under considerable pressure to reduce their costs, it is about time that similar pressure was applied to such as the Broads Authority. The duplication of planning services in the Broads area should be an immediate casualty, for example.

Higher order, logic, reason . . . . . . . . surely not all hirers are male!

Or a certain quango CEO, grrrrrrr.

Yes, it is, but wisely, in my opinion, the BA is making a stand against what they consider to be excessive demands. However, please don't think it's just down to money, you never know, there might be other factors involved !

If there is a handy pub then that has to be best advice!

The chronic shortage of moorings is not down to the Authority and subsequently the tollpayer, it's down to the industry itself. The industry relies on selling off ex hire boats in order to finance their new-build programs. Those ex hire boats, now private, then need moorings and all to often those will be in ex hire yards, the hireboats from which have been moved into centralised locations that will largely be empty during the week. There is a very strong case for upping the tolls multiplier for the hire fleets as a means of increasing the casual mooring stock, in my honest opinion. As for a 3% increase, it's to be expected, however I feel very strongly that the recent toll review itself urgently needs reviewing. A 'little birdy within' tells me that the good Doctor is in damage limitation mode so perhaps we should be grateful that the proposed rise is only 3%. Anything more really would be unacceptable.