grendel

I think its a London thing.....

a few more pictures I took of Albion. and the posh ducks just past potter bridge have ducklings

We too passed Albion on Monday, when we headed for Potter Heigham (this taken from the timelapse camera I was running). Polly pulled up just short of Herbert Woods yard to demast, I carried on to the pilots to moor up

Polly took me sailing to Horsey Mill, which is looking good now, renovation work is ongoing

Baby BA (model #1 ) made an appearance

Various presentations were made at the meet, the platter to the indy team, an a forum idiot certificate was also handed out, live music was provided in the evening

I too had ducks sitting on the boat, these were quite happy to let me get within a foot of them as long as there was a window in the way. I did make some rolls, but they didnt rise as well as they should, so were very hard and heavy.

yes when I picked it up the table was stored upside down on the seat, if the table is set up on its feet, theres not a great deal of space to get round it to the galley.

right at home, photos downloaded off of the camera so here we go firstly pictures of the boat - there were not many out there that I could find, so I took some. I have to say that on Janet 3 storage is not a problem, there are little cupboards everywhere, and drawers under all of the seating / bedding. there is quite a large storage space opposite the toilet area, this would happily accept several suitcases. the fridge was plugged in as I left and ran continuously, it had a small freezer compartment that kept my frozen sausages frozen all weekend. in the rear section there is a slightly tapered permanent double and there is a seat in the front section that makes up into a double with the back cushions

this is what I still do, I do have an ancient tom tom satnav, 99% of the time its turned off, I look at the map (either paper or google) memorise the major route - eg M2 - M25- M11- A11- A46, then the last section is either from memory (if I have been before) or I turn the satnav on to get me to the desired address - though at times I will just print the street map from google. that is not an uncommon accident on roundabouts where people get into the wrong lane and try and continue round in the outside lane, I have had a close shave where I was in exactly the same situation, turning right on a roundabout indicating to turn left onto the outer of a two lane exit, when I noticed the car outside me had started indicating right and was trying to cut across me. fortunately I was alert and always assume every other road user is out to get me and just hit the anchors and let him go. Unfortunately there are people who will religiously do what the satnav tells them some of whom have driven their cars into a river because it told them to, common sense seems to be lacking there.

a belated as I have only just arrived home after the spring meet.

Well I have to say, after my first solo hire I am now not as concerned as I was of my abilities to moor up on my own and handle the boat, prior to this I had only ever hired one other time, and had a few short goes at helming Broad Ambition. I must thank Griff for all of the pointers he gave me while I was doing that, as they stood me in good stead for this solo adventure. Martham boats were confident that the experience I had above was all that was necessary and just pushed me off and said they would see me at Potter bridge, I guess if you make it to the bridge you must be competent. my very first solo side on mooring was at the bridge pilots mooring yesterday, and I turned and reversed into the mooring without too many problems, certainly an experience I am now confident enough to want to do again. Janet 3 is a great boat to helm, though the engine only runs quietly at a shade over 5 mph, the rest of the time its a noisy klunking monster, but great fun, steering is really positive and a light touch is all that is needed for most normal cornering. the centre cockpit makes for easy mooring ( I saw the original Boat Jayne in the water, and although smaller, the forward helm position and rear door might make side on mooring a bit trickier.

sorry my post above never made it out yesterday, as I lost my internet connection. Today started at about 8am heading for potter heigham, in company with Polly in Lydia. we went through the bridge, and then motored up to moor up just past Martham boats and round the corner (candle dyke). then I decamped from Janet 3 and aboard Lydia, we then sailed up hickling nearly to the pub,then turned round and sailed to Horsey Mill and then back to the moorings. I was handling the tiller and sheets at various times, and thoroughly enjoyed it. it is something that I have wanted to do since I first read Swallows and Amazons as a boy, I have a multitude of thanks to go to Pauline and Phil for that pleasure.

Well this morning before too many people left it was time to get baby BA out and take her for a spin around the broad (well our bit of it) mid morning and it was time to do something, the water needed heating and i needed to move to top up the water tank, so Off I toddled at tickover up to wroxham, did a u turn and came back via a short diversion into wroxham broad. moored back up nearer the water point, and then spent the afternoon chatting with Polly, and having another play with the model - this time I was sailing for over an hour, getting appreciative comments from passers by and chasing boats. the rest of the afternoon and evening was spent chatting and drinking coffee with the other forum members still here (Polly, Cambridge cabby and Springsong) The mist dropped even earlier this evening than yesterday, so it was getting colder, so there was a general retirement to boats to warm up (and get on the forum)

well an evening with Bob provided the entertainment, and were very good. although it did get a bit chilly as the evening wore on there was a good audience and I think I can say a good time was being had by all. awoke this morning early to a misty Salhouse, I am just relaxing with a cup of coffee, and about to cook myself a nice breakfast.

After setting out at 6am this morning and breezing up to Martham in just 4 hours including calling into Lathams and buying half the shop (whats new there). I arrived at Martham |Boats early - 10 am, I had said I would be there at 11.30. This wasnt a problem, they had already emailed me yesterday to say the boat was ready. so I loaded up and by about 11am, I had had the checklist, been cast adrift and told they would meet me at potter bridge., I arrived and although the board read less than 6 foot (I had been told the airdraft was 6 foot 2") we went under with about an inch to spare. then I had a nice slow pootle down the river, turned left at the junction and up to Ranworth. ( I have no idea how fast I am going, there is no mod cons on this boat, that might give a clue - not even a rev counter) by 12.30 I am just off Ranworth, I say to myself, I wonder if the cruise in company have left yet, take a left turn to find myself bearing down upon the Cin C, a quick U turn and back on the main river, then hang around for the fleet, another u turn and i am now heading for the back of the queue, I do another quick about face and join the back of the fleet, only to find Nipper tucked in behind me. a nice slow cruise up river to Salhouse followed, finally arriving and all getting berthed up stern on. So far we have had a quiz, (won by the team containing myself and Polly) and a bottle auction that raised over £240 for the RNLI, just about to head for the music and entertainment (when my bread rolls come out of the oven)

the roof beam formed in the tighter jig was perfect, just got the rest of the set to do now, this wont be until next week as I am checking everything is packed and ready for the weekend, just the cold food to be packed in a couple of lunch box cooler bags tomorrow.

arrived home - getting stuff ready for an early start, Martham have emailed to say the boat is already ready and I can turn up early if I wish, planning to arrive 11am-11.30am ish.

remind me to get a tennis bat that says 'Missed'

I want one! I want 21 (for a 21 gun salute occifer- honest)

I think 50sqm would be better, as during the day the boats would possibly be consuming the whole 5kW, thus nothing going into storage for use in the hours of darkness. the storage would have to be sufficient to allow that 5kW over say 12 hours, so 60kWh, thats about 3 tesla powerwall panels of storage capacity, for a 5 berth mooring. as they will be generating their own energy, they may be able to price it to recover the installation costs, at £5500 per powerwall, thats £16500, plus the costs of the solar panels and installation.

finally I see a use for all those new solar farms springing up, they could be placed in a field adjacent to the mooring to power the electricity posts - the only problem - most people will want to use the posts at night, so a reliable power bank would be required that could store the megawatts generated to the day for release at night. while we do have high capacity power banks available, I dont know that any are considered reliable enough yet. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grid_energy_storage

You will never get a decent range on that, the position of the hole is stopping it getting to full elevation

Simon, if your car is only doing 1000 miles a year, its hardly a great polluter if you split it down to daily pollution, I know mine runs clean from the emissions test of the last MOT, but it still probably pollutes more in the 33,000 miles I do a year in it than yours does in the same year, that said its the people who just drive short trips in their car that are the worst polluters as the car never gets properly warmed up to keep the engine clean, whether petrol or diesel, those people would benefit from electric vehicles, I have yet to find a reasonably priced electric vehicle that could do my 124 mile daily commute on one charge (unless I could persuade work to fit a charging point in the car park). (added to that the electricity network at home would probably not support a fast charger for an electric vehicle, we only have 64A cutouts and the mains cable is not really big enough to support the 14 houses it feeds as it is).

here I am stuck in work today, so I will be thinking of all of you that are starting today, and I will be heading up bright and early (after 6am as the roadworks have the M2 closed until then) and off to pick up Janet 3 from Martham boats, from where I will see you tomorrow afternoon.