vanessan

Lovely! what a nice way to tell your tale.

I like curtains, particularly in the cooler months. Makes it cosy. Apart from the height of summer (if anyone can remember what a good summer was like!), I like the sunshine being able to warm the interior of the boat too.

I was awful at school in my teens, although expected to achieve a number of GCEs I left with one - cookery! My grandmother persuaded me to apply for a job in a bank but I told her I didn’t want to ‘work in a stuffy old bank’! However, I applied and 35 years later was extremely fortunate to be able to retire early. I did a few voluntary jobs until my OH retired and we bought our boat. During my time in the ‘stuffy old bank’, I saw many undergraduates come and go. Many were brilliant and certainly must have gone on to exhilarating careers. There were, however, quite a number who were excellent at learning and passing exams but incredibly poor at people skills and putting any knowledge to practical use. Banking of course has now changed beyond recognition and in this computer age maybe much more suitable to those with degrees etc. (I’m glad I’m not in ‘banking’ these days, that’s for sure!)

I believe the Radio Norfolk piece stated that the boat had too many on board. I wonder if this is an incident the MAIB will become involved with.

Exactly!

EDP on the ball as usual then!

Or it began sinking whilst en route…….

Yes please, nothing like first hand experiences.

Are you quite sure about that?

That’s a habit of ours too. The first 30 seconds or so of water is used to swab the deck down around the filler cap, before the cap is removed of course!

You then have to take the risk that you may not be near a water point when you need to fill up. Unfortunately water points can be few and far between, especially on the southern rivers.

You need a security guard for that! 😁

Dropped over the fence maybe? 😉

I can tell when our water tank is full by a wardrobe door closing automatically! When it is way down, the wardrobe door stays open.

I think you’ve summed it up quite well there. Having one of the much maligned bathtubs, it is only in very extreme conditions that we have a worry with bridges. We don’t even have to think about transiting at low water very often either and we use the whole Broads system regularly. (Our boat was chosen to take into account our advancing years 😩 and the ability to get dogs on and off relatively easily.) Probably the most practical boat, imho, is the centre cockpit giving views across the reeds etc and the opportunity to drop the canopy for low bridges. There will always be a compromise but it’s well worth taking the time to really think about what is important to you, as you do seem to be doing.

When you live on one, you do need a second for the ‘jollies’, right Colin? 😉

The BA tide tables quote predicted heights relating to Yarmouth Bar. If you look down the tables at the heights given for high and low water times, it is very easy to see when the highest and lowest tides are occurring. Many of us mere mortals are unable to judge weather conditions, pressure etc along with these details so rely on tide times/heights alone. If the water is high at Yarmouth Bar, then it will be high further up the system, just not as much. (I find them useful in deciding whether or not to stop at Berney Arms or Burgh Castle for any length of time, neaps provide easier moorings.)

But there is a shortage of bottles too! (According to Calor anyway.)

Just seen Meantime’s post, apologies.

I think it refers to that end mooring which is controversial in itself! A lot more information on this on t’other side.

Jet garage in Wroxham has a tanker on the forecourt…….

Water and electric available at the BA moorings.

We use a collection of tide tables, the BA booklet, the Norfolk-Broads.org tables and the Aweigh app. They’re never more than half an hour apart. The BA booklet is particularly useful for tide rise and fall information, if you know whether it’s spring tides or neaps you have a pretty good idea of bridge heights across the system (and mooring possibilities on the southern rivers too!).

Think they’re talking about upstream of the security gates John. Must admit I’ve always assumed all the moorings along that stretch are run by the BA. (They did in fact go a little further at one time, almost to the bridge I seem to remember.)

It was there last week.