Vaughan

I am afraid I have been waiting for this to happen ever since the crisis started and I am only surprised it didn't surface earlier. I will also not be surprised to see it get far worse once mass unemployment and deep recession start to take hold in the months to come. Remember Extinction Rebellion? They are still there you know - they haven't gone away, they are just waiting for the next excuse for their innate and blind hatred of any authority to break out again. Coronavirus and (whatever) government reaction to it will now be the latest excuse. A bit like a fire in moorland peat : it is always there smouldering under the surface and you can't put it out. The breakdown of law and order, down the ages, is always hard to understand but is usually based on hatred of authority. This is not helped when there is also a serious breakdown in respect for police behaviour towards the public. The police have done themselves no favours at all in the early days of this crisis and in London this weekend, it showed! I understand the wish to involve the Army but we should remember that their role in this is called Assistance to the Civil Power. The civil power remains the police, at all times. When we see soldiers on the streets of our mainland cities (and I think we will before long) it will be a mark of a shameful failure on the part of all concerned : the government, the police and above all, the general public itself. Such an escalation also carries a great risk. If a situation boils over and gets out of control, it can end up being carved on the hearts of the terrorist element, for all time, as "Bloody Sunday".

That looks quite normal, believe it or not! Not sure of the location but it looks like the village of Gardouch, between Castelnaudary and Toulouse, where there is a community of several houseboat barges.

This is in Trebes on the Canal du Midi after the drastic floods which hit the area. The Le Boat base is on the other side of the canal and this boat broke loose and ended up in the car park when the water went down. Another of their boats ended up on top of the lock gates about 500 yards further down. We were in Norfolk at the time but when we got back the whole area was devastated. We could only approach our village by road from one direction. Everything else was cut off. This base has now been closed by Le Boat but I don't know whether that was the floods, or other reasons of economy!

Actually there is a story behind those guns. They were left to my father in the will of a great friend of his in Coastal Forces who was killed in action in the North Sea, off the Frisian coast. They were by Henry Atkin, who was one of Purdeys' senior gunmakers before the war. They were not a "matched pair" as they had been made specially for grouse shooting. The No 1 gun had plain barrels, for taking birds as they flew toward the hides. You then swopped the guns with the loader and the No 2 had both barrels with 3/4 choke, to take birds at a distance as they flew over. Father always used the No 2 gun as it was great for taking high pheasants on Norfolk shoots but he liked the No 1 gun for duck shooting, which is much closer. We sold them when he got into old age but they weren't worth a lot. They were very well used by then, although the No 1 gun had been re-sleeved by Darlows in Norwich. It seemed that they weren't "collectable" as the barrels were 3 inches too long (so it seemed) and they were not nitro proofed. They were still only black powder proofed, after all those years that my father had used them! They were lovely guns though, and I used them myself in later years.

Don't forget we have all had to watch parliament stagger lamely through 3 years of Brexit (which is no-where near over) and now we have to watch them staggering through this. I wonder what the next problem for them will be? Bankruptcy, perhaps.

I remember many years ago when we had a small incident of a drunken prowler who had found his way over the railway bridge onto the island and my father, having disturbed him, allowed him to spend the night on one of the hire boats before clearing off in the morning. For a little while afterwards, he kept one of his Purdeys loaded in the bedroom. This worried my mother far more than anyone else as she knew very well he would not hesitate to use it!

If this turns out to be the same as I have read on Le Boat's website, then shore toilets and showers on the bases will be closed to the public to maintain hygiene. Very sensible I am sure, but not good news for attracting those who wish to hire a day launch.

Snap! I still have my very well thumbed copy of Burtons Nautical tables. It's worth a quick glance at the table of contents : Taking a sun sight with a sextant, all set up ready, takes less than 30 seconds. Doing the calculations with a slide rule and these tables, to come up with a position in latitude and longitude in degrees, minutes and seconds; takes at least 40 minutes.

In view of the post from Tom (Broads Authority) on another thread, I think my suspicion is confirmed! I suppose I shouldn't comment, as most members of this forum will know that the Thwaites family are among my old and dear friends. All the same, I can't help laughing!

Excuse me but I think I am starting to lose the plot - again! So where are all these day boat customers suddenly going to spring from? Surely the average day tripper in a launch is going to come from two main sources : 1/. They are staying in holiday accommodation in the area, such as cottages or chalet parks or houseboats. Sorry, not allowed! 2/. They have arrived in a day trip coach party. Worth noting that one of the main players - Shearings - has already gone bust. So are we expecting people to set out in their car for the day to spend 4 hours or less on the river, when there are none of the usual facilities such as pubs, restaurants or even public toilets? It is suggested that this will get a bit of cash flow going but I doubt, at the moment, with all the extra cleaning and distancing palaver involved, whether 50 odd Quidsworth of launch hire is going to cover the staff and turnround costs. I suppose we shall see. I also wonder why they are not starting until Monday when the legislation appears to be valid from 1st June. Or are there still some more boxes to be ticked? Meantime boat owners are left with a ridiculous situation. We can travel to our boat; we can work on our boat; we can go out on the river on our boat, but for some inexplicable reason we can't spend the night on it. I don't pretend to be a medical man but I cannot think of a single reason why that would pose an additional risk of anything.

As I did read it, I am pleased to see that they are carrying out what appears to be serious maintenance with an eye to the future and have specifically mentioned the passage of vessels. The risk was that they were going to just give up on them, and weld them shut!

That looks positive for the future.

Don't ask me, I'm only "reading what it says here"! I don't even know if they will have enough staff left to make this new operation work. Their management are famous for cutting down on staff as they think that a boatyard can be run off a computer screen, somewhere in America. We shall see!

That is a very good question. Except that it is what they used to say about the AIDS test.

A quick report from your overseas correspondent, which may, or may not, be encouraging! In France an enormous amount of bulk cargo is still carried by water and so commercial waterways have remained open throughout. Other waterways for pleasure only, such as the Canal du Midi, re-opened their locks on 28th May although the canals themselves have been open, for the hundreds of people who live on boats in towns and villages. Most waterways also play a large role in water supply, farmland irrigation and electricity generation. An article in this month's "Fluvial" magazine says that the tourist industry is still awaiting a date from the government for the start of boat hiring, although today (2nd June) all bars, restaurants and hotels are open and travel is unrestricted within the country. It is not clear whether holiday homes and B&B can be visited but campsites and "holiday colonies" are now open. There are still a lot of conditions applied to businesses, which mainly involve social distancing. Of the hire boat companies, "Les Canalous" which is a marketing co-operative of small businesses, similar to a mini Blakes, don't seem to say whether they are open or not! They just say you can change your booking date free of charge. Locaboat, on their website, say they are now open but we drove past their main base here on Sunday and they looked well closed to me! They have removed the boom across their basin since last week and someone has now put a flag up but that is about it. Le Boat are saying that they estimate opening in France on June 15th and on the Thames on 12th June. They also have several pages about their precautions on the bases. It seems you will be required to do almost all of the reception procedure on line before you arrive, including proving that you have watched no less than 7 videos on their site. They say that boats will be thoroughly cleaned and disinfected; linen will be on board but beds not made; only one person from each party allowed in reception and arrivals staggered by informing the base beforehand of your exact arrival time. The trial run will be given to the skipper and one crew only while the rest of the party stay on the bank. They accept that a trial run cannot be given outside of the social distance and so the instructor and the clients are obliged to wear masks. The instructor will wear gloves and sanitise anything he touches. They also say that if a case of COVID is reported on a boat it will be taken out of service for at least 72 hours. Typically of Le Boat, it looks as though there will be even more box ticking and signing of disclaimers than usual. So a lot of this still seems to be driven by social distancing. I may be quoting these figures out of context but I can't help noticing that total COVID deaths in France, as quoted yesterday, are just over 28,000. In the UK I believe they are said to be around 40,000. The social distance in the UK is 2 metres. In France it is one metre. I can't help thinking of that line from the famous song by Dire Straits : Two men say they're Jesus : one of them must be wrong.

The French word for hiring is location, so "Locaboat" is quite a clever pun. They are the only real French boatbuilders and hirers who started off in the late 70s with their classic boats called Penichettes, designed to look like mini versions of the French canal barge, or peniche. They still run these old boats and they are very suitable for the canals. Very popular with their regular French customers, who hire every year at Easter, or in October. They also have a few boats on the Canal du Midi called Europa. These are the Crown Crusader hull and superstructure modified with an aft bathing platform and fitted out by Haines to a specification by Keith Gregory. Hydraulic drive off a Nanni turbo with hydraulic bow thruster, shore power, satellite TV and a Kabola hot water and heating system. So you have a British design, Broads built and run by a very reputable French company. Those, I can recommend.

But that does not include mooring the car to the bank, fitting lifejackets or crowding into the same little toilet and shower compartment to show everyone how all the buttons work! Nor does it include standing close enough to the helmsman so that you can take over the controls when all else fails!

That is not the same thing in my view. A test drive in a car assumes you have a driving licence. A trial run on a hire boat is driving instruction to the inexperienced and it is very "hands on".

I hesitate to "like" that Poppy, out of courtesy but it may well apply in a lot of ways. By the way, my opinion of the NSBA also applies to the Broads Society these days.

I think Marshman's point is most valid regarding tourism but so is yours! This is the conundrum. I have been wondering, if I were still working, how would I be able to give a "trial run" to customers on a hire boat and stay within all these rules. I don't see how I could.

I am afraid a lot of us feel these days that they are not worth mentioning. The support that we might have relied on over other very important issues concerning navigation on the Broads has not been forthcoming in recent years.

As it is a quiet Sunday morning I have been having another look at this photo. The roof over the front cabin where the mast is stepped is clearly the coach roof. The area with the larger window forms more of a cuddy, which shields the cockpit and the main companionway into the cabin, from the weather. So this could probably be called a coach house roof. So now, having imparted that little gem of maritime memorabilia for your delectation I will go away and get on with some railway modelling. By the way, I like the little "arsesprit" which supports the standing backstay!

When I see in the papers the enormous crowds on beaches all over the British coastline this weekend I hardly think a cabin cruiser moored overnight at Paddy's Lane is going to change anything but that's just my opinion of course. Maybe this is a "public duty" for what Stumpy has called - on another thread - "blazered buffers in well polished Freemans"? I am only joking of course, as I would hate to see this forum go down that route and we must be careful that we don't!

In which case, to get yourself "bedded in" to a new area for your operation, I suggest the Prince of Wales Rd in Norwich, in the early hours of a Saturday or Sunday morning, when the night clubs turn out. Nothing to do with the Broads of course but responsible for a very large part of your overall average drowning statistics. And if you want to distribute leaflets around there, wear plenty of PPE!

You forgot the stepladder and the wheelbarrow.