Vaughan

I know they are a bit older nowadays, but the classic Bounty (Solar) 37 or 44 adapts itself very well for people who have to use wheelchairs. The double front doors give access to the front well for sitting outside and the saloon is very spacious, usually having a fold away or slide away double berth, very convenient for use by the handicapped. These boats can be moored bow on to the quay just as easily as stern on, for easy access to the bank over the foredeck. Getting on board depends on the actual severity of the handicap but assuming the person has help, then access should be practical in this way. If not, you are looking at fitting a hydraulic ramp, which can be done over the aft deck, into the aft cabin, which connects to the rest of the boat via a corridor which can easily be widened. The boat already has hydraulic drive, which can be used to power the ramp. These boats can also be easily driven by someone sitting in a wheelchair. During my career I have welcomed probably hundreds of handicapped customers onto boats of this design and they have all had a good holiday!

If I hadn't seen this with my own eyes, I wouldn't have believed it! This is on the Canal du Midi at Puicheric, and it is a self propelled dredger. The two sections are probably watertight but obviously not buoyant, as it simply walks along the bottom of the canal doing dredging or bank work, attended by a barge to take the spoil away. When they have finished, they just drive it up onto the bank, on caterpillar tracks. I imagine the whole thing comes apart in two halves, and can then be transported on low loaders. Maybe I shall find out in the next few days! The bottom of the canal is all firm ground at exactly the same depth, so perfect for an idea like this. I am not sure it would be much use on Barton Broad, though!

I just don't see this (or several other aspects) as joined up thinking. People don't seem to understand that, just because you have had the jab, it only protects YOU but not anyone else! You only have to touch a surface in a supermarket and you are just as much of a potential spreader as you always were! Or is this some bizarre Health and Safety risk aversion on the part of the pub companies? So long as you have a paper to prove a vaccination, then if you catch Covid in their pub, it can't be the pub's fault. Maybe that's it?

As far as I know they are giving it to those over 75, having given first priority to old peoples' homes. I am 73, but my wife Susie has a long term stomach complaint which may have put her in a potential risk category, so the doctor said he would do us both together. I get the impression that each French department is in its own situation and it seems you are better off in a rural location as we are, than if you live in one of the big urban areas.

Surprise, surprise! We had a phone call from the doctor this morning, and we have both had the jab. We also have a date for the 2nd one, on 2nd June. I had assumed we weren't going to get anything until the autumn, if you go by all the bad news about Europe. It was the Astra Zenica jab as well - I suggested to the doctor he had been holding that for us, as it is only fit for the British!

The yacht at the left is the Three of Hearts, nowadays called Tea Rose.

In addition, remember that the Bure at St Benets is a river navigation. We have talked about this before, where it affects fishing rights. Sounds as though this needs some clarification, preferably before the boating season starts!

Somewhere within sight of Sutton mill, I would guess.

Going about, is when you tack across the wind from side to side. When running free, before the wind, the sail goes across with much more of a crash and it is best to be prepared for it by altering course a bit and "letting it happen". Probably the most dangerous part of sailing and can be a bit dodgy on a winding river, with Richo's finest coming the other way down the Ant. A Chinese gybe is when you get a sudden gust from a different direction at the moment of gybing, so the boom and the lower part of the sail swing over to the new side, but the gaff and the upper part stay where they are! Usually causes damage, which can include losing the mast. I should stick to your omni-directional, BMC 1.5.

Talking of using the rig for craning, your last photo shows how they did it. The mast has been cocked back slightly on the forestay, while the throat block of the halyard has been clipped above the "spen" block, to give the result of raising the gaff horizontal, to clear the cargo hatch. The gaff can then be swung out over the quay and used as a derrick. For heavy loads such as logs they would take the gaff off altogether and use the halyard winch for lifting, with the mast cocked back. This last method strikes me as rather dangerous, but I guess they knew what they were doing! So the mast ring in your earlier photo is still a mystery.

I remember that the building of the flyover was controversial and was designed so that the average gaff rigged Broads yacht could still sail under it. But probably not with the topsail up, and not if it was Bermuda rigged! Even so, the rig of an average yacht only goes about half way to the height of the derrick posts on a sea-going coaster. Which is partly why I always enjoy debating with you! I also accept that my opinion is just that, with no solid evidence. All the same, it is based on a long memory of previous "anomalies" in planning decisions on the Yare navigation. Remember when they built the Breydon bascule bridge, at enormous cost, because the navigation (to Norwich) had to be kept open? At the same time the old Trowse swing bridge was replaced - also at enormous cost - with a single track sliding affair, so that the navigation could be kept open. At about the same time, they spent more millions on a rebuild of Carrow bridge. Then, only a couple of years later, they built the Trowse flyover, which was fixed, and this made all the other works redundant at a stroke! And it must have been the same planners, who were involved in all these decisions! Now, oh dear! The Trowse bridge is only single track and it is holding up the trains, so we will have to build a new one. And no need to make it opening, as no-one seems to use the port of Norwich any more. Rather pathetic in planning terms, since the previous swing bridge was double track in the first place! So given this lamentable history I can well understand that, looking objectively, there is no point in continuing to spend money on the old bridge at Carrow. And given this proven lack of joined-up thinking by the planning authorities over the years, I am afraid I still fear that Reedham bridge might be next.

This is all rather predictable, I am afraid. Chloe Smith MP wants a new rail bridge, which will be fixed, so that trains from London can do "Norwich in 90" minutes. Which may be why the T.S. lord Nelson and the Vagabond had to be moved with such suspicious haste. Who is going to commute on these new trains is another matter. I suspect they will in future be working from home, in all the new dormitory towns around Rackheath and Wroxham! They say that there is no longer any commercial river traffic to Norwich, which is no surprise as the building of the southern bypass flyover at Trowse effectively closed Norwich for all time as a port. So keeping the bridge working has become a bit of an expensive luxury. Doesn't surprise me at all. What should worry us all is the precedent. If they get away with welding Carrow bridge shut, then Reedham bridge will surely be next.

Duckhams used to produce water pump grease, which you also use on old fashioned stern glands which have a grease cap. Peachments sell a grease called Morris (I forget the number) and I am sure Brian Ward or other chandlers sell something similar. The thrust bearing on the hydraulic motor takes any normal grease, that you would use on roller bearings.

The best dictionary I know of is Harraps. It has never failed me, in 30 odd years!

Dew they'll just hatta dew loik wot we allus dew with our doo doos, out along the river bank. Oi say ter ol' Wussername oi say, woss all this hare about dewing with their do-ins at the Berney Arms? All these forriners in their noice noo town houses, they'll just hatta larn not ter pull the chairne until the tide is running out onter Breydon. Them grit ol' catfish, they don't dew so badly on it, dew the now? Old boy Jack, the river inspector, he never say nuthin dew he? Oi 'spose he just hatta hold it, till he git hoom of a night. Old wossnairme he say, thass just another load of old squit, int it?

Oi reckun with all them noo town houses, that'll need one o' them there masturbatin' pumps, an all.

Oi reckun that'll hev one 'er them there sceptical tanks.

So if the pubs are closed, you will have to bring one with you! These were regular customers, from Germany, who had measured up the situation the year before so that they could get under the bridges. But only just! They managed to cruise all of the Camargue as far as Agde, on the Canal du Midi, and back again without lowering the tent. That's not a barbecue on the saloon roof - it's live keyboard music!

The boat was built by Crown Cruisers in Somerleyton (not Le Boat) and the year 1996 would be about right. Some of the photos in the brokerage description, including the main one, are of a Classique, not a Crusader but this is not mis-leading as the Crusader is simply a smaller version of the Classique. These boats are very well built and the interior should be pretty much as good as the day she was built. The only place to look for rot might be at the bottom of the shower bulkheads where they join the shower tray, which may have rotted part of the floor in the front cabin. If you find this, it's not serious but may get you a bit off the price! The hull is very strongly moulded by Aquafibre with very strong rubber compound rubbing strakes (made by the same firm who supply the RNLI). Built to ERCD category C, although it may say cat D on the plaque in the wheelhouse, being only used for inland waterways. The drive is hydraulic, by Peachments, with a 38mm s/s shaft swinging a 19X17 prop, so a very strong installation. The Nanni 4220 may have a lot of hours on it - 11000 or more would not be a surprise - but if it needs an exchange unit it would still be well worth it at the price they are asking. These are lovely boats, built to a very high standard and I thoroughly recommend them.

Or try Peachments in Brundall.

And I agree with it, where the Thames is concerned. It is a river steeped in history, with historic pubs and restaurants, for which my mother had most fond memories, before and during the War, and without which the cruise would not have the same atmosphere, or style. The Rose Revived, at Sonning. The Angel on the Bridge at Henley. Skindles in Maidenhead. The Bells of Ouzeley at Runnymede. The Waterside Inn at Bray. The Swan at Pangbourne. The Swan at Streatley, once owned by Danny La Rue. The Miller of Mansfield at Goring. The Beetle and Wedge at Moulsford. The Compleat Angler at Marlow. And that's just a few, that come straight to my memory. I went to school on the Thames and I ran a boatyard there too. I don't think the cruise would be the same without its historic pubs and I very much hope they survive this situation.

Do you think you are the first one to have thought of that? Or do you not think the boatyard might notice, at the end of the week?

I can think of better places for that, than the Whitlingham gravel pits! Postwick Grove for instance. Happy memories. . . .

I would think £1.40 per litre is reasonable, as it may also involve the consumption of the diesel heating system. I am basing this on 3 litres per hour for a Nanni engine, having to push against the current on the Thames. In fact they do less than 2,5 litres per hour when driven a bit more slowly. I know this, because to charge by the hour you have to have an hour metre fitted and this gives you a lot of other useful information, such as the interval for oil changes. If they are charging £12 per hour however, then I think they are just biting the hand that feeds them.

Which I calculate at about £1.40 per litre.