YnysMon

Yes, that chimes with what I am thinking. We’ll probably stay on our mooring Weds night and start off early on Thursday. I’ve no idea whether today’s ‘atrocious’ weather will have had a ‘locking’ effect again. We are hoping not to have to move the boat to another location to load her up (like we had to in November) but are planning to get there early afternoon, just in case. Was it as bad today in Norfolk as was forecast? We did have some moderate rain and wind in Milton Keynes, but it wasn’t a storm by any means.

I’ve just been checking the tides and am starting to think that getting down south could be a possibility. I’d scratched that idea when we were due to arrive on Friday as we’d have had to return up north almost immediately if we didn’t want to end up night nav’ing. I shall have to check the project troll website though to get an idea of the clearance under the bridges. The weather forecast is looking promising too.

I probably going to revise that plan Simon. Having an extra couple of days and the weather looking likely to settle down a bit makes it look like getting down south for three or four days could be a real possibility.

Welcome to the forum Chris.

Belatedly realised that Harry didn’t have any wellies, so a last minute dash to Go Outdoors was in order this afternoon. Cheapo £18 ones but they should do the trick if we have to wade to the boat.

Yes, it looks like Stokesby to me too, though like Kate I was wondering whether there should be a mill in the background.

We'll be traveling to the boat tomorrow. We quite fancy a trip up the Ant, so if we do go to Ludham Bridge I'll let you know the clearance Simon. Helen

More good news. The boat isn’t occupied at present, so we’ve decided to travel to the boat on Wednesday instead of waiting until Friday. Bonus!

Hi Alan, I know how difficult this is, having visited my Mam in hospital daily for several months before she was able to return home. Your Dad is a fighter. You have all our thoughts and prayers that he will pull through.

I think mine predates even that, and our SatNav is pretty much behind the times too. On the other hand the river features seem to have lasted pretty well since Arthur Ransome wrote The Coot Club, so I’m not sure I’ll be buying a replacement OS map soon.

Was there ever a dog more loved (apart from Seren).

Hope you feel better son Kate. There’s nothing worse that having sickness when travelling. I was going to say ‘away from home’, but I’m guessing that Springer’s Retreat is a home away from home.

We prefer not to use the boat’s heating on overnight, hence our preference for being on electric. There’s a small dimplex that we left on board, but we’ll take a second one for the other cabin for son Harry and underblankets for all three of us. It does mean we’ll be spending a couple of quid on electric each night, depending how cold it is, but at least we’ll be lovely and toasty.

Yes, at this time of the year electric is a must for us. We could cope, but why not opt for cosiness? If it’s promising to ice up we’ll either stay put on our home mooring and visit places by car or cruise on the river and avoid places that are more likely to ice up (such as Ranworth). We certainly don’t want to damage the gel coat by moving the boat through ice. If it’s very cold and icy at the end of our week the tricky bit might be when we need to get refuelled etc. That might need a bit of negotiation with the people that will follow us. The main thing we need to do is keep an eye on the weather forecast and plan accordingly. We aren’t particularly bothered if we can’t cruise much as just being on board is a bonus.

Thanks for the update Alan. Our thoughts and prayers are with your Dad and Mum. Hoping your Dad’s fighting spirit will pull him through.

Whoopee, it looks like we’ll be on the boat for a week from 5th January. Eldest son Harry is going to join us too.

To echo Grendel’s post. I generally try to be considerate of fisherfolk by moving to the centre of the river, but it’s sometimes difficult to spot them until last minute.

Ian was THE pesky mod when I joined the forum. What a gent…a real gentle-man. We still have a brilliant team now, thankfully. Doesn’t stop me missing Ian though. Just imagine if he was part of the current team.

It’s windy again…at least it is on MK. Does that mean the flooding is getting worse?

We tried a Halti with Seren too, but she continued to pull so we discontinued using it.

Oooh, details please. Seren pulls like anything on the lead, though she’s pretty biddable off the lead. Pozzie pulls a bit at the start of any walk, but is mostly good once he’s had a bit of a run.

Growing up in a port, for us it was ‘Red sky in the morning, sailor’s warning’.

We were moored next to a Herbie Woods hybrid thing (sorry can’t remember what the boat was called) in Beccles last October and they started up an engine (generator?) in the morning. It was well after 8am, so no complaints. I was just puzzled why a so-called more environmentally craft would need to run a generator at all as they had been plugged into electric overnight. I suppose the win is that you have a quieter cruise once your batteries are charged with more of an awareness of bird song etc. I’m still puzzled why they had to run the generator though?

Pink!!! Eew!

They were happy for us to moor there when we were on Water Rail, and that was a September, when their fleet was still in the water.