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kpnut
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Posts posted by kpnut
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Tuesday started off beautifully sunny, but thankfully not as hot as recently. A leisurely start with a few housework jobs and then a cruise down to Wroxham. I’m sure the weed has grown in the couple of days we’ve been upstream of the bridge. I had to clear my prop just before reaching the Rising Sun as I noticed I had little acceleration, not that I needed any at that point!
I read somewhere that the weed cutter came about a week ago, but I might be wrong. Maybe it needed to cut a bit deeper as it’s more or less at the surface again now in places.
On reaching Wroxham, I checked the weed filter but that had very little in, compared with the journey upstream, so maybe the floating stuff from the recent cutting activity has mainly dispersed by now.
I moored up at the electric posts in order to give the batteries a good charge after all this gentle pootling about. It’s not among my favourite mooring spots I’m afraid and is surprisingly midgy, but the sunset over towards the boatyard on the Wroxham side was nice. The view of the motor homes parked by the water’s edge opposite the moorings reminded me of France where you often see campervans etc on the pollarded poplar-lined river bank. The only difference being that they often have lovely allocated pitches, demarcated by low hedges which look very tidy.
While the battery charger was doing its stuff we decided on an afternoon out on the Bure Valley Railway, up to Aylsham. That was a fun journey and Aylsham seems an interesting town with large church and market place and a couple of nice old streets to explore. There was a noticeable number of independent shops there, pleasing to see.
While clearing leaves from the sliding sunroof gutters I heard a ‘hello Kate’ and looked up see Jean (SwanR) who was taking x stroll along the moorings. Lovely to have a chat Jean and good that you saw your favourite boat moored up next to me!
The battery charger has done its thing by this morning and I can hear the fridge turning on and off again as it should. I shouldn’t have bought so much food and tried to run the cool box at the same time, just too much for the poor batteries when not going far! Lesson learned!!
Plan for today is to renegotiate the bridge and moor up at Fleet Dyke for a walk round Fairhaven Water Garden. Going right along there, missing out on a few other places specifically to give the engine a good run.
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Have a super trip, especially good with the whole lot of you!
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I left my tale with picking mum up from the train. It was rather surreal walking from the train, down the footpath to the viaduct moorings, straight onto the boat and bingo - right in the midst of a holiday in the space of 5 minutes!
After a salad lunch, I was keen to set off upstream. I was hoping for one of the staithes at Belaugh so we could visit the church, and was in luck with both, so chose the BA mooring. On the way we’d seen 3 kingfishers which was lovely for mum.
Plenty of comings and going’s on the staithe with a couple having a quiet afternoon (until I came along and got chatting about allotments!), a fisherman and various people turning up to launch canoes. The church didn’t disappoint and had the bonus of being lovely and cool.
A warm night and early sunrise saw me deciding to take Finlay for a walk round the lanes early on. I had soon realised yesterday that mum has certainly lost some agility since she came on the boat in July last year. Her walking pace is surprisingly slow, a big difference to last time I saw her as although I tend to walk quite fast, sometimes I used to be unable to keep up with her!
So if Finlay is going to get a decent walk, it’s going to have to be bolted on to the day’s activity with mum.
We moved off up to Coltishall lock where we were moored on our own for most of the day. There are 2 other boats here now.
My, it’s been busy here. Lovely to see the kids out near the mill, enjoying the water. My only hope is that they look out for each other’s safety while they play. On the lock side, a steady stream of paddle boarders and canoeists, one lady swimming, but the highlight of my day was when a gundog training class came to do some water training. 9 Labradors for an hour and a half or so perfecting their retrieve technique in the water and Finlay getting a free lesson in steadiness as he sat and watched with no whining etc for the whole time. He must have been wondering when it was his turn, - that came as soon as the other dogs had left.
Lunch at the Recruiting Sergeant, highly recommended, was followed by a walk upstream from the bridge. But it soon got too overgrown with stingers for us with our shorts on, so we doubled back before reaching our destination, which had only been to the little bridge over the side dyke by Hautbois Activity Centre.
Sheila and I took ourselves off for a walk with Finlay up the lane to the left of the mill. I’ve detailed that walk back in June, further back in the thread. The farm track was incredibly dusty and it was nice to cool down by walking through the mist of the irrigator on the potato field.
Back at the boat, a few more dummy retrieves in the water for Finlay to wash the dust off him, tea and bed, still seemingly as hot as it’s been during the day.
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1 hour ago, grendel said:
he also used to put labels on batteries to see how long they lasted.
My other half does that. It drives me nuts when I find his name label with date on bottles of tippex, sellotape rolls, the clingfilm tube, printer cartridges, bottles of sauce, cans of things like wd40, shaving foam, light bulbs etc. Just about anything and everything. Wierd!
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Maybe bridge broad is the place to practice.
anyway,I’m pleased to report that I did the bridge, woohoo. I did have the pilot with me though and will use his services for confidence on the return this then I should be ok given reasonable clearance.
Intriduckng my sister to the joys of Royland while we await mum’s train.
More dayboats out than I expected for Monday still in term time (England and wales at least). And stern on moorings pretty full. But viaduct moorings we’re fairly free. And we managed a spot in the shade as we moored. Probably not when we get back.-
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9 hours ago, garryn said:
There was over 7ft at Wroxham when we went under on Friday and Saturday. Plenty of room for you to do it yourself and not use the pilot.
I know Gary but I haven’t got the confidence yet. I’ll ask to do it myself with him standing next to me I think.
I hope there is room on one of those moorings for me Jean, otherwise my mums going to have a long walk from the railway station round to Castle staithe or Belaugh- only joking!!Catherine went up to Coltishall last week and although had to check the weed filter each day it wasn’t too bad.
and I’d love to mudweight Grendel, but the dog hasn’t learnt to wee on a mat, never even did as a pup, so he’s the problem. Next dog I get is going to be trained properly from the off!
Beautiful morning, already hot.
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Hi Roger, from Kate.
If my experience of buying a boat last year is anything to go by, you are in for a lot of fun, along with some minor worry. Just make sure the fun outwits the worry. I’ve decided that anything and everything on a boat is sortable, they are simple beasts, so you just tick the worries off one by one and enjoy the cruising in between!
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I have contemplated trying PH bridge this week, seeing as its high pressure and hasn’t rained properly for yonks, but have chosen wroxham bridge instead, seeing as I’m meeting mum off the train there tomorrow morning. Upstream of PH can wait for another trip.
I took a slow meander back up to Richardson’s this morning for a pump out and to pick up my sister. Always a good job done there.
Setting off again, our destination was anywhere between St Benedict’s Church mooring at Horning to Hoveton viaduct moorings. The Ant was very quiet, but that changed once on the Bure with dayboats zipping about and a couple of rather strange looking very large boats. I should have taken a picture. One at least, a blue one for what it’s worth, must moor at wroxham as it passed us again on its way back up there later in the afternoon.
We settled on the moorings by Wroxham Broad and spent the rest of the day in the sun with a breeze just enough to cool us nicely, watching the boats. It wasn’t until it all quietened down after 6pm that we I realised just how noisy it had been before then!I did notice that just below the surface there is an awful lot of weed along this stretch. Not sure if this photo shows it up very well. I suppose it’s the downside of having clearer water nowadays.
Reminder to self-check the weed filter in the morning.-
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Would be magical indeed on the river at such an early time, if you are able to be awake enough to enjoy it!
May see you in sept then instead.-
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Might see you somewhere Helen, will keep an eye out. We don’t need to be back up the Ant till Sunday.
When are you on Water Rail? -
Yes, I was looking forward to it after the buildup to it during the week, but knew I’d not enjoy today if I didn’t get some proper sleep.
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Not the best to be fair, but where I’d have got the whole boat in one go was right into the sun.
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Camera at the ready for you Neil
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My sister had been in touch overnight to take me up on the offer of a week on the boat. Mum is already due on Monday, so it’ll be good to have another pair of safe hands, mainly to keep mum in one piece. She’s 90, but thinks she’s still about 20, so doesn’t like to be ‘advised’! We discussed various public transport possibilities for her to leave her car in Stalham and come and find me by bus, getting off at Ludham being a good bet as there is a choice of the main Womack staithe, the dyke and St Benets for mooring, but in the end I decided to have one night out tonight and then go back to Stalham tomorrow to pick her up.
So a quick return to Tesco to buy a third person’s worth of food for a few days and I set off, with no destination in mind.I passed numerous vacant wild moorings down the Ant and thought I’d go as far as How Hill and turn round to see what was still free. I ended up at Jonny Crowe’s staithe as someone was leaving just as I went past. To be honest, I was needing a dozing sort of day, so on arrival, enjoyed the mooring spot to watch the boats go by for a while before deciding to walk down to How Hill for an ice cream.
it was very quiet on the moorings when I took the photos at 3.30, but I expect the newly released Richardsons boats will soon be along for their first nights stop.
Back now watching the boats again. It’s not too hot here as there’s just enough breeze.
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Well, here again.
Wanting to catch my daughter before she departed after her week on the boat, I set off from home at 4.30am yesterday. It’s been a long time since I was out and about at that time of the morning and I found the roads surprisingly busy. Sutton Bridge was clear apart from some temporary lights, which were green as I went through, AFTER the bridge, so not sure what their purpose is.
A quick stop in Hoveton to see what was out on the moorings and to get the excitement out of the dog before he meets his brothers d we were at Stalham before Catherine and Roald were up, at 8am. Odd not being able to get onto my own boat on arrival, but I took Finlay for another run at the public moorings down the end of the yard and they were up by the time I got back. It was good to hear the news of their week, they’d spent a good part of it up beyond Wroxham bridge. They say next time they are confident enough to go through on their own. I haven’t reached that stage yet! I’ll pluck up the courage one of these days and save myself some pennies.
They had a drive back to near Burton on Trent to consider, so after sharing my allotment harvest with them, they departed. When you are picking 4 punnets of raspberries a day, you have to offload it somehow! Even the freezer can’t cope with that.
I caught up with a few people I hadn’t seen for a while, modified a set of shelves that Tony had made for me and fitted them in their allotted space in the wardrobe to be used for all the ‘bits and bobs’ you accumulate on a boat, walked round to Simpsons where I’d seen Lulu heading, but by the time I got there they’d gone.After a shopping trip to stock up for the week, and sorting out an internet problem I’d had all day (by the proverbial turning off and on again a couple of times), I was ready for an early night I couldn’t even contemplate staying up for the Friday night quiz and it sounds like I missed a lot of fun.
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Jean, so sorry but I’ll have to give it a miss. I arrived at the boat at 8am to see Catherine before they left for home. Being nearly a 4 hr journey you can imagine what time I got up this morning.
Have fun everyone. Xx-
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Thank goodness for that. Gave up English literature before O level. I enjoyed reading books for the joy of it, not to dissect the characters!
Looking forward to it Jean, thank you.
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8 hours ago, Boycemaster said:
used to be a rare and exciting occasion when you saw a otter, some years you would not be lucky enough to spot one, now they are a daily occurrence. Just returned from 2 weeks boating and fishing, the fishing was very poor and what was caught was small
Two separate facts, not necessarily related.
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I saw kingfisher up at coltishall in early june. I saw her by the Norfolk mead mooring, then she came up to the lock where I was moored but you’d gone again by the time I came back from a walk. I commented to my friend what a beautiful boat, stunning.
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16 hours ago, kpnut said:
That’ll be you winning then Jean
I think Sam is good on the music rounds too Jean, and TH, so maybe there’ll be a competition after all!
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Oh dear!
Well, it seriously won’t happen with a music quiz, unless maybe it’s just trombone music, ha ha!I wasn’t allowed to listen to the radio as a teenager, (deemed evil in our house for some inexplicable reason).
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2 hours ago, Mouldy said:
eco warriors that glue themselves to the roads in protest of our use of fossil fuels, protested about the adverse ecological consequences of building such a barrier.
Frankly, I’m not sure that they’re capable of logical thought.
That’s the trouble with ‘eco warriors’. They see it all from one side of the argument, whereas an ecologist just looks for patterns.
it’s a bit like the fish/otter argument.
Fishermen say there are fewer fish and more otters so it must be the otters eating the fish. Eco warriors and ‘conservationists’ say otters used to be there and the fish didn’t die out, so can’t be the otters eating the fish.
And ecologists note that there are fewer fish. They note that there are more otters. But they observe and don’t assume an increase in one is causing the demise of the other without evidence. They then set up controlled experiments to refute or accept the hypothesis that there is no correlation between the two happenings.
a bit more true ecological thinking and a bit less opinion would help policy making no end.-
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1 hour ago, SwanR said:
Brilliant! Something to look forward to at the end of the week. :)
That’ll be you winning then Jean, and me last by a lofty ‘nul points’!!!!!!
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On 28/06/2022 at 17:55, Bikertov said:
They are called hydro generators, and yachts use them to generate power when sailing.
My daughter did her thesis on micro hydro generation/in-current turbines, which are used a lot and successfully in farms in upland areas where there is no mains power. They manage to power a whole farm using a large bank of batteries. Admittably, these take up a lot of space.
She was more interested in the ecological impact on the water course itself.
I have no idea why water power, be it tidal or river current, isn’t more widely being progressed, probably to do with funding and govts inclinations.-
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Norfolk Lady Tales
in Holiday Tales & Blogs
Posted
Ooh, that meat looks tasty! What a treat.