Broad Ambition - Underway on the H2O

[JennyMorgan]

Just now, C.Ricko said:

then there were the lot who complained that we didn't ! 

 

'Tis like being married, us blokes can never, ever win!

[LondonRascal]

A Christmas Tale | Part One

 

In 2015 Shiela and I spent New Year's afloat, this year it was time to try something different - Charismas.  There would be no attempt at cooking a Turkey onboard though, opting instead to spend our Christmas Day in the Swan Inn, Horning - but that was 3 days away since we came up to Norfolk on 22nd and began to deploy our carefully laid plan.

Firstly we would get onboard the boat, stow our stuff and then head off to Tesco in Stalham for a big shop.  We duly arrived to a very damp and wet shed and found Broad Ambition looking in a bit of a sorry state - her decks covered with moisture and small particles of rust that fall from the gentley decaying metal beams that hold the wet shed up. Inside, while the cabins were thankfully fine, the wheelhouse was very much damp - indeed it was past just damp but positively moist (don't you just love that word) so added to our shopping list would be a mould and mildew removing spray and some upholstery cleaner.  

We walked to Tesco and duly went about picking more and more items from the shelves making our large trolley soon fill up and me realise it would be a taxi back to the boat. Food, snacks, booze more food and back to the booze isle and then some cheese, grapes too and, well you know how it goes. While we qued for the till we played guess the price - I put it at £170.00 Shiela went for £140.00 so when we got the total and it came to £94.53 we were chuffed - a week's worth of food and enough 'other stuff' and alcohol to last us even if we found ourselves stranded away from any civilisation for days on end.  A call to Stalham Cabs and in a few minutes we are back at the wet shed and Shiela is doing her favourite job called organising - I am going through the 'pre-sail' foremost in mind is removing and stowing five blue shed fenders!

I opened up our second locker where we stow items this time to get to Henry - not a person, the Hoover. Back on the boat we attacked the upholstery first vacuum then deep clean and while that is underway Shiela is wiping down surfaces and removing mould that has taken hold since October when Broad Ambition was last out. Interestingly, where there are more confined spaces and less ventilation such as in the cabins there was no mould and very little dampness.  One issue with the wet shed is it is a semi-enclosed space with water - lots of it - and any spores will drift and take hold almost jumping from one boat to the next and even on some surfaces outside the boats finding this a rich ground to spread. It is a case of keeping on top of things than being able to eradicate it. 

All was looking good inside so I moved to the outside of the boat and set to cleaning the decks and cabin tops and before long she was looking grand. Next up was to almost completely drain the water tanks then fill full but the light was rapidly fading - a night nav was on the cards I thought, but then things took a real turn. 

I was putting back Henry and went to grab my 'boat box' out of the locker when my head put two and two together and for once made four. A distinct smell of pee, ripped kitchen towel and paper  torn to shreds - By Jove I think I've got it! And just then Mr Roland and I met each other.  

He was a shocked as I was but I kept a firm grasp on my box (steady now) and Roland did a sharp turn and vanished under the a pile of torn paper.  Back to the boat, boat hook in hand and I am now prodding and hitting and moving anything and everything I can and I can hear Roland moving but he remains unseen before long he shot out to the right and was off in a moment.   The carnage caused however was not at all pleasant to look at.  I can only assume after our last outing in October some of the empty but used maggot boxes placed in this locker might have had seemed attractive to Roland - either way I thanked my lucky stars he was not longer in the locker and it was confined to that and not the boat.  In the past a rodent had got on Broad Ambiton, he was never found but many months later evidence of his work turned up when a cable which attaches to the waste tank sender unit failed showing the tank as empty - until it overflowed through the vent on the hull.  Lovely and all because of a chewed cable.  It was now dusk so a quick clean up and brief to Shiela - we would head to Neatishead and then walk to the White Horse for a meal and drinks.  

We left the Wet Shed at dusk and I was pleased I had my 'enhanced' LED light bar - the smallest of this type of unit  you can buy, and I have custom made a base with a cushioned feet (so no risk of scratching) but will sit firmly on any flat surface and will provide a combined flood and beam of light - not usually required but for heading up to Neatishead in complete darkness just perfect. 

We crossed Barton and as we turned to starboard for Limekiln Dyke it was now properly dark - out with our pseudo Radar  or to everyone else Google Earth Imagery.  This allows me to see in real time and in the correct orientation, where the boat is and where the channel marker posts are along with when to turn and what to expect where you cannot see.  Short of real Radar it is surprisingly helpful to orientate yourself in the darkness. 

Before long we had made our way up the narrow twisting river to Neatishead  which was unsurprisingly empty - and duly moored. The rubbish bins are still here, the water hose removed for the winter. We then unpacked our things, made the bed and headed out into the dark, cold night.  What a show you get when the skies are clear so far as Stars go (I was in my element Shiela was shivering) and when we arrived at the White Horse it was full to bursting with a large Christmas party - and food only being served to those who pre-booked.  

Despite this, after my second pint of Wherry and things seemed to have calmed a little with the main bulk of patrons now seated in the restaurant we asked if we could get some chips and sweet potato fries - Chef said yes and it was a welcome hot snack.

To some wedge like chips with a good skin on them is lovely, but to me I'd rather some nice golden chips with a fluffy inside and these were not them, seeing other peoples food being taken to their tables it seemed over and above the usual pub fair - no doubt good food, but this is a pub after all and a small village in Norfolk so it was a fine atmosphere for a drink but I won't be worried about eating here. 

We had another drink and then headed back to Broad Ambition - it had been a long day of travel and shopping and sorting and it was nice to be onboard and just relax - a Jim Beam and coke went down very nicely and we listened to some Christmas playlists Shiela had created and all felt right in the world. 

The following morning we were up and I'll let the video fill you in as to our days cruise - a short one to Ranworth Staithe and from here in we follow each days progress over a multi-part Christmas Special of the Captain's Blog.

[BroadAmbition]

A distinct smell of pee, ripped kitchen towel and paper  torn to shreds - By Jove I think I've got it! And just then Mr Roland and I met each other.  

He was a shocked as I was but I kept a firm grasp on my box (steady now) and Roland did a sharp turn and vanished under the a pile of torn paper.  Back to the boat, boat hook in hand and I am now prodding and hitting and moving anything and everything I can and I can hear Roland moving but he remains unseen before long he shot out to the right and was off in a moment.   The carnage caused however was not at all pleasant to look at.  I can only assume after our last outing in October some of the empty but used maggot boxes placed in this locker might have had seemed attractive to Roland - either way I thanked my lucky stars he was not longer in the locker and it was confined to that and not the boat.

Hmm,  I'll ring you on this one, methinks a dedicated 'Boomtown Rats' device is required to be placed within said locker.  The electronic rodent / insect repellents are working for 'B.A' onboard, maybe after Roland has been duly despatched I might have to rig one up inside the locker too

Griff

[LondonRascal]

I can't seem to post long replies or links currently. Trying a short one..

[MauriceMynah]

 

 

 

Sorry Robin, Couldn't resist that.  

[Broads01]

I enjoyed Christmas blogs 10 and 11 Robin.  It was really good to see Ranworth Staithe as it looks in the winter.  I'm looking forward to the next instalment and some ice-breaking action! 

[LondonRascal]

Testing again to see if I can post in this thread.

[Hylander]

Robin I have just been watching your blogs too.    You say that you run your heating all night long,  I thought that was a no no for safety reasons.

[grendel]

I do believe he said it was the electric heater while on shore power.

[BroadAmbition]

You say that you run your heating all night long,  I thought that was a no no for safety reasons.

I do believe he said it was the electric heater while on shore power.

 

It could have been either.      There is no byelaw or official advice (Private Broads craft anyway) that I'm aware of stating that heating cannot be left on overnight.   Often in the dead of a cold winters night onboard, I will leave the Mikuni heating running all night long, Don't think I have ever left an electric fan heater running overnight when plugged into shore power.  Now before anyone says that's dangerous, let me state that I have full confidence in our Mikuni heating system (I installed it) it is fully serviced every two years (By me or Howard) we have two fire/smoke/monoxide detectors onboard, one in the fwd passageway and one in the aft passageway.  And  -  Horrors of Horrors - I often leave the heating on when we go ashore and no one is onboard too.   I am due to be afloat with a Broads 'Newbie' 13th to 16th of this month.  It is likely to be very cold overnight, it is therefore just as likely I will leave the heating on overnight too.    I will state that diesel is a safer option compared to gas heating, how many of you leave your homes or are in bed with the gas central heating running?

Now I just kinda know some clever Richard Cranium may state examples or for instances where crew have died or boats burnt etc etc due to be heating being left on.  This Richard Cranium will parry that with for instances of motorist / passengers dying on the roads but we still drive / ride, ditto for drownings when around the rivers but we still go boating too!

Griff

[CheshireCat]

The Old Corsican with it's Wood Burring Stove was out from the 22 of December until the 2 of January what a lovely time we had , I lit the stove on the 22 when I got to the boat , it was cold and wet outside the boat was freezing inside and full of condensation , with in half a hour I had the old stove burning lovely , with in a hour the boat was toasty toasty and no sigh of the dreaded condensation .

It's a fantastic stove once it was lit on the 22 it never went out until I let it on the 2 of January , whole of Christmas I was in a T shirt and jogging bottoms , there was one night I woke up about 4am it was -4 outside and for the first time I thought it's a little chilli in here I just opened the air up a little and went back to bed , got up in the morning and the boat was lovely and warm again .

One thing I would like to point out is we did not fit the stove ourselves we had it all done professionally for Saftey reasons , we also have all the appropriate detectors in fact we have both 12 volt and battery detectors for smoke , fire and carbon monoxide you can never be to careful .  ...

[BuffaloBill]

Hi Geoffrey. I can vouch for that. The heat coming out the stern door when we had a quick chat over Christmas was lovely!

And he and Steve were both in 'T' shirts and I was wrapped up to the nines!

As for overnight heating, where possible we leave an electric oil filled radiator on low until the Eber switches on at 0640 to bring the heat up to normal for me to get up and make a cuppa and then back to bed to consume at our leisure.

[LondonRascal]

I do not appear able to post to this thread more than a few lines.  On other topics I have managed to post rather detailed replies, but here no - so I'm sorry that my usual write ups which fill in more between the video clips can't be posted currently, along with my videos.  To catch up with my videos that I've not posted here just head over to my Channel The Captain's Blog

Hopefully things will be sorted out in time, it may even be just my account so I've opened a new 'LondonRascal2' account and will, when approved, see if I can post my write ups here using that.

[CheshireCat]

And it makes the best toast ever ... Bill your wright private boats only can you imagine if they put them in hire boats good god not a good idea ...

[LondonRascal]

Ok now as to the heating on B.A.

I don't mind 'roughing it' at times, and I live in an old Victorian house which does not have the luxury of central heating and double glazing, which just so happens to mean very little condensation issues and no expensive boiler repairs and so on.  You also get used to a cooler environment, but I am all for comforts too.

Once warmed through B.A is very cosy and especially in the cabins you really do feel rather cocooned - so we left the heating on overnight on low to keep nice and comfortable.  We also would 'post hop' from one electric post to the next for two reasons firstly so we can have the fan heater in the Wheel House which naturally has very littler insulation since it is only a vinyl cover, but I'm sold on Ceramic Fan Heaters - on low it was plenty warm enough but sipped electricity at less than 1Kw which meant even with use of the second reason our immersion heater, so no need to run the engine for hot water in the morning, we were leaving very little pennies behind in the morning from our £1 top ups.

A chap I follow who lives on a Narrow Boat did a video about heating and he uses a stove to heat the boat - but the issue as he pointed out with these are the weight of the fuel and where to store it, no matter how careful one is there is always some ash dust to tidy up when clearing the stove out, and while it can be so hot inside the front of his narrow boat he must open windows or a door, the heat does not really reach the rest of the boat to the stern.  A guy in Denmark has fitted a Diesel heater but that is not warm air and works very well, his latest project will have a larger version with radiators attached.

As you can see there are alternatives to heating a boat than just the usual warm air heating type.  If you have the space on a boat in cabins I'd recon permanent electric background heating may be a good bet.  They are used usually in homes and are called 'skirting heaters' - instant heat but not a huge amount, just enough and run at 500w so a small cabin would be perfectly suited for such.  Just plug into an electric post and away you go.

Oiled filled radiators are bulky and heavy and new 'dry' models are lighter and as efficient . Electric heaters are all considered to be 100% efficient (i.e. they turn all the electricity they use into heat) and so may be a better bet if you can plug in to an electric posts per hour than using diesel to heat - of course burning wood and coalite are going to be the cheapest.

[CheshireCat]

All I can say is I have no problems getting fuel my coal merchant delivers straight to the boat , he even told me if your out and about and you run out just call us let us no where you are and we will drop you some off .

I dust and hover every day anyway so the small amount of extra dust is not a problem , as most of you no I have a guide dog he in out running about dragging in a lot of crap shaking his hair all over the place , so when you have a big dog your constantly cleaning up after it so a little bit of coal dust really dose not bother me and I love my old dog to bits so I don't mind cleaning up after him .

I don't have a narrow boat so storing my coal I really no problem The Corsican has a abundance of places for storing things .

When we first put our stove in we did not have a stove fan and a lot of the heat was just rising as heat dose , however we now have a fan my god it dose make a difference , we point the fan towards the wheel house you can go and stand in there and feel the heat blowing in it's amazing and as I have said before no condensation anywhere even when I cook and I cook a lot .

So Robbin I don't see any negatives in having a multi burning stove I only see the positive your always toasty your boat is lovely and dry you don't really ever need to plug in to the mains , the one thing I mist was the boat getting to hot well all that tells me is he is still learning how to set his stove there all different you have to get use to your stove and adjust it accordingly , e.g. when your sitting there and the stove is burning perfectly and it is time to cook the dinner you need to turn the stove right down or it will become unbearable but as I said you have to get use to your stove .

So that's my rant over I hope I have answered all the points you made be a cool fish and swim deep ...  ...

[LondonRascal]

I don't think that is a rant at all Geoffrey just saying what works very well for you.  I found the link to the video I referred to and the link to it is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDv4zGlQJjs

[CheshireCat]

Very nice of you to put a link up to crushing the cut but I know David even be fore he bought a boat ...

[ExSurveyor]

We were onboard from 27th to 3rd of January. It was minus 5 for a few nights.  The webasto played up a couple of times due to a  faulty remote sensor but we used  a fan heater in the main cabin and slim glass fronted convectors in the cabins,  with plug in  thermostats. 

The boat never got cold and zero condensation,  they were also cheap to run. 

Interestingly the roof had a heavy frost across the whole area all day and night,  1" ply with fibreglass over and under and a decent headlining obviously helps.  We have large areas of glass including 4 x  patio doors,  these are double glazed so the heat loss is minimal .. 

Almost home from home 

[Broads01]

I enjoyed blogs 12 & 13 Robin,  thanks again.  The Salhouse spit view was brilliant and I'm starting to see the benefits of winter trips.  I loved the shots of Thurne Mill sails turning (never seen that in real life) and the stuff you did at Irstead. 

[Vaughan]

I can't see why one should not run a Webasto all night on a boat and I have done so myself quite often, when on long delivery runs in winter.

The modern ones are a "room sealed" unit, so no worry about CO2 or CO. Just make sure the boat is moored so that exhaust gases cannot get back in from outside.

The real problem is the usual one - batteries! Do you have enough battery capacity for this, and are your alternator and battery bank big enough to accept the re-charge in a normal day's cruising?

If not, we are back to talking about shore power again!

[BroadAmbition]

Ah yes batteries, the bane of many a water borne money pit.  During the lads week in October it can be proper cold, not once have our chosen hire boats ever lasted all night long with the heater on as the batteries just won't stand for it.  'B.A' of course can do so, we have a domestic battery bank of six 110amp (Plus the cranking engine starting battery) so we can run the heater along with all the other stuff for an age.  Charging is no problem either, with a solar panel and two alternators onboard, this too is not 'Lucky' it's the way we planned and the system we opted for

Griff

[tjg1677]

On my boat i have benefitted from the famous barnes brinkcraft innovative thinking. My webasto and fridge are both 24 volts, which in turn is charged via a seperate engine alternator or the shore power charger. The system works superbly well and touch wood, have never had battery issues overnight.

Trev

[Hylander]

Thoroughly enjoyed the video blogs Robin.      Can we expect any more of your trip this time.        

[Hylander]

Robin just out of interest what make are the earphones that Sheila uses please.     I would like to purchase a pair.