Back up North

After a hard working, but enjoyable few days at conference in the Midlands, I am back home.

It is ironic that I was less than half a mile away from the grand union canal but didn't manage to get out the entire three days I was away. I didn't really have time to fret about not being outdoors and I did have two baths every day, but I was glad to get back home and get some fresh air.

The first 'person' I saw was Jack the whippet, who was standing outside our closed up boat whimpering. I crept up behind him and surprised him. I think he was pleased to see me judging by the way he bounced around me!

I took him for a quick walk as it was starting to get dark and it was so lovely to be out and about.

He is now dossing contentedly on our bed:

Al :)





Money saving experiments

As if boating isn't inexpensive enough, boaters tend to be always looking for new ways to save money. A friend sent me a post from the canal forum about the exhorbitant price of toilet fluid and how to get around paying so much.

We spent many months trying out various brands when we first moved to the boat and the one thing I hated was the chemical smell, especially as our bedroom is very close to the bathroom and I would sometimes wake up in the night to that horrible chemical smell. We eventually found an organic fluid which didn't smell too bad, but then it wasn't too good at covering other smells if you know what I mean!

At the moment we are using a fluid which we get from our local chandlery, but bearing in mind that we empty our toilet cassette every other day, we seem to be buying quite a lot of it and it is quite expensive stuff.

The suggestion on the forum is that bio washing powder and a little washing soda does the job just as well. I bought both for a grand total of £3 from our local pound shop and they should last for about two months which beats spending over a tenner every three weeks for the blue fluid. You put in a couple of teaspoonfuls of washing powder and soda every time you empty the cassette. We have only just started trialling this, but so far our toilet smells of fresh laundry, so it is all looking quite promising. I will keep you posted.

We went for a lovely bird watching walk this morning as the weather was so lovely. I got a couple of nice but small pics of the birds:

Also one of a swan in flight:

And some grazing:

We walked along some lovely country lanes:

And the scenery was lovely:

What really pleased me was the discovery of a veritable wood graveyard! I had encountered lots of wood washed up on these shores before, but have never seen so much as we found today. It was all along the shore line and stretched for a couple of miles:

We collected as much as we could carry and I spent the afternoon chopping wood and filling the other wood store:

The beauty of the wood washed up along the estuary is that is has already been seasoned from being so long in the sea, so we can burn it straight away. I told Jack's owner about the find and we plan to go and fill a couple of car loads with it. It will take us a whole day probably, but we will be able to fill the middle wood store:

It means that we will then have another year where we haven't spent anything on wood. Our first year we bought logs quite regularly, but this year we haven't had to buy any logs or kindling, which has saved us a couple of hundred pounds.

I have had a lovely week off, but am back to work tomorrow and at the end of the week I am off to a conference for a few days, so I probably won't be posting for over a week now.

I'll be back soon

Al:)

Indulgence

I have just spent two days doing things I could only dream of a couple of years ago.

When we lived in the house I was constantly busy, even during time when I wasn't officially working. I would either be catching up on housework or preparing for the next few weeks of work. So I never had time to indulge myself and if I did I usually felt guilty.

Yesterday morning, I met a good friend for coffee and a long chat and then Phil and I went to the cinema in the afternoon. I started my old pattern of feeling guilty at having spent the whole day enjoying myself and maybe being a little self indulgent, but then I realised that these things are not just about me, it's important for the other people too. Over the years I have lost a lot of friends because they got fed up with me always being too busy to spend time with them. The upside is that the friends I have left are loyal and real stayers!! I used to meet up occasionally with the friend I met yesterday, but I was always stressed and rushing. It was a joy to sit and relax with her and I know I will see her again soon as well, instead of only once or twice a year!

Today has been lovely too. Phil booked me a spa morning at a local beauty clinic and by lunch time I was in a purple haze having been saunaed, jacussied, massaged and generally pampered! We went to the pub for lunch and sat and marvelled at how our lives have changed. We spend more time together and are both so much more relaxed.

The weather is improving and we are planning to be on the move quite soon which may hopefully add some interest to my musings, So keep watching this space!

Al

Living the Dream

Yesterday was fantastic! Nothing special, just everything about why we moved to the boat....

We got up quite late (9am) after a lovely lie in. The boat was warm because our central heating switch is by the bed, so I switched it on at about 7am and there was enough hot water for the two of us to have a shower.

Phil decided that he would go out and do some shopping and get some petrol and the only place to get cheap petrol and do a big shop is through the town and out the other side. Quite a long trip, so I knew I would have some peace to do my own thing!

I did some work on my website as the weather was a bit dull, but as it brightened up I just had to get out! I decided to sort out our wood store which was a mess, and also we had lots of wood which needed chopping up and putting away to season. I spent a very happy afternoon sawing wood and stacking it in the store and this is the result:

Jack then arrived back from a trip with his owner and danced around me trying to say the one word 'walk' that he was thinking of. I took the hint and walked him along the towpath in pursuit (unsuccessfully) of the otter.

The late afternoon sky looked quite magnificant:

Having chopped all that wood and sorted out our supplies for at least the next year, I still couldn't resist picking up a MEGA bit of wood I found on the tow path. It was about 20ft long, but thin so I was able to drag it home! I passed a couple of boaters on the tow path who as it happened were chopping wood, so a bit of banter ensued about my bit of wood compared to what they had managed to collect. It was a fun and friendly conversation and is what boating is all about - we all are there for each other and it is a great community.

I got back to a cracking fire which had settled nicely. Recently we compared our fuel costs on the boat with what we had paid in the house. We were paying £145 per month for our gas and electricity in our house and that was every month, even in the summer when we were hardly using any power. Phil has been keeping a record of what we have spent since October when the weather started to get a bit colder and to date we have spent £412 over 5 months which includes coal and diesel and we pay virtually nothing in the summer .... Quite a saving eh?!

I then made mince pies using some mince meat that T had bought us. She often buys us stuff to say 'Thank you' for having Jack. I also made some pizza for tea and Jack turned up just as we were finishing, so had the scraps!

Today was even better than yesterday! We now live within an hours drive of the Lake District so decided to celebrate valentines day by having a lovely walk together. As Phil said 'Most men take their wives out for a meal for valentines day, but I take you up a mountain!' I can't think of any better way to celebrate than to be sharing a common interest with the person you love.

There was quite a bit of snow as we neared the top and the weather closed in. Since there were some big drops we decided to call it a day just before we reached the summit, but still had a nasty ridge to negotiate on the way down:

It had seemed quite manageable on the way up although the wind was strong and we struggled to stay upright at times:

When we eventually got down after a 5 hour walk we were really very tired and cold. The wind chill at the top had been quite horrendous and even our hot chocolate had gone cold when we had stopped for a hot drink, despite being in a normally really efficient flask. We had a quick drink and a warm by the fire in the pub and headed for home.

It was so lovely to come back to our cosy boat after such an active and sometimes anxious day. I cooked a roast dinner (we'd shopped yesterday in anticipation of being out all day), Jack called by and had some left over chicken and is now next to me snoozing as I write this. Jack's owner dropped by with some mince pies she had made, which put mine to shame.

I know all of this is not everyone's idea of bliss, but it is mine and I just love every minute of my life now living on the boat. This has been my dream in the past and now it is my reality. I feel as though I am truly 'living the dream'

In 1854 Henry David Thoreau wrote about his experiment of living alone in the woods for a couple of years. In his conclusion he says:

' I learned this, at least, by my experiment; that if one advances confidently in the direction of ones dreams and endeavours to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours'

Absolutely right!

Al :)

 

Fog

The planned walk was cancelled due to thick fog which hung around all day, so I had a walk down the canal trying to find some otters which had been seen just a couple of bridges down:

The canal looked quite quite spooky, especially with much of it still iced over  .....

This afternoon I went up to the University to play my beautiful piano :)

I came back to find Jack the whippet waiting outside our boat, so let him in to have a snooze by the fire. We put an old coat on the chair for him but he loves to lay his head on one of our cushions! he has ideas above his station that dog!

Looking forward to a brighter day tomorrow

Al 

Wellies and Whippets

Having taken Jack on his favourite bit of the tow path yesterday and having got my boots and jeans covered in mud yet again, I decided it was time I bought some wellies. They were selling some lovely bright cheerful ones in town and they were half price, so I bought them. When I got back Son number two and girlfriend had arrived to watch the football and they fell about laughing at the sight of the wellies. Phil has declared that he will not be seen with me when I am wearing them. I think that is a tad unfair, they're not that bad are they?

I had a lovely walk with Jack the whippet who didn't seem to have any trouble being seen with me in my wellies! We went up to the local farm to buy some milk and eggs. That is one of his favourite walks because there are so many interesting smells around the farm. I think he knew he was having a special walk because he kept running, leaping in the air and coming back to nuzzle my leg all the way down the tow path.

Up at the farm I took a picture of where we live, you can just see the buildings around the marina, it is so rural I love it:

I arrived back just as the football was finishing, a good result so everyone was happy. The only thing to do after a result like that was to go and celebrate with a meal out at our favourite local pub. After a lovely meal and having dropped son and girlfriend off at their house, we arrived back at the boat and watched a really exciting performance of Bach's Brandenburg Concertos on Sky Arts, so a great day for entertainment overall.  

We are going to get an early night as we are climbing Blencathra tomorrow. I did it a few years ago via the notorious sharp edge ridge which was quite scary. We are going to do a safer route tomorrow in view of the snow and ice, but it will still be quite strenuous.  

:)

Owls

It has been a misty day. We hoped to go in search of owls with our new camera and it was looking unlikely that the weather would be right, until the mist started to clear early afternoon:

It was lovely driving through the country lanes to the owls' usual haunt. I feel so lucky that the countryside is so accessible to us now.

We met two other birdwatchers there who had their tripods, binoculars and cameras set up. They had state of the art cameras with telescopic lenses which made my camera look very small and insignificant.

Within minutes of us arriving, the owl appeared and started hunting. All you could hear was the fast clicking of three cameras and the occasional gasp as it headed straight at us a couple of times. It seemed to know that we were watching because it put on an amazing display for us. After several dives and unsuccessful attempts to catch something, it flew off. One of the other bird watchers said 'I think that deserves a round of applause' Absolutely!

Not having a telephoto lens, our pics were quite distant, but still better than with the old camera:

 

I'm looking forward to getting some more bird pictures in the future and if I could get the Kingfisher I would be thrilled to bits - we will see.

Al :)

Talking Dogs

Yesterday I got back from my second long day at work to find Jack the whippet waiting for me. When he doesn't see me properly for a couple of days he gets really annoyed as he can't understand why I disappear instead of taking him for walks. On these occasions I get an enthusiastic welcome but accompanied by a cacophany of howling and yelping as he tells me what a terrible time he's had and 'how dare I go off and leave him'. He's perfectly happy with T his owner and he sees Phil whenever he wants, but he seems to only feel really contented when he has all three of us to himself. When T comes over for a drink and we are all chatting, he will lie on the floor and snooze between us the picture of contentment and happiness.

We always know when Jack is really happy because he turns himself upside down .....

On the subject of talking dogs, I was sent a link by an old college friend of mine to this youtube video. His sister lives on a narrowboat too and writes books about the adventures of her dog Chico.

It's fun video if you have a couple of minutes to watch it .....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cf-PWpfqVyE


Al :0

Iced In

The weather is getting colder and we have been keeping the fire in over night. It is a good job we did last night because we woke up this morning to a big freeze! We were actually unaware of it when we woke up because the boat was so warm. It was only when I got out of bed, walked down the boat and heard the creak and crunch of the ice underneath that it dawned on me that we were frozen in. This was confirmed on looking out of the window:

 

The poor ducks only have small pools of water to swim in:

So I thought I had better give them some food this morning:

 

I have some major work to do which forms part of my contract for the company who send me abroad. The deadline for this is next Friday which, if I don't meet it I won't have my contract renewed. Although they are paying me for 3 hours to do it, it will actually take me much longer, so I spent all morning indoors working solidly and still haven't finished! I was completely stir crazy by then, so needed to be outside doing something active. The sawing frame came out and I set to sawing up some of the wood I had collected from the tow path, ably assisted by my canine companion Jack in his smart new coat:

I was going to fill up with water today, but I left the hose outside over night and it is frozen solid inside. I have now brought it inside the canopy and hope it will be defrosted by tomorrow!

All this sawing, chopping and foraging has meant that I have become quite strong over the last few months. I bought a bag of coal from the marina caretaker today and normally he would bring it over to my boat, but I could see he was busy so collected it myself. The bags weigh 20kg and it felt as light as a feather to me. All this physical work is better than gym membership!!

A ;)

A productive day

I have got so much done today it has been fantastic! Maybe the bright sunshine and the cold weather has energised me, but I seem to have not stopped all day!

I started the day by recording some more tracks for my website. I then prepared some soup for lunch and put a beef casserole in the slow cooker for tea. I picked up an email offering me a days work in Manchester at the beginning of March and took a 'phone call asking if I could play for a wedding in May.

I love the variety of my work and especially playing for weddings. Whether I just play while the guests are arriving, during the meal or for the actual ceremony, it is a great feeling that you are contributing to someones special day. I love also meeting with the prospective Bride and Groom and talking about their favourite music. It often involves arranging something specially for the day, I remember a wedding I played for last Christmas, which a flautist friend and I did. We had arranged 'their' song for the bride to walk up the aisle to and she was crying as we played it, (I hope it wasn't our playing!). I started filling up myself as it is such an emotional occasion. Another wedding I remember well, I had timed the bride's walk to perfection, but when it came to it she kept breaking down with emotion and had to stop every few yards to recover her composure. Luckily that time, it was only me playing so I managed to improvise a sort of middle bit and still played the final chord exactly as she arrived next to the groom.

Having forced myself to stay indoors all morning I felt justified in going out this afternoon. T and I chopped up several pallets of wood and then took the car down the back lane near to the bridge where the tree felling had taken place. Although we had told lots of people about the wood, no one had been near, so we filled the boot up, drove it back and filled our depleted wood stores with it. It won't be fit for burning for quite a few months, but it felt good to already be getting ready for next year!

It has been a very busy day, but extremely productive. I am knackered now though! Tomorrow I have lots of paper work to do which I cannot shirk, because if I don't do it, I will not be offered work this year by the company I work for who send me abroad, (I won't bore you with the details). I know I am going to be frustrated as the weather is forecast to be fine tomorrow. I hope that if I work hard I will have some time to go and collect more of the cut wood on the tow path which is still plentiful.

We will see - watch this space.

A very tired Al

Karma

Another lovely bright, sunny, but cold day. We managed to keep the fire in all night so the boat was warm when we got up.

The chores this morning took an unexpected turn when I found a bit of a sausage roll under Phil's pillow while making the bed. This is not the first time this has happened, I have been finding bits of bacon rind, garlic bread and all sorts of scraps over the last few weeks. Needless to say Phil denied all knowledge and it was only when I mentioned it to Jack's owner this morning that all became clear. She said 'Oh no he's not started doing that again has he? I meant to warn you about that'. Apparently when he was a puppy, he would often hide tit bits of food he was given so he could eat them later!

As I was making my way to the rubbish bins I saw a cyclist coming towards the gate in full regalia, fluorescent top and all. I moved into position to challenge him - we often get people wandering around taking pictures and walking up and down the jettys, picnicing on our benches, because they think the marina looks 'pretty'. There are notices everywhere saying that the area is private, but this seems to make no difference. I often ask intruders how they would like to have people wandering up and down their front drive, or garden and plonking themselves down to have their packed lunch.

However this chap took the wind out of my sails by asking if I was Phil's wife as he had been told to seek me out by our marina caretaker, as being a keen cyclist I would very likely have the equipment to repair a puncture. I duly obliged and it turns out he was quite an interesting bloke, so we had a nice chat. His puncture had resulted from spurning the proper local cycle paths for the tow path. He was riding a road bike with totally unsuitable tyres so I gave him directions to the nearest cycle path and he was soon on his way having thanked us effusively.

That good turn was rewarded within the hour as I was walking Jack along the tow path. I couldn't believe my luck as I came upon some trees that had just been felled.

I rushed back to the boat and Jack's owner and I took a shopping trolley and a wheelbarrow and managed to get quite a lot back to our wood store. We plan to go back tomorrow and collect some more, although there may not be much left by then. We told some of our friends who are moored opposite and the tow path telegraph is swift and effective. That is fine as long as everyone gets a fair crack at it.

I have had a lovely day pottering around but must buckle down to some work tomorrow. I just find it so hard to stay indoors when the weather is good and I do need to chop up some of that wood and put it in the store to season. It will burn beautifully this time next year .........

Al ;)