Kingfishers

Last night was very cold and even though the wood burner was lit all night, we still felt the cold air, despite being warm in bed. Phil has a heavy cold, so I decided to get up early, get the fire up and running properly again, to warm the boat and to get out for a walk in search of a kingfisher.

I had heard that several had been seen south, but for some reason I decided to walk north up the tow path. It was a lovely morning and the colours were beautiful:

The views across to the Trough of Bowland were very special and made me want to get out on the hills for a walk, but Phil is not well enough at the moment.

A few hundred yards later I was rewarded with a flash of bright blue hurtling along the canal and I knew I had found my kingfisher. Unfortunately, he was always too far away to get a decent picture.

 I was pleased to get a shot of him in flight.

I met a dog walker on my way back who told me that she often sees him and she showed me his regular perch, so I resolved to set up camp there one day next week and to lie in wait for him, so that I don't have to chase him along the canal.

When I came back, Phil was up and about and was well enough to do some wood chopping, so we spent a happy hour or two stocking up our wood store with logs from a tree a friend had recently felled and given to us.

All in all, it's been a great day, reinforcing again our reasons for moving to the boat. The closeness to nature and the simplicity of the life is wonderful!

A very happy Al :)

Happy New Year!

I arrived back from a long work stint in India just before Christmas and am now well over the jet lag and tiredness having done two 'back to back' tours with only a few days in between back in the UK. I love India, the country is fascinating and the people are wonderful, optimistic and hospitable.

So far I haven't been booked for any work in 2015 so I'm feeling just a little bit twitchy. Being self employed is hard sometimes. We could just about manage without me working, but it would be a very much 'hand to mouth' existence. However, that is why we moved to the boat, so that I didn't have to constantly worry about getting enough work to pay the mortgage etc. on the house. I met a number of other musicians on my travels this time and it is interesting to see how so many of them work themselves into the ground, just to ensure they can sustain a reasonable lifestyle. I wouldn't recommend that anyone goes into the music profession as a career, it's too insecure.

We are now in our fifth year of living on the boat and I am still absolutely besotted with the lifestyle. This is a common theme on the marina. Everyone I talk to who is moored here, just loves living on a boat. Currently, most of them are like very similar to us in interests and aspirations, so many a happy hour is spent chatting away on the jetty about recent wildlife sightings and fell walks we have done.

I remember the scepticism with which many of our friends greeted our decision to live aboard. Some kind people advised us to at least give it a year before we threw in the towel! I don't think many thought that we would still be so totally content with the lifestyle five years on.

We have learnt a lot in that time mind you and our existence is much more comfortable as a result. Within days of first moving on we had the harshest winter in living memory and it was difficult to keep warm. Now we have double glazing, a curtain at the door, which helps with insulation, canopies at front and back which provide extra space and keep the rain out, a dehumidifier to get on top of the condensation and a wall panel heater which keeps the chill out. We also are now quite expert at keeping a good fire going and keeping it burning all night. All of these things have made a huge difference to our comfort in cold weather.

This winter, the weather has been quite mild. The canal has only frozen over twice and then with only a thin layer of ice:

We have heard the otter splashing about under the boat in the dead of night, but so far we still have no sightings on camera despite having it positioned at the end of our boat. I'm hoping that our patience will one day be rewarded. I'm also planning to capture a kingfisher on film this winter. We have quite a few on the canal and the marina at this time of year, outside of their breeding season.

On the domestic front, most of the fruit gin which has been steeping over the last few months has been decanted. The sloe gin was rather bitter, so I have added more sugar and left it for another few weeks, but the plum brandy, blackberry whisky and cranberry gin all came out well. What was most successful was the raspberry whisky made with raspberries from our allotment. This tastes absolutely gorgeous and I will definitely make more next year.

The allotment is mostly dug over now until the spring, although we still have some leeks growing for making soup.

On the negative side, Phil has been diagnosed recently with an immune deficiency illness which affects his thyroid and makes him quite weak and weary. He has to have vitamin B12 injections every few weeks which perk him up a bit, but he is finding it increasingly difficult to do the heavy work which is part and parcel of living on a boat. I am very happy to chop wood, empty the toilet etc, when I am here, so for now we can overcome that obstacle, but we are not completely sure how much longer we will be fit enough to sustain the lifestyle.

In addition we are finding it disproportionately expensive at the moment, with the mooring fees probably the most expensive in the country. This is because we have residential status, but our local council has jumped on the band wagon and is charging us full council tax and has back dated it to when the planning permission for residential status was first agreed. Currently they are taking £330 per month from us. Don't get me wrong, we don't mind paying an element of council tax, but when the marina owners are paying business rates and we are also paying them council tax within our mooring fee, it would seem that we are paying twice.

For the moment though, we are battling on and hope to spend at least a few more years living our dream.

I'll leave you with some lovely sunset pictures I have taken over the last few days. The light at this time of year is very special:

It just remains to wish you all a very happy New Year!

Al :)