How lucky are we?

• Thoughts

We have all been affected by the Coronavirus lockdown, not least those that are living and trying to travel on their canal boats. Movement has been forbidden, apart from topping up water and fuel, for the last 7 weeks. This means they have been stuck at a canalside mooring for all that time, and still cannot move on. Fine if you happen to have been on a nice mooring when it was imposed, but not so nice if your spot is less pleasant. After all, the reason many are living this lifestyle is to travel.

As our followers will be aware, we decided last November to move into a house here in Wales over the winter months. How lucky was that?

Our plans for this year, to return to the canals and travel again this summer, had to be abandoned. We have extended our mooring reservation in Droitwich for a year, to make sure we have somewhere to keep Brandy Pad. Although the restrictions in England have changed slightly, in Wales they have not and we are still unable to visit the boat. Even in England, you cannot make an overnight journey to your boat, hence those living a long way from their mooring are also unable to visit.

View of the marina from the bow

We have a couple of cameras onboard, which enable us to keep an eye on things.

This is a view from the bow. You may have seen similar views on our website previously.

Inside the saloon

This is the current interior view. Everything is safe, secure and dry.

Langland Bay, Mumbles (click for a better view)

On top of being fortunate enough to have moved ashore before this terrible situation developed, we are extremely lucky to be living close to the coast and we are able to take regular walks, for exercise, through a local nature reserve and along the Coast Path. This is a recent photo I took while out for one of our walks, on a lovely, sunny day.

So, all in all, how lucky are we?

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Finally on the move

• Moving
• On the move
• Thoughts

So, after 4 weeks in the marina, we are FINALLY able to set off on our travels.  I sold the car yesterday, which was the one thing that was still tying us down.  Today we left the marina and having stopped to top up our fuel, we set off to Braunston. Only travelled 4.7 miles and 5 locks, but that was not bad going.

Along the route, we travelled through the Braunston tunnel.  For those of you who have never travelled on a canal, tunnels are basically just holes dug through the hill.  No lighting, no towpath, just the darkness and a semi-circular brick or concrete wall and roof. This one was over a mile long.  We have a headlight on the front of the boat that lights the inside of the tunnel immediately ahead of you, which helps you see where the walls are and steer straight along the middle.  This is actually quite difficult as you cannot see very far ahead – there is nothing to see. So you tend to weave your way along, trying not to bounce off the sides too much.  Today the tunnel was full of mist, which just reflects the light back at you so all you can actually see is a white haze in front of you and no wall.  Fortunately, turning on all the lights in the boat means you can at least see the walls alongside you, so you just try and estimate where the wall is going to be a few feet ahead.

The other thing the headlight does is let other boats coming towards you know you are there.  Today, for the first time in all our experiences of tunnels over the years, we met someone coming the other way – a bit over halfway through.  At first you see a tiny light ahead and you wonder is that the exit?  Then it dawns on you that it the wrong colour and might be too close, although you cannot really tell as you have no reference for distance.  As you get closer to each other (guessing how close you actually are) you slow down and try to keep as close as you can to the right-hand side (starboard).  On top of that, most headlights tend to be on the right-hand side of the boat (to better see the wall you are supposed to be keeping close to), which means as well as being dazzled by the light, you cannot actually tell where the nearside of their boat is.  Suddenly you see their bow and with only a minor bump of the wall and touch of the oncoming boat, you whizz past each other at about 4 mph.  Just time to exchange a greeting and then on your way.  Interesting experience and no wonder you have to pre-book passage if you are in a wide-beam boat, which is roughly twice the width – you would not be able to pass each other, and someone would have to try and reverse out, maybe for a mile!

It has, however, turned out to be a lovely day.  Mild, not too windy and intermittent sunshine.  One advantage of cruising this time of year is that you pretty well have the canal to yourself.  I think we passed about three other boats going the other way, including the one in the tunnel.  Fingers crossed for another nice one tomorrow.

Arriving at Braunston

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Moving house – to boat!

• Thoughts

We are well under way with the business of moving.  Of course, most of you will have experienced it yourselves, but it is somewhat different for us.  Although we are moving, basically nothing is coming with us.  All that we will be taking onto Brandy Pad will be stored for a short period in a small storage unit. Everything else and I mean EVERYTHING else has to go.  Those of you who saw our garage, with a lifetime’s collection of tools etc, will appreciate some of the problem.  All my tools (with the exception of the few that I am taking onto the boat) have to go.  Air compressors, tile cutters, chain saw, power washer, ladders, chop saw, axle stands, winch, ramps, the list of stuff I have accumulated goes on and on.  One good thing about it has been that I discovered loads of bits and pieces I thought I had lost but were buried.  We took a lot of stuff to a very well organised car boot sale last weekend.  That got rid of a huge amount of it.  The trouble with car boot sales is that although we weren’t really doing it to make money, rather that things went to good homes and not landfill, people don’t want to spend more than 50p or £1.  So, it was hard work and we met a lot of “characters”.  We also made about £160 on the day, so that wasn’t too bad.

Then we get to the contents of the house.  Given that we bought this house not least so that we could host large family gatherings, we had a LOT of bedding, cutlery, crockery, you name it.  It has almost all gone.  All we are left with is enough to make sure the house does not look empty to buyers, although as we currently have one it is to be hoped we won’t have to impress anyone else!  Beds, wardrobes, dining table, coffee table, office desks, settee, armchair all have to go.  Even the TV.  The weird thing is that you would think it gets easier as you go along.  It doesn’t.  The decisions become more and more refined.  The early decisions on obvious things like junk are relatively straight forward.  Yesterday we cleared out three chests of drawers (down to three drawers – one each and a bathroom/medicine one).  So, it was down to the recycling centre this morning to get rid of the spare socks, pants, handkerchiefs  and general bric-a-brac that was eliminated before we have time to change our minds.  It is astonishing how many bottles of vitamin pills and the like we found.  A huge bag of now redundant towels went to the dogs home.  The dogs will love the scented smells of the washing liquid.

Looming now is selling the trailer and then my much loved Land Rover Discovery (I’m open to sensible offers).  Once that has gone, we will be completely without a vehicle and will just hire one as and when we need one.

Eventually, of course, we will be moving back into a land based home.  Have no idea where or when, but when the time comes, we will have the fun of reversing all this off loading.  By then, we will have become so used to minimal living, that we will not need to buy much to replace what we are now getting rid of.

As a last thought, take a walk around your house.  See if you can work out what you would get rid of when you have to downsize (and I don’t mean the kids/grand-kids).  It is not as easy as you might think. 😉

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