It has taken me a while to venture back into Blogland but I'm nearly ready to start penning, done enough pining and as per our nature we have been ever so busy. I think I'm sounding pommyfried!!
We have been back on Avalon Mist and if not always on her we have been nearby. When we flew out of NZ we were in raptures about all the good fortune that had buoyed us as we had packed up our lives to begin afresh in England. (Although I have had a period of being in my own Angerland - put it down to a grief process....but the glass is half full again). We even managed to get a standby upgrade with AirNZ and that was brilliant. Breezed into Heathrow with 4 suitcases, 2 full of necessary Job's-On tools. And Della's Possum & Ballduck, harness, leads and vet records ready for her arrival in late April.
A couple of good nights sleep and hospitality at Chateau St Margarets (thanks Pops) and we were ready for the drive up the M1 in the rental car. Popped into IKEA, Wembly for a cheap but cheerful meatball plate and 5 hours later we were at Mercia Marina. The bright red car in the carpark was our new motor. So handy to have wheels and to have a SatNav, not to mention 6 gears and reverse! I've never heard of a car having 6 gears but then I've been mostly driving automatics in recent years!
The walk down to Avalon Mist was exciting but I should have known falling over on the steps down to the boardwalk was an ominous start....
Saturday, 7 April 2012
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A brief history
This is a blog set up by Chris and Sarah so family and friends can catch up with their travels on the British waterways in the summer of 2011. In 2010, I went to England with the idea of getting a narrow boat built. I had specific requirements so I thought that a new build may be the way to go. I e mailed to numerous boat builders, a great percentage of whom ignored me. The problem of having a family name of Laycock is that hotmail and a few others think that I am a porn star. At an early age you learn not to put C Laycock on your school books. But I guess that my nephew Paul did worse. Anyway I spent a very pleasant few weeks driving around the beautiful English countryside visiting boatyards, marinas, boat builders and just a few pubs. I had narrowed it down to two builders and in the last week I was in Devizes Wiltshire when I came across "Avalon Mist" 54 feet of throbbing neglected narrow boat. The past owner had lost interest, hadn’t maintained her and to add insult to injury had been made redundant. After a very short negotiation I was able to buy her for a pretty fair price. On the day the sale took place I had to beg her to take her trainers and a few rather suspect items of clothing, in other words she left everything. Lock stock and barrel.
Soon after the purchase I flew to California to meet Sarah and have a short holiday. Once back in NZ I started to try and organize works. The first thing that I learnt was that the marina does not allow any contractor on site, only their chosen ones, the excuse given is a concern about insurance, the suspicion is, graft, pay back, baksheesh, call it what you like. It is possible to take the boat off the marina to have the work done, but not really practical.
The first job to be tackled was to “winterize” the boat, i.e. drain off all the water, check the anti freeze in the engine and central heating and fit an automatic bilge pump.
No real problem there except communication, the mechanic just didn’t answer e mails. Difficult to do business like that.
The nice marina lady had a quiet word with him, and things did improve, thanks Debs you have been a star through out . He later confided in me the reason for this was that he was dyslexic, apparently a malady [he] claims affects a lot of mechanics.[It turns out that he is a great mechanic and a nice guy to boot].
That goes pretty high on my list of lame excuses, the top one being a really nice Irish guy Pat, who I had employed as a carpenter years ago when I lived in London. He was always a bit late for work, when I finally collared him about it; he said he could never decide what to wear to work.
Nice one Pat.
I digress, the boat was winterized, which was just as well as it was a cold one and the whole marina froze over.
Next job was to have her taken out of the water, have the hull stripped back to bare metal and have a bit of over plating done. There were a couple of areas where there was pitting, and I though if she’s out of the water, may as well do the job right, so a small amount of over plating and then the hull was blacked, and the engine bay partially de-rusted and then back in the water.
Seems like a good job was done, I had the marine surveyor who had done the original survey, check out all the major works and give me written reports and photos, so all good except once again communications.
I then came across a great guy, the partner of the woman who runs the marina and a carpenter/narrow boat fitter outer .He replaced the stern deck and did a great job, also did a great job on de-greasing, de-rusting and painting the engine compartment. A job I should have done myself, but I just didn’t fancy it, not only that be was great with communications and chasing other people up
So that takes us up to present.
There needs to be a bit of electrical work, not much. The outside is badly in need of paint, Sarah and I can do that and a bit of a tidy up inside, and then she will be a really nice boat.
Soon after the purchase I flew to California to meet Sarah and have a short holiday. Once back in NZ I started to try and organize works. The first thing that I learnt was that the marina does not allow any contractor on site, only their chosen ones, the excuse given is a concern about insurance, the suspicion is, graft, pay back, baksheesh, call it what you like. It is possible to take the boat off the marina to have the work done, but not really practical.
The first job to be tackled was to “winterize” the boat, i.e. drain off all the water, check the anti freeze in the engine and central heating and fit an automatic bilge pump.
No real problem there except communication, the mechanic just didn’t answer e mails. Difficult to do business like that.
The nice marina lady had a quiet word with him, and things did improve, thanks Debs you have been a star through out . He later confided in me the reason for this was that he was dyslexic, apparently a malady [he] claims affects a lot of mechanics.[It turns out that he is a great mechanic and a nice guy to boot].
That goes pretty high on my list of lame excuses, the top one being a really nice Irish guy Pat, who I had employed as a carpenter years ago when I lived in London. He was always a bit late for work, when I finally collared him about it; he said he could never decide what to wear to work.
Nice one Pat.
I digress, the boat was winterized, which was just as well as it was a cold one and the whole marina froze over.
Next job was to have her taken out of the water, have the hull stripped back to bare metal and have a bit of over plating done. There were a couple of areas where there was pitting, and I though if she’s out of the water, may as well do the job right, so a small amount of over plating and then the hull was blacked, and the engine bay partially de-rusted and then back in the water.
Seems like a good job was done, I had the marine surveyor who had done the original survey, check out all the major works and give me written reports and photos, so all good except once again communications.
I then came across a great guy, the partner of the woman who runs the marina and a carpenter/narrow boat fitter outer .He replaced the stern deck and did a great job, also did a great job on de-greasing, de-rusting and painting the engine compartment. A job I should have done myself, but I just didn’t fancy it, not only that be was great with communications and chasing other people up
So that takes us up to present.
There needs to be a bit of electrical work, not much. The outside is badly in need of paint, Sarah and I can do that and a bit of a tidy up inside, and then she will be a really nice boat.
Love it! You both are an inspiration to us stay at homes.
ReplyDeleteWelcome back to batty boaty blogland Sarah!
ReplyDeleteKeep up the good work next door, curtains next eh?
From neighbours Heth & Dave xx :-)
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ReplyDelete