Inside nb Parisien Star

Today we did a last supermarket shop as the car goes back tomorrow.  We called for help with the washing machine and they can't send someone out until Monday.  That will delay our departure from the marina but give us time to sort out the last jobs.  Mick has quite a few jobs on his list that were waiting for his tools to arrive.

- There's a mirror to go inside the wardrobe door.
- He is going to put rails up under the gunnels so we can hang things there to dry (especially towels).
- The new boat pole and plank need painting (they're at our feet in the living room).
- There'll be a rail under the cratch cover for hanging washing.
- Mick's going to make boxes for the base of the footstools for storage.

The next things we want to sort out are installing a solid fuel stove in the front corner of the boat and Mick will also install a shallow cupboard with mirrored doors in place of the current mirror in the bathroom.  It'll keep him busy for a while anyway.

We had good news and bad today.  Mick went to ask Alan, our boaty neighbour up on the hardstanding if he might be interested in our two armchairs.  He bought them!  We excitedly got online to order the leather chairs we saw when we were in Leyland and much to our disappointment they don't have the colour we want for 6-8 weeks.  With Alan having already demolished and discarded the sofa that the chairs were replacing we decided we'd just have to choose a different colour.  There was only ivory, brown, black or burgundy.  I didn't want anything lighter than the "mink" colour which was our first choice, we didn't want black or the brown so we ended up ordering the burgundy colour.  We've actually seen these chairs in use (on nb Kelly Louise) and I did like the colour.  They will arrive tomorrow.

These are for those of you who have asked what it's like inside the boat.  It's hard to imagine 10 boxes off belongings have been hidden away in here.

1. Our living room - looking to the front of the boat (there's still some stuff to sort out and put away).  You might notice the doors to outside are not adult human height.  We bang our heads regularly!
2. Living room - looking back to the galley.  Very cosy.
3. Galley (kitchen) - looking back
4. Galley - looking forward
5. Back of bathroom
6. Front of bathroom
7. Bedroom - looking back.  You can see the edge of the bed disappears under the gunnel.  It's my side of course!
8. Bedroom - looking forward.  A narrow section of the mattress can be folded up against the gunnel.  We can't be bothered making it up again each night so we leave it down.  That means we have to walk like crabs to get past as we can't walk upright down this narrow space.
9. Our dressing area.  We have to take it in turns.
10. Dinette - looking back.  This is my office - well, it will be once I have the rest set up.
11. Dinette - looking forward (Lois, note the tin... we love the fruit cake!)
12. Dinette - side hatch windows (we removed the horses today!).  Jack the dog comes to visit us each evening.  Because the boats are so low in the water (about knee height when you're standing inside), Jack sitting on the pontoon outside is at just the right height to poke his head in the window.