Weather madness

We had a quiet day today after staying up til midnight watching the snooker masters.  It was mild and we went for a good but muddy walk.

There's been a heatwave back home with days and days of scorching weather into the 40's.  Melbourne is in the midst of the longest heatwave in 100 years.  There's been tennis players collapsing at the Australian Open, melting bitumen on the roads, bushfire warnings, and paramedics under pressure.  The bushfire risk is worrying as this is the worst weather situation for fires since the 2009 disaster.  There are fires already burning and lightening strikes starting new blazes in South Australia and Victoria.

Every email I've received from home in the last few days has been full of talk of the heat.  We don't miss that!

BSS - a perfect score

Our boat safety scheme certificate expires in March so we decided to sort a new one while we're in the marina.  It would give us time to rectify anything that needed attention.  The Acorn Aarrow stove has been fitted since the last BSS so we didn't know if this might require additional ventilation to satisfy the BSS.  My own research suggested it was all still fine but I'm no expert on the matter.

We had it booked in for today and kept fingers crossed.  Mick desperately wanted to have no fails on the BSS... that's just how he is.  He got his wish.  We had a perfect score.  The examiner even commented that the stove is the best retrofit installation he's seen to comply with the new guidelines and took a photo of it!  Well done Mick and thanks Roger Olver for your advice and guidance.

So nb Parisien Star is all set for the next four years.

Back in marina

Aston Marina to Stone visitor moorings: 2 miles, 2 locks
To date : 961 miles, 678 locks  

We got our mornings errands done in Stone. Mick had no luck with the dentist who refused to witness our document because he hadn't known Mick for 2 years.? He had more luck with having his teeth checked and cleaned, costing a whole £18. He did say they were no way near as thorough as his dentist at home but the cost would have been half what we it costs at our dentist.

I decided to try the bank for our document. The list of possible witnesses includes school principal, solicitor, pharmacist. The bank said its their policy not to witness documents. We had agreed we would give it one more go, so three attempts, before telling them they'd need to sort the problem themselves back home. It seemed things are different here and nobody wants to witness a document unless they've known you for 2 years. Goodness knows what new migrants are supposed to do. On the way back I passed a pharmacy and thought I'd give it one more go. He was a very helpful fellow and seeing my folder of ID and hearing my explanation, he readily agreed to witness the document.  Finally!

We had lunch back at the boat and headed off back to the marina. We hovered mid canal to chat with Barry when we passed them. He's not keen on reversing the boat so they had opted for mooring down by the scout hall.

Wednesday was a quiet day of catching up with washing.  We went for a walk to Aston village when I'd finished my work for the day.  The marina field was good and muddy with the worst spot just by the marina being so bad there's really nowhere to step any more that doesn't sink into mud.  I was glad I'd worn my old walking shoes.  They haven't been out of the cupboard since my dunking in the canal a few months back.

The river that runs by the canal had a good flow going but there hasn't been all that much rain lately so it isn't high.  The little footpath beside the lowest point of the road appears to have been cleared in readiness for flooding.  When we came this way a few weeks ago it was so overgrown that you couldn't walk on it.

Out for a cruise

Aston Marina to Stone visitor moorings: 2 miles, 2 locks
To date : 959 miles, 676 locks  

Woohooo!  We're out!!

We decided that as we need diesel and a pump out it would be silly to leave the berth to go and do those things and not make the most of it and cruise on.  The weather looked good for the morning and again for tomorrow so off we went.  Alas it meant missing afternoon tea again but with early appointments in Stone tomorrow it was worth taking advantage of the nice weather.

We ticked off our mental list of things to be done before leaving the marina mooring.... pram hood, chimney, aerial, electric lead, centre ropes on.  We decided to turn at the winding hole below the Stone bottom lock and reverse through the lock onto the visitor moorings above.  They get a bit more sunshine.  That was the plan and we had our fingers crossed there'd be moorings available.

I steered into Aston Lock, worrying that I'd be so out of practice that I'd make a mess of it but didn't even touch the sides.  It was gloriously sunny and felt great to be out.  We enjoyed the short cruise into Stone and as we rounded the bend we could see moorings... empty ones!  The serial offenders must have been moved on.  There's two boats still there from before we went into the marina.  So they've been there for a good 8 weeks, one of them on a 48 hour mooring and the other on a 5 day mooring. 

We encountered another boat reversing back to his mooring from the water point at Stone so lurked at the winding hole to wait for him.  I walked up to the lock to assess the mooring situation above.  The timing was good as another boat was reversing back into the lock to come down so we could go up after them.  It's the first time we're reversed into a lock and it looked so strange from the lock side.  It all went well and we even got my favourite mooring.  Perfect.

I worked for a few hours with light streaming in both sides of the boat and a lovely outlook while Mick went out to do a couple of errands.  One of them was a failure.  We have a statutory declaration that we need to have witnessed.  We tried the police station the other day and there was no police officers in residence so Mick went again today.  They wouldn't witness it!  The sergeant said he wouldn't because he didn't know Mick.  I don't know if things are different over here but a witness only needs to see ID to confirm the signature of the person signing.  Ho hum... we'll try the dentist tomorrow.

We received a text message in the afternoon to say Barry and Carol were back at the marina and they were going to come up to Stone too.  Carol's on early babysitting duty tomorrow morning so it's looking like we'll all be up early for our various appointments... except Barry, who says he's sleeping in.  There was a knock on the side of the boat a couple of hours later and we enjoyed a chat and cup of tea.

Living costs for 2013

What does it cost to live aboard a narrowboat?

I had started on the calculations for this blog post a couple of weeks ago.  Having noticed a similar post on James and Debbie's blog (nb Lois Jane) has galvanized me into action to finish the job.

The cost of coming on this adventure was something we really struggled to quantify before we arrived.  We really had no idea of what we'd spend on things.  We had a few emails from other boaters and we read some articles about the cost of living afloat but everyone's spending pattern is different and the way things are marketed here and the types of stores they're sold in is definitely different to home.

In the end I allowed for a budget of £350 a week.  We have exceeded that slightly but we have bought stuff for the boat that we wouldn't beyond the first year.  We don't go out all that often and we rarely go to a pub just to drink (Mick loves a beer but he'll drink at home).  I've kept record of our spending in a spreadsheet with columns for each category.

We're having to do a bit better than this budget now as our tenant has moved out of the house and we have less money, but it's been no big hardship to cut back.  We've paid up on insurance, licence, moorings until we leave so the large outlays will be less.  We were conscious of the cost of fuel while we had Lynne's car so didn't go out quite as much as we would otherwise have.

What's included :
Groceries : supermarket spending including food, drink, cleaning products, toiletries.  If we buy these type of items in a discount store we still call them groceries.  Sometimes printer cartridges or paper for my work are in here.
Pub/cafe : any time we eat or drink out (we've often paid for friends' meals as a thank you when they've done us a favour or had us stay with them or lent us their car so this is a bit inflated). The allocation between this category and groceries is a bit hit and miss when it comes to beer - sometimes it will be here instead of groceries.
Day out / transport : entry fees, hire cars, fuel, bus and train fares, cinema.
Household : postage, stationery, gifts, clothing, printer, kitchen gadgets, quilt fabric, dvd's.
Phone/internet : this includes my Three wireless internet, O2 mobile phone and Mick's Lebara phone account that we use to call Australia.
Gas : the only gas we use is for the cooker and, as you can see, we only bought two bottles the whole year.  We do go through a little more now than we did at the start.  We thought it was going to be a big expense but when we realized how little we used we no longer avoided cooking things that take a long time in the oven.
Diesel : I know a lot of boaters just declare 100% if it's at all possible but I do a little calculation each time we buy diesel and we declare what we think is a fair thing.  The only time we declare 100% is when we're in the marina over Winter. We've had a bit of ribbing about it but I just think it's the right thing to do.
Coal : we pretty much keep the stove going all the time from when the weather cools until it's warm enough again.  We have always said we won't be cold in our own home.  We run the central heating over Winter early morning and late afternoon both for hot water and to keep the bedroom from getting cold so that pushed the diesel up a bit.
Loo : 11 pumpouts plus loo blue.  In hindsight we now know we could probably have pumped out the loo less often.  To be honest we thought the gauge must have been dodgy but I don't think we've ever let the tank get half full.... it's enormous!  We do a double check using a torch against the side of the plastic loo tank and it confirms the gauge is telling the truth.
Marina : this includes both the actual mooring fees and electricity and laundry charges.  We wash everything in sight when we go into a marina so we can use their huge tumble dryers.
Boat maintenance & improvements : anything for the boat; buckets, locks, folding outdoor chairs, two tv aerials, storage containers, an entire new set of fenders and spares, shower re-panelling, shower pump, paint, polish, water tap filter, charcoal filters, servicing and repairs.  Mick isn't mechanically minded at all so we pay for all servicing.  We've not scrimped on anything when it comes to the boat.  If it's needed attention or replacing then we've done it.
Licences : annual licence and also the licences for the Thames and the Avon.
Insurance : Collidge and Partners

What's not included :
I have excluded from these figures any overseas travel, items we've bought to take home with us or things that are not relevent for the purpose of the calculation.

	Year	Weekly
Groceries	£6,236	£120
Pub / café	£1,833	£35
Day out / transport	£947	£18
Household	£2,184	£42
Phone / internet	£448	£9
Gas	£51	£1
Diesel	£1,627	£31
Coal	£354	£7
Loo	£180	£3
Marina	£765	£15
Boat maint / improvements	£3,310	£64
Licences	£1,186	£23
Insurance	£249	£5
	£19,370	£373

Car return

Friday we headed off in the morning, dropping Barry and Carol off at the railway station in Stafford. I had a document to be witnessed so on our way back through Stone we stopped at the police station.  We learned another difference between Oz and the UK. There was no police officer in the police station. It seems they employ "non-officer" reception staff.  We will try again next week.

We had lunch at The Lounge in Stone which we have walked past many times but never gone in.  We also drove down the road beside Morrisons to check out the old flint mill that featured on Restoration Man the other night (thanks Maggie, for telling us about the show).  It's one of the nicest spots we have seen in Stone with just a few houses and a dead end street.

We decided we would go to Buxton in the Peak District before the airport in Manchester.  Lynne's flight wasn't due until almost 7.30pm. Such amazing scenery with winding roads clinging to the sides of bare, windswept hills. We got out of the car at Leek to browse the huge antique market and on the way back to the car I noticed a hairdresser with nobody waiting.  Well overdue for a haircut, I ducked in and was pleased to find they had a gap before their next appointment.

Buxton was a lovely spa town with fabulous buildings. There were some very grand hotels and houses and the spa building was very interesting too.  It's now a shopping centre.  There was a tap providing spring water with a queue toting containers. It was well worth the visit.

By the time we were approaching Manchester it was almost dark so we found ourselves a Wetherspoons near the airport to wait out the time until we needed to be at the airport.  A cheap and cheerful dinner and 99p coffees.

We collected Lynne and Marie as planned and by the time we were back at Ormskirk it was 9pm. The cats were happy to have Lynne home again, slinking around legs at the front door.  She had cleverly arranged for an Ocado grocery delivery for 10pm. They called to ask if they could deliver early so by 9.30 we were relaxing and catching up with our respective news over the last month.  Mick is always keen to hear news from his hometown. 

This morning we left Lynne sleeping in and took the car into Ormskirk for a car wash, a diesel top up, and then to Marks and Spencer to spend the last of our Christmas gift voucher.  Convenience dinners for the next few days then.

We were back at the marina in time for lunch at the Three Crowns, coffee and chat back on the boat, and it was time for Lynne to head of home again.  Lynne... thanks so much for lending us your car while you were away!