Black bottom girl

Arrived on saturday to find my girl getting her first set of black bottoms!




Doesn't she look all grown up? Have decided that she won't get her coat of many colours until she has been launched. So if anyone knows of a good painter with dry/wet covered dock that can do a brilliant paint job (in black!) let me know.



Bryan has done a mock up of my side stairs to see if we could fit them in without them being too steep and the answer is yes we can. Cue Bob the builder theme tune!






and here we have a mock up of my basin complete with special contact lens paraphenalia storage facility. The lens container is actually sitting in two circular cut outs so it can't slide about! Bryan seriously needs to get a life!






And my lovely water tank. Reading from left to right. Breather pipe, sender unit, filler pipe and at the bottom the exit pipe.







And my pretty gauges water and diesel.

Ok so Bryan thinks I am weird photographing these but is he one to talk?

I don't think so ...

You will all be thrilled to know at the weekend I finished off the study and have now vacated son's bedroom. Using Rob's clever mitre thingy I actually cut and fitted all the boards myself. All was going swimmingly until the very last cut which was 1cm too short. Luckily had a piece just the right size to squeeze in and as that corner is behind a drawer unit not a problem. However two other corners which are visible will need a bit of filler cos my walls are not straight.

Typically the two corners completely out of sight are perfect. Ho hum. And yes I do have five corners in my study. One out and 4 in.

Ok slight design change

Have decided to move the basin in the bathroom over to the same side as the bath so that you can bend over to wash your face in the basin without getting the corner of the Omni Tub up your Jaksi!

Luckily due to not finishing the 240v wiring yet at the front of the boat it was no problem for the mirror to also swop sides. As the mirror is a monster and has a heating element as well as pretty lights the on off switch has to be located under the gunwales in the galley on the steps! So when you decide to have your shower etc you must remember to turn it on before closing the bathroom door.

This means that my tall cupboard is morphing into a corner cupboard of minute dimensions but hey better than nothing and I will hopefully be able to swing the cat if she lets me.




This is an unusual sight. My electrician in daylight! He is drilling holes in my lovely boat. Shock horror it is no longer water tight. He will test out the grommets and see if they are okay before recommending the source. As he has had to purchase 50 of the little darlings he may be pursuaded to part with some for a few sheckels. My steel sides are only 4mm though which is why he was having trouble sourcing them and most I think are 5mm?

My water tank has also arrived. All we need now is for Mel to finish the amendments to my diesel tank and it can be installed.

Whilst worrying about sourcing bath shower panels small enough to fit in a narrowboat I noticed that head height whilst showering is not too much of a problem. Tall people will have their heads in the pigeon box so that gives you an extra 3 inches!

Memo to self. Must remember to get opaque glass for that box!

My bathroom has shrunk!

How did that happen? The bath as you can see is quite tall and when it has it's shower panels on it will be quite imposing! The panels will be made to measure and will have 180 degree hinges even if they never attain the full 180 degree revolution! They will be stored across the bath when not in use and when I am bathing in all my glory they will open out across the bathroom so one of them will have to be a bi fold one otherwise someone entering the bathroom from the galley could well break the panel! Of course I could always fit a lock I suppose.

There will be a shallow cupboard on the right behind the bulkhead. We have determined that this right hand bulkhead 'wall' has to stay that size because of the inner glazed window of the side hatch will just open on to it and not go beyond. We will be making the doorway a tad wider by reducing the bulkhead on the left as we have moved the rather large round mirror that was going there onto the side wall. Bryan will make a clever bit of boxing so that the mirror will hang straight even though the wall slopes.

My basin cupboard will also have to shrink otherwise we will be forever banging our thighs on the corner of the bath! And I may have to take my towel radiator back!

In my mind my bathroom was large and spacious. Now it seems to be small and confined. May be when everything is finished it will grow larger again? I hope there is room to dry off in there without banging your knuckles all over the place.

The bulkhead wall behind the bath is the side wall of the loo which is in it's own compartment. "Senior's private" you know! (Family joke)

Bit of a blow

For the work party doing the Chesterfield Canal restoration. I discovered today why we were back at Mill Green doing some scrub bashing. Those of you with March's Waterways World will see an article by Hugh Potter detailing a walk you can do from Chesterfield up the full extent of the open but land locked part of the canal which ends at Mill Green.



This was where I started to help out back in 2004. We were building a towpath side retaining wall showing the line of the canal up to Constitution Hill. About 1/4 of a mile in total if not more. This section has taken about 6 years of Volunteer Labour every Sunday. We laid a concrete plinth and then curb stones topped off with cut stone. And then many barrow loads of concrete back fill - and believe me it was many barrowloads - that is my expertise! Only a small section could be accessed by a load of delivered concrete because of the un safeness of the bridge at Mill Green, the whole lot was then re buried for digging out later. Anyway I digress.



So here we are starting to clear the brambles so that the rebuilt bridge base and the wall can be seen.




Looking a bit clearer here.





The wall on the right goes all the way down to the van and caravan parked in the distance at Mill Green.






View the other way from Constitution Hill towards where they are building the Staveley Bypass. Now this is where the blow comes in. Remember that the wall to the left is the long wall from Mill Green and following the line of the Canal it heads across the current path nearly to the edge of the slope and then curves gently back around.



The road builders are building the Bypass and putting in various bridges etc to accommodate the canal and I believe re instating parts of the canal as part of their contract BUT instead of crossing over the River Rother and bringing the bypass on brown belt land earmarked for development they want to bring it between the River Rother and the Canal on green belt land.



As the canal is at the top of an embankment with the river way below there isn't much useable room up there so their plan is to move the canal over putting a single carriage road in and reducing the Canal to a 3m wide concrete channel all the way to Mill Green. Bull dozing our wall and seven years of hard work plus the cost of the materials in the process. Why? Because the plans are drawn up, because if they bring it nearer the river they would have to do clever works to shore up the river, because it is easier. Mick says that it actually contravenes their planning permissions.



Anyway so that the Road Builders couldn't say that they were unaware of the work we had done because they couldn't see it we have been busily scrub bashing and making it quite obvious.









Current head of navigation from Chesterfield. I felt that I wouldn't be involved in removing that tree. It looked far too precarious.

views in and out

Spent the weekend at Robs with views over Carsington Water. Was a bit trepidatious about parking car at his house in case it snowed again and I wouldn't be able to get back down the hill.

Decided that as

a) I was bringing him 20kg of coal and

b) forecast said wouldn't snow until Sunday I could risk it.

First snow flakes following day had me hareing out to the car and home though - I am such a whimp! Still the house was warm (apart from the outhouse) and there were no spider parts in the bath. We went out for a meal saturday lunch at the Knockerdown and it was absolutely delicious. Rob had to stop me licking the plate.

All in all a good weekend.




Bryan has been busy.



I am amazed at the difference between the oiled panels and the not yet oiled panels.

Still waiting for some grommets so John can drill and connect the outside stuff to the inside wires.

Went for a walk today!

I thought it would be a good idea to take some photos of the Chesterfield Canal with snow for the calendar I produce to raise money for the working party. I have previously found it difficult to get suitably wintry photos. Having said that this year I found I didn't have any summer ones - how strange!

Anyway we three intrepid walkers set off. I may have mentioned earlier about a bridleway not suitable for horses. Here it is...



It was quite funny to see Claires face when she got to the top and came back down again sharpish.

Glad that didn't happen on the day Sam and I were up there with our horses milling around on the rails trying to find a way down! At least now they have put a barrier to stop other visiting riders from making the same mistake.

This is one of our staircase locks. We have a couple on this stretch. Putting the Chesterfield Canal in the running for the most locks in a mile.

and this is a house with an interesting front porch.

Walk was longer than intended as Yvonne and Claire took me back via Lindrick Dale where there were some interesting quirky houses. With chess boards in the garden etc and built into the cliff face. I have left it too late and most of them have been demolished to make way for some ugly millionnaires abodes. I have known about these houses for about 18 years always intending to go see them and now all gone. Replaced by huge soulless boxes and the gates ... so hideous. Who in their right mind says 'that's the gate for me it says so much about who I am?' (I really should have taken a photo of it instead I will have to leave it to your imagination - believe me you will not do it justice).

Moral of this story?

Don't leave things too late.

Oh and ask for a second opinion before you get the gate.

I am a little bit pooped

but also a little bit pleased with myself.

I was rung this morning by my Sheffield clients to say not to bother trying to get in to see them as they hadn't managed to get to work themselves. So what's a girl to do? Well she fettles the bedroom so that just leaves the bathroom now for it's spring clean. Then what? I know lay the laminate floor what I bought yesterday. So the last few items transferred into both bedrooms. But the square Ikea table won't go into either room without removing the legs so it is balanced on the landing! Those two socks are waiting to meet their other halves! :)

The larger Ikea table cannot leave the room so I upended it and worked around it.

I then got to the point where I needed to cut some boards. Aagh Himself has taken his Jigsaw home, nextdoor doesn't have one, Bryan who probably has several is down at the boat. I am in the mood ...

So another visit to B&Q and buy a cheap £9 one plus the correct blades for cutting laminate. What a nice man.

I also had to remove the door. I did try to work around it but in the end it had to go. You really cannot clunk click laminate floor with a door in the way no matter how hard you try.

And there it is finished. I will ask someone nicely to do my skirtings. The rest of the stuff better wait to go in until the skirtings are done I suppose I couldn't face moving them again.

But though I say it myself who really oughtn't I am rather pleased with my going round the door jambs. A lot of grunt went into those. And one not quite right one used as a template for the one that worked.

right that's it going to make some supper as it is 8.30pm now and I am well and truly pooped. gonna sleep well tonight in my lovely clean sheets etc. Bliss.

Oh yes girls whilst doing this manly stuff I also managed to do two loads of washing!!!