Moving out and moving on board

The past few days have been quite hectic.  Friday was my last day at work.  There were lots of nice words said, there was a cake that was quickly demolished, and I was applauded out of the newsroom as I left.

Yesterday we moved out of our house.  In the morning, our next door neighbour and his sons came round to take our remaining furniture, as one of the lads was moving into a new flat with his girlfriend and needed stuff.  We did a final charity shop run, a last tip run, and then loaded the pile of stuff we were bringing with us into the car.

It was quite emotional leaving the house we’ve lived in for more than 20 years.  We took the keys to the rental agent, and a tenant moves in next week.  Then we went to stay with some friends for the night.  This morning we were on the road about 8.30 and arrived at the marine just after 11.  We unloaded the car, nd set about trying to find a space for everything.  To our surprise, it wasn’t too bad; we still have too many clothes, and we’ll probably end up having a few more turn outs as we go.  This afternoon we went to Tesco in Wolverton to have lunch and stock up on fresh food, and also popped along to B&Q for some coal and logs in case we need an evening fire.  We’ve also filled the water tank, which must have been pretty empty, and continued putting things away.

One thing we wanted to get rid of was an oil-filled radiator we intended to use in the winter but never have.  We put it outside the boat with a ‘free’ sign on it — and much to our relief, when we got back from shopping it had gone!

We’ll have a celebratory roast this evening, our first night as liveaboards.  Tomorrow, we’re going to Stoke to see the new boat in build.

More sorting

More sorting out was done today.  We’d brought with us all our jars of herb and spices from home, so I combined them with the boat ones nd went through getting rid of all the out of date ones and the duplicates.

We still have a good range on the shelf.

I then did the same with all the roasting trays and bakeware, with the duplicates going in the charity shop pile.  Then we did a trip to the recycling centre in Towcester, and the Willen Hospice charity shop in Stony Stratford.  We parked up and went to find a cafe for lunch, stumbling across Miss Havisham’s in a little courtyard off the main street; their toasted sandwiches were pretty good.  At times (such as just after we parked) there were heavy showers which included little hail stones, but at other times the sun came out.

On the way back we stopped in Cosgrove and went for a walk down the canal and round a loop of the Ouse Valley Country Park to get some steps in.  It was pretty cold and windy in places, but you do get nice views of the Iron Trunk Aqueduct.

This afternoon, Adrian has been through the can cupboard weeding out more stuff that’s past its date, and we’ve also been cleaning things.  Tomorrow we’re going down to London for the Country2Country festival at the O2.

A moving process

We came up to the boat today, via the opticians where I was having my annual sight test, and with a stop at Tesco in Bicester for lunch and a quick shop.

The car was fully loaded as we’ve brought up loads of stuff from the house — because (and I don’t think we’ve actually said this before), we’ll be moving onto the boat at the end of the month.  Adrian has already stopped working and has spent the past few weeks clearing the house, which is being rented out.  I am taking voluntary redundancy, and will be leaving the BBC in a couple of weeks time.

For things like kitchen stuff, we brought a load with us, then got it all out, compared it with the stuff already on the boat, and decided which we wanted to keep.  We have more work to do in this area, but for some things we’ll take everything back with us and do the comparison at home.  We’ve also cleared lots of the storage areas under the bed and the dinette, so we have space to store seldom-used things, like our ski gear.

It soon became clear that the Eberspacher wasn’t going to start, so I called Dave at BLS, who’s an expert.  He came out, and basically declared it dead.  We’ll get some costs for replacement options.  We’d turned out some stools from under the bed and put them outside in case anyone wanted them — and Dave took a liking to them and took them off our hands, which was good!  And at least we’re on shoreline, so we could have the immersion heater on.

I also swept the chimney and put some blacking on the stove before lighting it.  Then we had a heavy rain shower, which included some distinctly sleety precipitation.  It didn’t last very long, though.

Tomorrow, we have planned an exciting trip to the tip and a local charity shop.

Mac on test

The April Canal Boat is out, and includes my boat test on Mac, by Stone Bespoke Boats.

New year, new boat, new blog

Big announcement time!

We’re having a new boat built, starting very soon.  Kingley Vale will be built by Braidbar Boats, and I’ve set up a new blog to record the build and our subsequent travels.  I’ve added it to the blog roll to the right hand side of this blog, so new posts will pop up there — but please add it to your own blog rolls and book marks too.  There’s a first post that’s just been published.

This blog will continue, because very soon we’ll be having some other life changes and BR will be our home!  Stay tuned, there’s plenty going on at the moment.

Flow Down on test

The March Canal Boat is out, and includes my boat test on Flow Down by Aintree Boats.

The family Stone

It was pretty chilly overnight, even though the fire stayed in well. We had a fairly relaxed start to the day, and then got in the car and headed up the M1 and M6 to Stone, where we were meeting my Cheshire family. We were there a bit early, so went for a walk. 

We had a table booked at the Crown Wharf, which overlooks the basin by the Stone hire boat company. We were able to get it early and had coffee and tea before my sister and family arrived, also bringing my dad. It’s a huge pub, but we had a nice booth; the food also turned out to be very good, and excellent value. After lunch we did Christmas presents to my nieces, then went for another look at the canal.

The drive back was pretty foggy, and it was almost dark by the time we were at the marina. It had been a lovely afternoon seeing the family.