18th & 19th December
We woke to find that there had been no further freeze overnight, and there was clear water between us and the water point. After a quick trip into town, we started up and pushed across to start watering and pumping out, at the same time running a washload.
Using the new pump out pump means that it only needs one of us to do the pump out, whilst the other one can keep her hands clean to handle the drinking water hose. We still didn't get the tank absolutely rinsed out – it's built up a bit in there, and will need several sessions to clear it properly.
When all was done, I took Sanity through the bridge and winded her with some difficulty, as there was still ice in the approach to the Marple lock flight, which stopped the bow from swinging round as easily as normal.
Whilst we were doing this, a guy on Poppy, moored on the towpath just through the bridge, popped up in his hatches to tell us of goings on further up the Upper Peak Forest on Monday.
We'd noticed that they'd stopped the canal for most of the day, and a police patrol had prevented people from going up the towpath. Apparently someone suffering from epilepsy had bought a boat about a month ago and started living on it in Marple Basin. After two weeks BW moved him on, and he went some way up the UPF to a towpath mooring.
He was then not seen for 16 days. The boater on Poppy became concerned and contacted BW, who rejected any responsibility for the welfare of boaters. (Tricky one that – they're not Social Services, after all, but they usually show some concern for our safety).
The guy on Poppy then conducted a search and found him floating in the cut (I presume, though don't know, that he was dead). BW then closed the UPF and police and fire service personnel recovered the body. It seems he'd had a stroke and fallen in.
Cheered by this jolly tale (not), we boated back to High Lane for lunch, then went on to Poynton, running another washload on the way. On arrival at Poynton we topped up the water again, and tied on the last available slot on the Deeps. The forecast is for another freezing spell, so it was good to get ourselves sorted, with a full water tank and empty toilet tank, somewhere handy for the shops and our friends in the yard.
Last night was a quiet night without too much frost in fact, and the ice had only spread out along the shallow portion of the lagoon we call the Deeps. After breakfast, we sorted some stuff to post, and I emailed Chris Daniels, the deputy editor at Waterways World, about the Upper Peak Forest business. I also had a nice comment on the last post from Sarah – it is good to hear from the select band of folks who follow my witterings on – what started as a way of keeping the family posted with our movements clearly also supplies a need in people for some vicarious boating. You are all very welcome, say I.
Then we went down into town, visited the Post Office and bought the usual daily supplies of bread, paper and some veg.
Back at the boat it was nearly lunchtime. After lunch, we settled down for a quiet afternoon. Sheila watched the DVD of Paint Your Wagon she got for her birthday, whilst knitting me a hat for Christmas, and I did some more emailing.
I'm having an interesting email conversation with a guy who rejoices in the nickname of Electricky Dicky – he's actually an experienced electrical engineer with an interest in boat electrics, so a good guy to know in these situations.
Meantime it's feeling colder and colder as I type this, so looks like we will see some more of the freeze up. Stewart Hooper off Anne tells me that the price of coal has gone up again – he's going to have to charge £8.10 for 25 kg of PureHeat in future. When we were first living on board in 2004, we thought PureHeat expensive because it cost more than £6 a bag.
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