Here we go again

We’ve decided that we might be getting old. Sanity Again is a wonderful boat, but at 70’ and 23 tonnes displacement she can be quite a handful to heave about on a mooring or lock landing. We thought about getting a shorter used boat, but couldn’t see anything we liked. So it’s going to have to be a new boat, a Braidbar naturally, and the next build slot is not until early February/late March 2021.

After an email exchange with Donna and a phone call with James, we’ve booked that slot.

I’m going to repeat what I did with SA and keep a separate blog about it. There’s nothing up there yet, but I’ll give the link here when there’s something to read. As before, I’ll do occasional posts about our design thinking in the run up to the build and then probably a weekly one once the build is underway. What I can say here is that the theme will be minimum maintenance and a modern approach in a much shorter boat.

We’re really looking forward to working with James and his team – I reckon he’s the most exciting designer in his field these days.

Late Extra – Braidbar win Crick

We've just heard that the Braidbar boat Elizabeth Anne has just won Favourite Boat in Show at Crick, the first time they've won (as opposed to coming second most years) since Braidbar 100 in 2007.

Very well done to both the team at the show and the team at Lord Vernon's Wharf who designed and built her.

Good grief, it's Tuesday!

We've had a phenomenal weekend, despite lousy weather on Saturday. We had more members of the Owners' Group than ever before and 13 boats to show. The pot luck supper on Friday, followed by the Austinacious magic show, went very well and there was even a bit of food left over.

Sadly, Saturday's rain meant that only the very serious potential owners turned up. This was fine for Peter, who had as many likely buyers to talk to as usual, but did result in the strong team of owners and boats being under utilised. There's also the factor that the order book is particularly full at the moment, with the next available build slots in mid 2018, which discourages some folk.

Believe me, you might have to wait a bit longer for your Braidbar, but it will be worth it in the end! Especially as...

We were welcoming two new members of the team. James Attwood has been responsible for the design of the boats that meant that Boating Leisure Services have won favourite boat in show at Crick for three years running. And from the end of this month, he and his partner Donna will be sharing the load at Braidbar. James has some really stunning and innovative ideas to bring to the already successful Braidbar design and I can't wait to show them off at Crick next year.

Saturday night went with a swing. The charity auction raised £2255, a record amount. As before, it will be split between the Anthony Nolan Trust and Bloodwise, in memory of Peter and Susan's son Michael who succumbed to a blood cancer in the year before they took over Braidbar.

As usual, Sunday was a quieter day, but we had a good discussion forum covering boat security, innovative design and accessing the internet whilst afloat. The most radical idea proposed was "Mooring Assist" – get your boat alongside the space on the towpath, press a button and the boat moves sideways into the space...

Sunday evening saw thirty odd of us scoffing a Chinese takeaway.

After making a start on the take down on Monday, we went down to the Boar's Head for a meal, just for a change. Today, we've finished the take down in pleasantly dry and sunny weather. We're planning a quiet night in tonight and will set off for home tomorrow.

Sanity Again has not been neglected. Her weeping fuel joint is sorted, a dodgy electric cable terminal remade and the new solar panel controller is in and working. The Tracer BN series has a remote meter option which gives both more info and more control over the three stage charging process. Today, the redundant summer valve in the central heating circuit has been replaced, so we are all done, dusted and raring to go.

Progress

This is another of my quick catch up posts:

• We've been boat shuffling off and on
• We had an excellent meal in the Boar's Head last night
• Destiny and Drum Solo II have arrived and enough other boats have moved on to leave us the space we need on the towpath
• The materiel for the marquees and show boards have been brought out of store; we'll put them up tomorrow
• Sheila managed to fit in a walk down to the hairdresser for a trim

So tonight is our last quiet night and this will probably be the last post for a while... I'll let you know how it all went next week!

Off again

The batteries finally reached float after six and a bit hours last night. I reckon that the bank is on its last season; we had an interesting conversation with Peter about recent advances in maintenance free batteries – something to think about for September, probably.

Andy got cracking first thing and by ten all was finished and checked over by Peter. I had a session with Susan bringing the Braidbar Boat list up to date, including the next shell to be delivered, which will be number 165. I've got a bit of maintenance to do on that database to increase the engine options as the new bunch includes an electric boat and one with a Russell Newbery.

We set off just before eleven. I set out to wind outside the yard, but a combination of Tiree on the water point and a gusty wind in the wrong direction made it too difficult, so we went on to High Lane instead. In any event, I wasn't sorry to have a run away from the yard and back again just to make sure that all was well with the engine's fuel supply before we headed off. There was, naturally, no problem. When we stopped for the day at Whiteley Green, I lifted the engine boards and checked all the new joints in the pipework – again, all was well.

Whilst we were boating, I finished off making some bread I'd started first thing, so we were able to have hot rolls for lunch as we boated along. After a quiet post-prandial interlude, we walked along the Middlewood Way to Bollington and did a bit of top up shopping in the Co-op there. It's just over a mile each way and on the flat, of course, apart from the start and finish.

Tomorrow, on to Gurnett Aqueduct for a rendezvous with Ian and Sharon on Bunnies Warren.

Mostly very good...

... but weary. We had an excellent time yesterday evening with Peter and Susan, as you'd expect. Food, wine and talk were all great.

Overnight, however, I started to worry that the battery charger was staying on absorption rather than going to float voltage. Regular readers will recall that I'm quite neurotic about the batteries, so had a very broken night. Today, on Peter's advice, I left the shoreline off and allowed the batteries to discharge with the solar panel covered. When they were down to 70%, I put the shoreline back on and we're waiting to see what happens. If they are still not behaving in the morning, further investigations will be undertaken.

Now for the rest of the good news. The Fuel-Guard, fuel polishing circuit and Webasto are all functioning and we once more have central heating. There are some tidying up jobs to do and I need to get my head round the programmable timer, but lots of progress has been made. The boat is mostly back to normal apart from my half of the wardrobe.

Peter and Jan joined us in the Boar's Head for lunch, followed by ice creams at the Trading Post and chat sitting out on the lawn in the sun. Another excellent session!

We're planning on a quiet night tonight. On the current thinking, we should be leaving the yard tomorrow lunchtime.

Progress continues

The Fuel-Guard is in and the plumbing for the Webasto mostly so, in that the fuel supply is connected and the wiring loom run through to where the controller will be in the bedroom. The exhaust still needs fitting and the water connections to be made.

The weather continuing to be brilliantly sunny and warm, Sheila has run and dried a couple more washloads. She also washed the well deck.

I bought and stowed two bags of mixed ovoids from the Trading Post, hopefully the last we'll need to get before the Autumn.

Apart from all that, some constructive loafing has been done... Oh, it's worth recording that one of the ball valves supplied with the Fuel-Guard was faulty. I emailed them about it just after lunch yesterday and a replacement arrived first class post today, so good customer service there.

We're off out with Peter and Susan tonight, Italian meal in Poynton, probably, and we're meeting Sheila's Peter and Jan for lunch tomorrow.

It's all go, I tell you ;)

What a nice day

It's been a beautiful day here, making up for the chilly weather over the weekend. John and Martina on Burnt Oak were getting some snagging done. It gave us a chance to chat to them and to Graham off Priscilla II who turned up. Whilst we were hanging about, a dedicated reader of this blog came seeking advice for his overheating engine.

I took a look at it for him, but it was apparent that it had developed a water leak and he went off to utilise his RCR membership. Writing this made me realise a) I never got his name and b) I never heard the final outcome! Sorry about that, hope you got it sorted without too much expense...

Once the work on Burnt Oak was done, Andy got back to our challenges. Putting the Webasto in is comparatively straightforward – a bracket had to be fabricated to take it and it's now in position – but retrofitting the Fuel-Guard is a bit trickier. Things are progressing there, though, with a bit more plumbing of fuel lines and the like to do.

Meantime, we didn't waste the fine weather. Sheila ran a washload yesterday and hung it out to dry on the bungalow whirligig today. We also mowed the lawn for Susan. Didn't take a lot off as it was the first cut of the season, but it looks a lot tidier for it. Finally, we gave the boat's roof a much needed wash before rewarding ourselves with ice creams.

Tomorrow, more work will be going on in the engine room and we're going out with Peter and Susan for a meal in the evening.

In the yard

We're in safe and sound, after getting a pump out. We're up the middle, which will make receiving the Ocado delivery interesting tomorrow, but not a major problem.

The Hurricane is out and Andy needs to make a bracket to take the Webasto in its place. Some rearranging of pipe work will be needed, but not too much, hopefully.

We're discussing the best way to fit the Fuel-Guard – more of this anon!

Embarrassing start, better finish

The plan today was an early start as we wanted to get to Lyme Green in time to meet Sheila's brother and sister-in-law for lunch in Sutton Hall. Just after seven, we started up and I reversed Sanity Again out under the towpath bridge. It meant winding her immediately, as you can't come out facing Macclesfield, but that's no more than I've done several times before.

Only this time, I messed it up completely, reversing too far into the rather dodgy hole (which is shallow and full of scuttled boats from the end of the carrying days) and ending up with the boat stranded across the width of it with both bow and stern well stemmed up. Sheila's efforts with the shaft at the bow were to no avail. By this time, John had emerged to see us off and with some difficulty I managed to get an extended stern line to him and Andy who had turned up for work.

It proved impossible to get the stern to come round, so we transferred the line to the bow. By now, most of the rest of the workers were about too and with their help the bow was hauled off the mud. An attempt to swing the bow round with the stern in the hole didn't work; there just wasn't the depth. In the end, forty minutes after we'd started, I reversed Sanity Again along the length of the Deeps and winded her in the official winding hole at the far end.

I've not made such a mess of a boating manoeuvre in many years and have duly nominated myself for the BOG Award next year.

We were now seriously tight for time, but dedicated boating in rather unpleasant, chilly and damp conditions got us there with 20 minutes to spare. We'd no sooner tied than Jan rang to say that they were running late and wouldn't arrive until half twelve...

No matter, it gave us a chance to get our breath back. We met up in the car park of the Retail Park and drove to Sutton Hall for another excellent meal, leisurely, well cooked and washed down with good beer. We're looking forward to a quiet evening and another serious day's boating tomorrow. We plan to get down Bosley and on to Congleton by the afternoon.

Jobs done

In a burst of activity, Peter and Andy have finished all the outstanding jobs on Sanity Again. First off, Peter did the fuel filter changes I'd asked for, including the fiddly CAV 296 filter/agglomerator. All seemed well there. There was no water or nasty black stuff in the bowl of the CAV and just a bit of rubbish in the filter after several thousand hours. The Wasp filter in the Hurricane feed was sparkly clean, too.

Meanwhile, Andy looked at the top of the toilet tank – Sheila and I had stripped the bed off the top ready for him. The original plan had been to fit a new 6" square inspection hatch, but what we'd all forgotten was that the boss for the MSC gauge sender had been mounted on a similar but larger plate. We decided that it would be fine to remove this plate to look in and to rinse out the tank.

Accordingly, I pulled the boat out of the yard, winded her and put her alongside the shop mooring ready to be pumped out. After spreading polythene sheet over the bed base, we ran a hose in through the Houdini hatch, Peter supplied me with a long narrow flexible strip of steel and I put the gauntleted pond gloves on. As the level of black water in the tank went down, I plied the scraper along the sides and bottom and sprayed water around in the tank.

After a few iterations of this, we had light brown water emerging from the pump out point. I cleaned off the tank gauge sender and moved the boat back into the yard. Here, Peter refixed the plate to the tank with sealant and the bolts. When we reconnected it, the gauge was once more showing just one bar rather than the two which has been the best we could manage for some time.

Meantime, Andy had replaced the weed hatch having welded in a new bit of threaded rod in place of the one with a stripped thread. Incidentally, the fact of me being able to move the boat with the weed hatch out demonstrates the virtue of the Tyler/Wilson design, with the weed hatch access trunked right up to the stern deck. There's no risk of sinking the boat because the weed hatch has come loose.

After much washing of hands, we had lunch, leaving a large fan blowing fresh air through the bedroom. The afternoon has seen us putting everything back together and getting Sanity Again into cruising mode. We're going out to lunch with Peter and Susan tomorrow, so will stay one more day and leave on Thursday morning.

Oh, one more thing to report. CRT are halfway through repairing the hole in the bridge approach. A piece of piling has been inserted at the uphill end, sandbags full of concrete mix strategically placed round the sides and the hole half-filled with more mix. I guess the final phase will be to fill up the hole completely and reset the cobbles over it.

Progress

Despite a bad night last night, it's been a day of progress today. We were up betimes, as one tends to be after a broken night, and had breakfast well before we were needed by the yard staff. I put a batch of bread dough on – multiseed and rye – and had not long left it to rise when Andy turned up to fit our bubble tester. Those of us who are liveaboards are required to have the gas system checked every year and the easiest way to do that is with a bubble tester.

The first problem was that the floor of our gas locker was underwater, as it tends to be when the water tank is full, especially if we've got two full cylinders as well. We tried taking as much weight off the bow as we could by emptying both the upper and lower bow lockers, but there was still most of two inches of oggin in the locker. Since Andy had to get in the locker and crouch down, he wasn't too keen on the situation.

In the end, Peter Mason brought up the yard forklift, it was attached to the eye at the top of the stempost and the bow physically lifted up until the water started draining out of the locker. I should explain that we have two sets of drain holes in the locker, the upper pair remaining clear at all times. Andy then spent a bit of time rinsing out the floor of the locker and making quantities of snails and mussels homeless.

He'd finished fitting the tester shortly after coffee break which was good, as by then I was ready to cook my bread buns.

The next task was to fit the WiFi aerial and router. This has been done with typical Andy neatness. The aerial is now fixed to the front edge of the solar panel and its lead taken down through the mushroom just ahead of it. But it doesn't come into the cabin. Instead, it passes above the ceiling lining and down into the cupboard over the desk. Meanwhile, the power supply is led up from the socket, behind the cabin lining and into the same cupboard.

The router is mounted inside the cupboard and all the wiring is tidily disposed of. I've tested it by connecting to the bungalow WiFi. I was a bit worried as it seemed very slow, much slower than the iPhone hotspot connection, but Peter tells me that that's the state of their broadband at the moment. Having paid to be upgraded to fibre optic, the speed is much slower that they had had on copper. Apparently, the company now admits that that was to be expected and has offered to charge them again to put them back on the copper.

What a rip off! Ah well, at least I know that the Wynne James aerial plus router is fully functional.

There's been good news and bad from CRT. Newcastle Road lock has indeed reopened and traffic through Stone resumed. Meanwhile, the local guys turned up to start repairing the hole in the bridge approach ramp here. Initial work found that things are worse than supposed. There are in fact not one but two holes into the canal, both flushing material out. They will need to shutter across the holes, pump concrete in and then make good the setts which form the actual pathway.

After all this excitement, we're going to have a quiet evening tonight. Tomorrow, the remaining jobs should get done, namely the toilet tank inspection hatch, changing the fuel filters and repairing the weed hatch.

Well exercised

We've managed to avoid washing the boat (we decided that the roof needed more time to harden off before risking splashing it with detergent...) but otherwise it's been a day for exercise. First though, I need to record what a very pleasant evening we had last night on Cala. It was nothing dramatic, just some good friends having wine and chat about a wide range of stuff, but extremely enjoyable even so.

Peter and Gill must be two of our oldest friends on the cut – only John and Nev are older, in several ways ;) – and we never feel the need to choose our words carefully or to watch what we say with them. Thanks, you two, it's part of what makes it all worthwhile.

This morning, then, we got up in leisurely fashion and pottered about doing this and that before Peter and Gill emerged. We had a further natter with them before saying goodbye, in case they'd gone before we came back, then walked down into Poynton to do some much needed shopping at Waitrose. We had originally planned to go yesterday but were put off by the weather. There's no bus service on a Sunday, so there was nothing for it but to slog back up the hill with our goodies.

When we reached the yard, Cala had indeed left. She was on the shop mooring having had a pump out, some diesel and a new gas cylinder; that meant that we could say goodbye all over again. By now it was lunchtime but we were feeling very dry after our walk. We thought about getting a coffee from the Trading Post but Nigel was frantically trying to keep up with the demand as it was. Instead, I went to make coffee for us on the boat with the idea that we would take it round to the bungalow lawn to drink.

Sheila stood on the bridge, meanwhile, and supervised Cala's exemplary winding and departure. We then changed our minds again, made our lunch and took the whole lot round to the lawn with the coffees. Since lunch we've been resting on our laurels a bit, reading in the well deck at first, then inside when it turned cool. We did go to the Trading Post for ice creams at tea time, the rush having abated somewhat.

Chicken and prawn gumbo tonight, methinks, and back to work on the boat tomorrow.

A recovery day

It certainly rained overnight and has continued for much of the day, on and off. We had a very lazy start and have spent much of the day doing bits and bobs indoors. I caught up with some outstanding email, booted the Mini and archived my email boxes, backed up the iPad and then backed up the Mini.

Sheila has run a washload and caught up with similar chores. It was cool enough just before lunch to make it worth lighting the Squirrel. Since it was the first time it's been lit since I blacked it, we needed to do it on a day when we could have the doors open to let the smokey miasma dissipate.

Apart from these jobs, the day's been given over to reading and doing puzzles and quizzes. After some internal eyelid inspection after lunch, we managed to get a walk along the towpath between showers to freshen up. We finished with tea at the Trading Post with Peter and Gill off Cala.

They plan to leave tomorrow, now, so we'll have a last drink with them on board Cala tonight. When they've gone, we'll be all that's left of all those boats which came for the Owners' Weekend.

 

Progress continues

It's been a pleasant day both weatherwise and workwise. It was a bit moist this morning, but the sun has been out for most of the day and we've had the advantage of being out in the yard rather than in the paint dock. The final bits and pieces have been done to finish off the work on the roof and we've reinstalled all the deck furniture. I made some bread for lunch, something I wasn't able to do whilst in the dock as using the gas cooker was to be avoided.

After lunch, I topped up the batteries, having got a replacement float unit from Peter for the one that had started leaking. Now that we can see what we are doing, we've done a fair bit of tidying up inside the boat, too.

This afternoon's project for Sheila was getting quotes for renewal of the lodge insurance. Jo James had put us on to a broker who could offer a better price than our current insurer, and the quote is indeed a good deal cheaper. We'll wait and see what the policy looks like, of course; Sheila was a bit surprised at one of the questions when she rang. Having given the address as Mercia Marina, she was asked "Is the lodge anywhere near a river or lake?"

Umm, it's a marina...

We'll have a quiet evening on board tonight after a merry time in the Boars Head last night. We're looking forward to a fairly relaxed weekend, though if the weather holds (and it's looking better all the time) we'll be busy recoating the cratch boards and cleaning the cratch cover. The boat shafts could do with some TLC, too.

We've been a bit anxious about the situation at Stone with the failed lock at Newcastle Road, but the latest info from CRT is that they hope to reopen it on Sunday afternoon or Monday, well before we need to go through. Mind you, there are a goodly number of boats stacked up waiting for the stoppage to end.

Tiring but absorbing

We set off just before eight for the walk up to Lyme Park and got there at around half past. Our timing proved to be spot on; there was a bit of a queue ahead of us, but nothing off-putting and by half nine, the official opening time, we were being assessed as to which expert to see.

This proved to be Andy McConnell, a manic character who was very good value for money, not that we'd paid any money. He encouraged all those who were at his table to put their glass out together and then delivered about ninety minutes of tuition and humour on the subject of glass making, the social history of glass usage and anything else that occurred to him.

What was particularly pleasing was that he was just as interested and interesting about the items that were of no special monetary value but which illustrated the points he was making. An example of this was the way glass pieces were often bought by working class women, after a whip round for one of their number who was getting married.

Having said that, he was very taken with Sheila's Lalique rose bowl and, indeed, went off with it twice to try to persuade Eric Knowles to do a piece to camera about it, but it was not to be. At least that meant that we could then get away rather than hanging about; we were back at the yard by twelve and ate our picnic lunch in the bungalow garden rather than the purlieus of Lyme Park; more plebeian but probably better company.

After lunch, the good news was that Sanity Again was ready to come out of the paint shed into the sun. As it is forecast to be a fine afternoon and evening, it means that the final coat of paint will harden off well before the roof furniture is replaced. Johnny put the mushrooms and the slide back and there followed another session of Braidbar shuffling.

Cala is still in the yard with us; there is a bit more to do to her before she leaves tomorrow. We'll be here over the weekend, it looks like, which is just as well as we have a fair bit of washing and polishing to do to get the sides of the boat looking as good as our nice shiny roof. When it's all done, I'll take some photos of her in all her new found glory.

Steady progress

After a decent night's sleep, we've been getting on with things today. Sheila is keeping up with the laundry, though the rather cool and moist weather doesn't help with getting it dry. I polished the pole and plank racks and then gave them three coats of Incralac lacquer. We'd had to use wet and dry followed by fine wire wool to get the thick patina off first.

We've had a further conversation with Peter about the jobs that will need doing when we come out of the paint dock, hopefully on Friday. There's an inspection plate to fit on the toilet tank, the WiFi aerial to install, the fuel filters to change, a bubble tester to add to the gas installation and the weed hatch securing bar to replace. We only need to get away from here by a week on Friday at the latest, so there shouldn't be any problem with time.

Meanwhile, we are all keeping an anxious eye on the approach to the bridge over the arm into the yard. At the end of the weekend, one of the large cobbles suddenly fell through into a void underneath as someone stepped on it; he was lucky not to seriously injure his leg. CRT attended promptly and it was established that the water from the canal had penetrated beneath the bridge approach ramp, washed out the earth from it and left a huge void.

It's been fenced off with pig netting, aka DEFRA rash, but a couple more of the cobbles have since joined their fellow. No more has been seen of CRT; the last time this happened, to part of the shop mooring, it took them two years to come and fix it. Hopefully they won't hang about as long this time as otherwise the towpath could end up closed and people diverted down through the Nelson Pit car park.

Some of the Braidbars returning from the Weekend will also be delayed by the stoppage at Newcastle Road lock in Stone, where part of the lock floor has caved in. It's hoped to get it sorted by the end of the week, but I'm glad we're not due to be going through there for some time.

The other good news is that the final total for the charity auction was £1700, which has been split evenly between Anthony Nolan and Bloodwise, formerly the Leukaemia and Lymphoma Trust.

Tomorrow, we're taking some glassware to a recording of the Antiques Road Show at Lyme Park, so there may only be a brief blog when we get back, depending on how long we're away.

 

Getting back to normal

Well, what passes for it on Sanity Again ;) It's hard to know what to mention from the weekend and what to leave out. If I wrote a complete account, it would be far too much for one blog post and probably amazingly boring for those who aren't part of the Owners' Group. There's nothing worse than being presented with a load of in-jokes and private references that you're not privy to. So, just some highlights:

Both the set up and take down were blessed with good weather and with a team that co-operated without squabbling about the right way to do things. We saw a lot of folk at the Open Day, both potential customers and those with build slots booked, the "Owners in Waiting". The Boars Head meal, the pot luck supper, the barbecue and the Chinese on Sunday were all successful. The auction was one of the best both for entertainment value and for the amount of money raised for Anthony Nolan and the Leukemia and Lymphoma Trust. I haven't worked out the absolute final figure, but it's going to be over £2,000 all told, including Gift Aid.

We had a good mixture of old hands and new faces and the newbies fitted in very well indeed. The quiz seemed to go down OK, including the experimental Pointless round. We made sure that Peter Mason won the BOG Award for heroic failure, nominating him four times for a variety of mishaps. He took it very well and promptly set himself up for next year by nearly wrecking a carefully worked out boat shuffling scheme on Sunday afternoon, one he'd set up himself.

A moment's forgetfulness meant that he tried to bring one of the boats in build back into the yard off the water point before I'd moved out the boat that was occupying the space it needed to go into.

Those of us who were left went down to the Boars Head last night and had a very pleasant, relaxing and winding down evening. Sheila and I were feeling both pleased with the way things had turned out and completely relaxed for the first time for a couple of weeks. We got to bed reasonably early, anticipating a good night's kip.

So the burglar alarm in the bungalow went off at five to one in the morning. We woke about a foot above the bed as our bedroom is presntly just through the paint shed wall from the alarm box. I popped out with a torch and checked that there was no sign of nefarious activity in the bungalow. Peter and Susan had gone home to Stockton Heath for once and had turned off their mobiles, so there was nothing for it but to sit it out until the alarm silenced itself after 20 minutes.

It took us quite a while to get back off again.

Heigh ho, it's been another good day today, cleaning the brass pole and plank stands and helping with yet more boat shuffling. Most of the owners have now headed off, leaving just the crews of Cala, Ice Breaker and Sir James here. They will all be taking off in the course of this week – I reckon we'll be on our way early next.

A good weekend, but tiring

OK, I said I'd blog today and this is it. 'Bye.

Nah, I'd better do a bit more than that, I guess, but the old creativity is at a pretty low ebb, so I'll just confirm that it was, in fact, a superb Open Day and Owners' Weekend, probably the best we've had so far. The weather has even been very kind today for taking down the tents.

I really, truly will do a proper post tomorrow, complete with an account of how Peter Mason not only won the BOG Award for this year, but got himself nominated for next year within 24 hours.

We had lots of visitors and a fair few Owners in Waiting came to see us, those with build slots later on, either in 2016 or even 2017. There were 15 boats to view and several of the visitors were talking very seriously about the kind of boat they wanted.

We're off down the Boars Head for one last time tonight, then back to real life tomorrow. The roof repaint is well on, but there are various bits and pieces to do as well. The hope is that we'll be out of the paint shed on Friday, though quite possibly won't get away from Poynton for a few days after that.

I'll see you tomorrow.

Ready for action

The boats are finally all in the right place and people are buzzing about in a good mood.

I've got to finish a bit of cleaning in the boat then cook my contribution to tonight's pot luck meal, chicken gumbo with prawns and scallops.

No more posts now until Monday, I'm afraid, I'm just going to be too busy. Have a good weekend, folks.