Not much exciting happened today, so I though I would use today's post to do a bit of thinking out loud.
A point that has been causing me to ponder over the last few weeks, from the first day we moved on to "Jolli" actually. Is "What are the benifits to consider between life on a marina and life on the canal."
Obviously on a marina you have lots of material benefits, laundry room, dryers, toilets, mains electric hook up and showers to name but a few. You also have much better security that if you leave your pride and joy out on the cut all day, with just the dogs to keep it company. Lets be quite clear about this, our dogs in no way whatsoever would be a deterrent to burglars. In fact as Tess was making them a cup of tea, Tam would probably be offering them my slippers and a beer.
So lets go through these benefits. Laundry room, well we have washing machine on board. Dryer, its usually so hot in the boat that clothes get tinder dry in seconds, We have a cassette toilet and a shovel. Gail has broad shoulders and could no doubt learn to dig a decent hole in a few weeks, she is, after all, half Irish. We also have two spare cassettes and a key to the disposal points situated along the canal. Electricity? We have an inverter and a 2 ltr diesel engine to charge the battery bank (4 x 110 amp/hour leisure batteries)
So that only really leaves us with security to worry about. Well I suppose if you left your boat in the centre of a busy town, on a canal that may be a direct route back from the local nightclub to the nearest sink housing estate, where ASBO's are considered a badge of honour you may be asking for trouble. But surely your boat would be safe, moored up,out in the sticks, or next to a couple of like minded individuals.
I took some photos today whilst walking the dogs and it was this scene that let to the "in head" debate as described above. Yes, it looks lovely and picturesque but does it remind you of anything else?
It does me. It reminds me of a bl"*dy housing estate for boats. Exactly what we are trying to leave behind
It is pretty though isn't it. And I suppose it looks a lot nicer than a lot of housing estates.
All three photographs were taken from the hill overlooking the marina
I think that in all fairness both our minds are already made up. That is to say that come the better weather we will be off down the cut to further explore this alternative life style.
I would welcome any comments that any of you experienced live-a-board boaters may have and indeed any comments from anybody at all.
That's it for today folks. Stay safe and be happy.
Hi Gail and Chris.
ReplyDeleteGreat post and photographs.
For us there was never any thought of living in a marina, because we are not marina people, we like the wide open spaces of the canal and not being cooped up with hundreds of other boats looking into each others windows. I personally can think of nothing worse than being stuck in a marina when there is so much of the system to see, but I am also a person who say's "never say Never. No one knows what the future holds when living aboard, and should health fail or we get to old to move a marina maybe our only option, we would of course like a mooring somewhere out in the countryside.
Marina's serve a purpose of course and they do have the benefits of their services and security. In the time that we have been cruising the system we have never had cause to worry our our security, even though we have been shot at and someone tried to take our bikes, this was when we had our old boat. We have moored in big cities and never had any problems at all.
We have a few friends who go into marina's for the Winter, so they can be on hook up should the weather turn, like it has now, but we try to make sure we keep an eye on the weather and move accordingly. Being near services is a bonus, but we can last for up to three weeks without filling up with water, we have a shovel for the cassette, should we need to empty a cassette and I always have emergency rations of food on board, but with good old Mr Tesco that is not a problem these days.
Every body had their own point of view, but mine is to be out on the cut for as long as possible.
Stay safe and warm x