Saturday

Three men went to Henley in a small boat (IRIS), had lunch and came back again. Two of them had burgers.

Crazy.

Edinburgh
Been up here for work during the last few weeks and there is not much narrowboating to be had in Scotland. Did another little trip on the Thames last weekend with Mary, and cabin boy Mat makes his first appearance of the season this weekend with our lunch trip to Henley (teenage girls optional I hope - see previous post) - hopefully we won't be mobbed by adoring fans, judging from the number of times you've checked out his profile compared to mine.

Been reading Sarah's Warrior blog and have to say I agree with her view of modern boats. There aren't many that I find inspsiring, I guess thats why I like mine with its old-skool appeal.

Went to the Little Venice canal festival on bank holiday monday and saw a range of interesting old working boats, as well as a range of interesting old people.

Just to include some photographs, here is one of my favorites from this year, IRIS in the ice in february.

...and completely at random, my brother and cat in front of my house in NZ in October last year.

Henley - chavtastic
We decided to go to Henley on saturday, I was quite excited as it was the first time I've taken Iris out on the river this year, Mary was excited as she had no idea of what to expect. I was trying to remember what I need to do going through the locks, but all was fine when we came to Sonning lock - we were the only boat going downstream. After letting the water out, the downstream gates opened, and I hopped onto the roof from the lockside like the sprightly 42 year old I am. As you have to turn the engine off in Thames locks I went to start it again and......nothing, just a faint click. After letting the lockeeper know why I wasn't leaving, I went and had a look. Luckily it was just a loose connection on the starter battery. Years of various cars and bikes have taught me to check the obvious first.

Finally we arrived at Henley in the late afternoon after a pleasant trip. After a spot of shopping to get some essentials (gin, lime, tonic), we watched the sun go down.

There were some interesting boats around, including this steam driven launch.

At about 7:00pm there was a commotion in the park next to us, as a group of teenage girls shouted obscenities at each other and threatened to start a fight. Meanwhile a boat was going round and round the island increasingly erratically as the teenage boys driving it got stuck into the refreshments. Inevitably, the two groups become aware of each other and then it all kicked off. Very tedious, and it reminds me of how old I'm getting when a group of drunken, shrieking, teenage girls fills me with a sense of outrage rather than a sense of hope.

Still, the youth of today have no stamina and they were pretty much done by 9:30pm. Gin, wine and ranting about it to Mary helped ease the pain.

Sunday morning came and another lovely day arrived

We headed back upstream to meet my sister Beck, brother in law Steve and nephews Thomas and William for lunch at the Bull in Sonning. Mary had a go at driving while I stood on the roof at the front and generally pretended I was Nelson.....

We had a lovely lunch, followed by ice cream on the boat. Here is a nice shot of the Brookes family.....

.....and a classic one of my two nephews attempting to abandon ship ahead of schedule.

Three stories
Got a collection of random updates to add in, so in no particular order, here goes...

Three stories #1
Last month I went down to Bristol with Mary to see my old friend Nev. That's old as in I've known him since we were 13, not old as in age, although there is no denying we're getting on a bit now.....

The hotel car park was full, but I managed to find a place to park (underneath a ramp) as shown here.

Here is another picture (model provided for scale).

Nothing to do with boats, but amused me and puzzled the hotel staff.

Three stories #2
Been making some steps to access the front deck. My neighbor Dave watched my initial attempts to cut the rebate for the treads and then offered to help me (he's a carpenter and has a table saw on his boat). The picture here shows everything in kit form.

This next picture has everything all glued and clamped up.

...and this is what they look like in place. I need to oil and wax them, but that'll have to wait until I get back after Easter.

Three stories #3
During the course of the stair making, the cable ties holding on one of my low profile tyre fenders broke, and the tyre sank into the depths. Even though the tyre was free, it was doing a good job of keeping the boat away from the dock. No one was around for me to borrow a boat hook from, so I wandered over to the marina shop. They just happened to have a tiny folding anchor for £3.65 - bargain! I've no idea what sort of boat this is meant to hold, but it'll do me as a grappling hook.

After about 10 minutes of dragging the lake bed, I managed to find the tyre and hook it back up. Far more satisfying than I would've thought, and I had to be restrained from throwing more things in just to fish them out again.

I upgraded the attachment for the tyre to a chain based system. Its not going anywhere now.

Bathroom
Its all been a bit quiet on the bathroom front, as I did a couple of minor projects (table etc.) that were more immediately gratifying. So on Saturday while Mary did some work on the laptop, I got down to the laying of the floor.

I'd previously treated the underfloor area (once I'd removed any loose rust and dirt) with an anti-corrosion wax. I couldn't reach all the areas I wanted to without dismantling the shower etc., but a couple of judiciously drilled holes helped out. I used the anti-corrosion wax from here. The aerosols came with a long probe (ooh-err) to get to those hard to reach places.

The next stage was to cut the floor tiles to shape. I'd previously got some tiles from the Rubber Floor Company in 'cinnamon', as this closely matches the raddle red paint used on the exterior decks. Tedious eh? :)

These two pictures show the glue being applied to the floor and left to go off a bit before putting the tiles back down.

Here is the (almost...) finished floor, just need to do something around the edges. Then it'll be onto the new sink to replace the old one I so rashly ripped out 5 weeks ago.

Finally, here is a reminder of what the old toilet looked like before......skank-tastic.