Drawing to A Close

We would like to thank all of our regular readers for their time and lovely comments over the years.

We have made the difficult decision to sell Naughty-Cal. We just have not got the time for her at the moment and it is a shame to leave her sat idle on her mooring. With this in mind we are spending the next few weeks fettling and cleaning before she is officially put onto brokerage hopefully by the end of next month.

We have had a great 12 years boating and have made some great friends over the years. We won't be strangers and will still see our friends on the water. Just for the time being not on our own boat.

We have plans in the pipeline to buy a campervan and do some exploring by road, but this won't be for a couple of years as we have other holidays booked and planned so no point getting one to just sit it on the drive.

So for now it is goodbye and fairwell. 

Good boating to you all.

A Birthday Disapointment

It was Liam's birthday yesterday, so to celebrate we had booked a table in The Parish Oven in Thorpe Salvin. A pub we had only just discovered but had heard good reviews about the food, so we thought we would give it a go.

I will start firstly by saying that the pub is very well fitted out, very clean and very welcoming. Even on a wet, cold and miserable June Tuesday evening we received a very warm welcome from the staff and were quickly seated and enjoying a drink of our choice.

The food however did not deliver as expected. My fish and chunky chips were really very good. Sadly the same can not be said for Liam's Ribeye steak which was firstly not cooked how he asked for it, it was far too rare for him, but secondly was for the most part inedible and chewy. Even Sydney has a struggle with it!

Will we visit again? We will certainly give it another try. Every pub can suffer from a less than perfect batch of steaks. We will perhaps try other items on the menu though.

More Exploring

After a wet and windy Saturday on the boat yesterday dawned bright and sunny with light winds. Perfect boating weather.

We had a breakfast of sausage muffins on the way back to Saxilby where we had a brief stop to visit the shops and let Sydney have a good run around with his ball on the playing fields before heading back to the marina at dinnertime.

With the boat packed up we headed home, put the cola gammon in the slow cooker and then decided to head out and go for a walk around Cresswell Crags. Another local spot ideal for walking the dog. We will certainly go back here, Syd loved it.

A Mixed Bag

It has been a weekend of mixed weather. If we had not arranged to meet friends at Torksey on Saturday afternoon we most probably wouldn't have gone to the boat. But we had so we battled through the wind and rain. We had a lovely evening in good company.

Today has been a much better day and the run back was in glorious sunshine. 

Pub Lunch

Last night we met up with some friends in one of the local pubs for a bite to eat. We met in the Romans Rest which is about a 10 minute walk from our house. It is a sprawling family pub with a childrens play room, restaurant, bar area and games area which serves the now typical pub grub. The food won't blow you away but it is perfectly acceptable pub grub and you can't complain for the price. The two for £10 menu is definitely excellent value.

We are having an evening at home tonight. The weather forecast later looks none so clever so we will take the chance to have an evening in and get a few jobs done at home in the morning before we head to the boat to meet up with some friends at Torksey later in the afternoon. We have been putting off putting up the remaining blinds for too long now. They need to go up in the kitchen and in bedroom three.

Exploring The Vicinity

At home we are still very much exploring our new surroundings and finding new places to visit and take Sydney for his evening walks.

Yesterday evening we visited the pretty little village of Thorpe Salvin. We stumbled across it quite by accident and having previously heard great things about the village pub we have booked a table for one evening next week when it is Liam's birthday.

Safari Chef

At the weekend a friend of ours got out his Cadac Safari Chef so that we could have an outdoor breakfast. We were very impressed with this piece of kit, so much so that we have decided that we really should get one ourselves. So tonight we are heading to Go Outdoors to hopefully pick one up.

The Cada Safari Chef is essentially a small portable gas BBQ but thanks to its many attachment and plate options it can also be used as an over, pizza oven, grill, wok and most other cooking surfaces you could conjour up.

Now as regular readers will already know we are not blessed with a choice of cooking options on Naughty-Cal so the Cadac will open up a range of other meals that we can cook by the riverside with the added bonus of keeping the cooking smells and spitting fat out of the boat.

Now of course this will only be of any use when the weather is suitable to cook outdoors. So no doubt we have just let us all in for a wet and windy summer ahead as we plan to do most of this years cooking outdoors!

Sorry everyone!

A Few More

Just a few more pictures from Saturday for you today. We didn't do anything interesting at all to share with you yesterday. We just locked up the boat and headed home to chill out and have a roast chicken dinner before hitting the sack for an early night.

A Fab Day

Well we certainly dropped lucky with the weather yesterday for our first weekend back afloat. We couldn't have asked for better. We had a brilliant day in Saxilby with a couple of drinks at the Pavilion before heading back to the boats for a bbq.

A Gentle Start

With Naughty-Cal having been out of the water for so long, a shade over five months in total, we are going to give her a nice easy shake down cruise this weekend to break her back into the swing of things and check that everything is working as it should.

We will have a few bits and bobs to sort out on Saturday morning before we can set off from the marina but nothing that will take too long. 

We are planning to head to Saxilby for the evening and to hopefully fire up our first BBQ of the year. A whole four miles for our first cruise of the year, well eight if you count the return trip but still, it won't go down as an epic voyage!

From The Coast

Just a few pictures from our blustery bank holiday on the coast for you today. It was a pleasant day despite the threatening skies we didn't get wet but it did chuck it down with rain as we were driving home. I think we were lucky to stay dry.

Spicing It Up

This recipe is one that I discovered recently and it has changed how we have our Sunday lunches. Now we like a Sunday lunch as well as the next person but sometimes they need a bit of jazzing up and this is the perfect way to do it.

It is so simple you won’t believe it.

Simply chop up some potatoes and cauliflower and place in a large baking tray. Take one tablespoon of curry paste (all supermarkets sell this now but it need to be the paste) and massage the curry paste into the skin of a whole chicken. With the residual paste on your hands toss the veg around to give it a light coating. Place the bird on top of the veg and roast in the oven at 200 degrees for an hour and a half. Serve simply with some green beans.

So simple yet so delicious. We did this with duck last night which also works well but I think I preferred it with chicken.

Playtime

As Sydney has been such a good boy this weekend while we have been busy with the boat and when we had guests come to stay yesterday, we decided to treat him to a trip to the seaside today.

It was lovely and fresh on the beach and he helped us with some fish and chips.

All sorted

It was a bit hot for painting antifoul today. We were both baking in the sunshine. It is done now though and Naughty-Cal is ready to go back in the water on Tuesday.

A Mixed Weekend

We have a very mixed bag in store for this long bank holiday weekend. Something different planned for every day.

Tomorrow we are heading over to the marina to finish off Naughty-Cal. We only need to apply a couple of coats of paint to the bottom and get the fenders scrubbed and the ropes back on so it shouldn't take us too long and then she will be ready for relaunch on Tuesday next week.

On Sunday we have some friend coming over to stay for the evening. This will be our first over night guests in our new home so we are really looking forward too it. No doubt we will have a walk to one of the local pubs and then will return home for Sunday lunch and a few more drinks at home.

Monday we are going to take the chance to explore more of the areas surrounding our new home on foot with the dog. We are not 100% sure where we will end up yet but we are thinking perhaps a walk in Carlton might be on the books.

A Word On Paint

For almost as long as we have had the boat we have used an antifoul paint by Premier Paints called Premier One Can. It has proven to be a very cost effective way to keep the bottom of the boat clean and looking fresh.

Unfortunately this time we have decided not to use the Premier Paints product due to a massive increase in price that no longer makes the product an attractive prospect.

When we got the boat she was painted with Cruiser Uno which we never really liked. It got too much weed growth for our liking over a season in the water. So it was time to look elsewhere.

Several people have recommended Hemel Tiger Xtra. So on the back of these recommendations that is what we have gone for this time around. It has come in a good £30 a tin cheaper than the Premier Paints equivalent product which is about a third cheaper. 

Only time will tell if it will perform as well. Fingers crossed it does.

New Car

We took delivery of our latest new car yesterday. This one is a bit smaller though and might take a bit more effort to get to work in it!

We have bought a little vintage Jeep pedal car. The maker is as of yet unknown but we are going to do a little research into it and try and find out who made it. It just needed a little dust down last night and then it was able to take pride of place in the living room.

Now we just need to find some wall art for that corner of the room that will go will the Jeep.

A Confession

We have a confession to make. Over the last few weeks we have been seriously considering selling Naughty-Cal and using the proceeds to buy a VW van to convert to a camper. In fact up until yesterday afternoon that is what we were going to do.

But then as we were both polishing the GRP in the sunshine we realised it just wouldn’t be right for us. We couldn’t sell Naughty-Cal. It would be like selling parts of our own body. We realised that we are just not ready to give up boating just yet.

Now that we have made the decision to keep Cal we need to figure out what jobs we are going to do to her this year. We know that the engine is due a service, we have all of the bits we need to do this so this will be one of the first jobs to do when she is relaunched. The canopies are ready for a good scrub and a coat of Fabsil Gold to keep them weather proof. We are going to bring all of the removable upholstery home and give it a run though the washing machine to freshen it up and the mattresses and curtains as well. We also need to finish the installation of the new navigation gear which we will now get some use out of. We are looking forward to trying out the sonar now which is supposed to be excellent.

All of these jobs can be completed with the boat in the water. So we will soon be able to relaunch the boat. The only thing holding up the relaunch now is us painting the hull with a fresh coat of antifoul and Burton Waters carrying out some remedial works to a repair they did for us last summer. Clearly five months out of the water isn’t long enough for them to get their act together and sort things out!

An Apology

Firstly an apology that it has been so long since the last post. We have had a busy time.

Today we have been to polish Naughty-Cal. We went in the week to rebuild the stern drive and hand hoped to have her finished by today but alas we have run out of time. 

She is now polished but we have a couple of bits to do on the stern still and she needs a coat of paint so it will be next week when it is finished now.

She does look more like our beloved boat now though not a scruffy unloved boat at the back of the hard standing.

A Long Three Days

What with it being a long three day bank holiday weekend we decided to split our time between doing some work at home and cracking on with some work on Naughty-Cal.

Saturday we spent at home as the weather forecast was not great. We managed to get one of the large garden storage boxes assembled and in place and took yet another car load of packaging to the recycling centre. With that done we had a long walk around the local fields and woods.

Sunday morning after breakfast we headed across to the marina under blue skies. It was still on the chilly side though. The first job was to reassemble the stern drive. This did not go to plan though as we noticed at the last minute that one of the new oil seals was damaged. So we will order some more this week and get them fitted. We did manage to get the trim tabs cleaned up though and the new anodes fitted to these and the bar anode and new bellows fitted to the drive. We will finish building up the drive and get the fresh oil in there one night in the week. We did also make a start on the polishing. We have got the starboard side of the hull looking far more respectable.

Yesterday saw us back at home and after a long walk in the morning, some 4.5 miles though the local fields and woods, we were back on the driveway assembling another garden storage box, this one went together much quicker than the first one as we knew the routine by now. With the storage boxes complete, Liam moved a load of stuff out of the garage and into the boxes while I mowed the front lawn. Then it was time to set about the garage workbench assembly. The instructions for this were very poor and it took several attempts to get it right. By the time we had finished this we had had enough for the day so we took yet more packaging to the recycling centre before having a nice walk along the canal, then headed home for a few well earned drinks and a roast duck dinner.

Back to work for a rest now!

Getting Back into the Swing

As I'm sure you will appreciate it has been a busy five or so weeks for us, but now we are moved in, making a house a home and back at work we are starting to get back into the swing of things and bedding into the new routine.

The commute as we had expected is hardly any different time wise to what we had before but it is considerably more mileage. Our previous commute was 6 miles each way whereas we are now at 15 miles each way, but the type of roads means that we are getting more MPG from the car so fuel costs shouldn't be that much more overall and to counteract the extra fuel all of our car insurances have come down considerably for the move.

This weekend we will be heading across to the marina to start getting some work done on Naughty-Cal. We really do need to get her back in the water now before we lose too much of this summer ashore!