Hull 2014 - Part 1

 Setting Off

 Steady Cruise

 Time to go.

 Catch me if you can.

 Cruising past Keadby wind farm

 Cruising in formation.

Waiting for the tide.

You've Been Framed

It would seem we were photographed heading into Hull Marina on Saturday.

Home Again

So we are back on the Fossdyke once more heading for home after a great weekend in Hull.

Now we have a quiet day to ourselves as we have tomorrow off work as well. So here we are moored in Saxilby.

An Evening Cruise

Last night we enjoyed a lovely evening cruise along the Fossdyke to Torksey Lock.

The cut moorings were busy so we stayed above the lock. This morning we locked through at 8.45am and are now swinging on the hook at Trent End waiting for the tide to Hull.

We set out with five boats but sadly one has turned back due to overheating problems.

Plans Afoot

I know its only the end of August and we still have the bank holiday and another weeks holiday in October to think about, but we are starting to make tentative plans towards Naughty-Cal's next lift out in January.

This year we had Naughty-Cal out of the water for much longer than usual. In previous years we have had her ashore for just a couple of weeks, this year we had her out for a couple of months. We actually enjoyed having her out for longer as we could take our time over the jobs we had to do, and being the beginning of the year we didn't miss out on much cruising either. The extra time ashore didn't even cost us more money. It turns out that the weekly charge for storage ashore is pretty much the same as the monthly charge ashore!

This time we wont have the laborious task of scraping off all of the old antifoul paint. We did that last time so we should be left with a smooth finish so will be able to just paint straight over whats there, well thats the theory anyway.

Hopefully as in previous years we should have a straight forward time ashore. Its time to do a major service on the stern drive, which will include changing the bellows, oil seals, anodes, flushing through the oil, changing the props and painting the drive. We also know that some bushes need changing and we have some wear on the shaft which either wants replacing or fixing. We will have a look how bad it is and make that decision once its out of the water.

As we know roughly when we will be pulling her out of the water we can start to gather together all of the relevant materials and parts prior to her coming out so that we will be fully prepared, or as prepared as we can be, for when she finally does come ashore.

It seems like it has been a long hard season already for Naughty-Cal despite our later than usual start to the cruising season. She has been far and wide this year and that is set to continue for a couple of months more yet. 2014 promises to have been our busiest year afloat to date and our most adventurous. With plans for next years cruising already in the making we need to make sure that Naughty-Cal is going to be ready for action in 2015 so we need to put in a bit of hard works as well.

Under Attack

Our house is under attack from a super sized squadron of spiders.

Now I'm rubbish with normal size spiders but these are all together in a league of their own.

A Chill in the Air

There has been a definate chill in the air for the last couple of mornings so with this in mind I have dug out the fleece blanket we usually keep on Naughty-Cal during the winter and given it a nice, long, hot wash ready to put back on the boat on Friday evening. 

Hopefully its just a small hiccup and we will see more of the summer weather we were promised, where is the heat wave we were supposed to be getting?

For this coming weekend at least we are resigned to the fact it isnt going to be overly warm so we are taking the blanket, plenty of warm jumpers and with the diesel tank full and the Webasto in full working order we shall be lovely and warm whatever the weather throws at us.

Mind you we dont intend to spend that long on the boat. We are not going to Hull to drink on the boat!!