MY IDEAL BOAT

Whilst moored in Brinklow Marina, I have time to think about things. So, after living on 'Rosy' for over quite a few years, I have been sketching out My Ideal Boat (hereafter called MIB)- not that I can acquire it, as my finances are such that I have to make do with what I've got. But here goes.

Rosy is 52 ft long. I would be tempted to make MIB up to 8 feet longer, but as the licence fees increase with length, this has a low priority.

Rosy has rectangular hand-holds on either side of the roof. I much prefer the 'rail on upstands' approach.

I'm very iffy about the engine. A 'classic' engine would be nice - I still mourn loosing Rosy's Kelvin - but classic engines need classic engineers to keep them in order. My current Perkins is fine (if a bit noisy) but I bought the last one for Rosy, and would not want a second hand one! I'd probably plump for Beta Marine, though I would contemplate a single speed, hydraulic drive engine.

The engine room would be at the stern with doors fore and aft.

I would pay particular attention to the cooling of the engine coolant. It was fine in the UK, but in Euroland, where the daily (ish) cruising was often quite long, I had problems with the engine over-heating. Mike (on nb Temujin) fixed it by making and installing 4 steel boxes, sited under the engine and incorporated into the cooling system. They worked a treat.

In many ways I would like a gas-free boat, but gas is so good and convenient that it is hard not to have any. I certainly like cooking on gas, and I'm told that gas fridges work well. I very much like my Paloma gas water heater, but whilst I can keep mine on Rosy, Paloma's can no longer be fitted into narrow boats. I assume, though, that other gas water-heaters are available.

I would like a fair amount of foam to be pumped into the space between the hull and Rosy's interior - including the roof. I'm not too sure how one lags the floor.

I would like a double bed that is always available. My current bed is across the hull, so has to be set up each night and put away each morning. My ideal boat would have the bed, fore and aft at the stern - just forward of the engine room - with a door between the bedroom and engine room. In case of fire, the quickest exit from the bedroom would be via this door.

Rosy does not have a table. Food is eaten from a plate on one's lap. There is some comfortable seating in the cabin, which, at night, can be easily be converted into a double bed. I would copy all this in MIB.

I'm a bit iffy about washing machines. I don't have one on Rosy. If I am near a laundrette I am happy to use it. What I DO have is a spin dryer, so I normally 'soak and hand wash' the washing, and then dump it into the spin dryer. I then pour water into the spin dryer and swish the washing about, before spin drying it again. I do this 3 or 4 times. This all works a treat. Hand washing is not a problem and the spin dryer is very much better at drying washing than is a washing machine.

I have central heating on Rosy, which was originally designed by Dick Goble. As it stands at the moment, the Squirrel stove, up near the bows, has some copper tubing that slopes slightly upwards towards the back of the boat, as far as the bathroom. It then turns through 180 degrees and heads back (parallel to the outgoing tubing) to the Squirrel. All the nay-sayers tutted and said it would never work, but it does!!

Currently, the back cabin, where I sleep, is warmed by an Epping stove - Yes!! There are 2 stoves on Rosy!! MIB will only need the one stove, and will cut my winter coal bills by about a third (currently it is about £3 a day).

When I bought Rosy, aft of the forward cabin there was a space, on one side of which there was (and still is) a wardrobe. On the other side there were 2 single bunk beds. I removed one of the beds. The second bunk was tweaked and raised, and is now 'the office.

The next space in the bathroom with a small sink and a shower. The bathroom works really well.

BEING IDLE ON ROSY

Although the Kindle is very convenient, I still prefer reading a 'proper' book. One can acquire books from junk shops, 2nd hand shops, swapsies with friends etc etc. I occasionally buy new books (especially if I know the author), but us OAP's have to take care of the pennies. However, I tend to rely on ABE books (the UK version) which, for the un-initiated, is a website where book sellers can advertise their wares, often at a discount. 'Angela's Ashes' cost about £3 (inc p&p) paper back and £4 hard back at ABE. Interested? UK based book-a-holics should go to www.abebooks.co.uk. If you want to pay in US dollars (and spend a fortune on shipping the book from USA to UK) you could try the USA branch at www.abebooks.com. 

Remember, too, that there are web-sites that cater for those of us who appreciate FREE e-books. Some such sites limit your downloads to so many per month (5 in the case of www.free-ebooks.net, though an unlimited (?) number if you pay a subscription). I've also heard of 'lending libraries' that let you have a book for a given number of days - I assume that the book self destructs on the appointed date. I haven't yet tracked one down, and I won't look for one until I have put a dent into the 50+ books that I have recently downloaded).

WORLD WAR 1. I've been re-reading my collection of books about the First World War battle of the Somme. I was in The Somme Company at Sandhurst, and on a couple of occasions I have visited the site of the battle. Each time I see the site, or read the books, I seem to learn another twist in the tale. Incredibly, the planners (in the rear) rarely visited the front, so were un-aware of the conditions there - e.g. the mud and even, apparently, the fact that the Germans held the high ground! Hence the Brits (and Commonwealth supporters) had to attack up-hill. The same, outline plan was used over and over again, each time with the same result - dead Brit (and Colonial) soldiers. Grrrrr!!

GETTING READY FOR FRANCE. Meanwhile, I'm twiddling around preparing to take Rosy back to France. She needs to have her Small Ships Register number re-applied - they were erased last year during the big re-paint, when I did not envisage returning to European waters. Also, the insurance vultures will soon be wanting an 'out of water' hull inspection.

MUSIC ON 'ROSY'. For various reasons, I have not used Rosy's music system for quite a while. I have just been trying to get it going again. At present, I can play all my CDs. Unfortunately, the ex-car radio that used to play my 300ish cassette tapes no longer wishes so to do. I mentioned this some time ago, with the result that I acquired a rather nice second hand Blaupunkt car radio/tape player at a very good price. Unfortunately this is a bit bigger than the old one, and installing it will take some time and ingenuity.