Retirement with No Problem

Calf Heath to Hunting Bridge 7, Staffs & Worcs and Shropshire Union Canals, 9 miles 1 lock

A quiet weekend after all the excitement of the previous week.  A more settled life aboard No Problem now that the electrics and power supplies have been sorted.

Running the power on a narrowboat is something that always needs to be thought about.  Before I had a boat, I would never have bought anything and actually looked underneath to see what power it was.. buy a toaster, plug it in, toast the bread!

The only thing I did look at was the power of a vacuum cleaner.. the higher the wattage the better it sucked!

But on a narrowboat there is only so much power available.  I won’t go into the technicalities of that, but our inverter, the equipment that basically converts our battery 12v power into AC power, controls the power we use aboard  We can only run electrical items that add up to 1600 watts at the same time.  There are larger inverters, and some people have 3Kw or more.  But for us 1600w will be fine.

A quick add up of the main items aboard.  The breadmaker is 480w.  This particular breadmaker was chosen because it is low in wattage, and it can make a loaf in one hour, so it won’t be on for too long.  The computer is 90w when plugged in and charging, various phone chargers and the like and the TV is 60w.  So we can run all that lot together.

The washing machine is 1300W.. the biggest drain.. but we can run that with everything else except the breadmaker.  So if we want a loaf of bread no washing gets done!!

Washing and breadmaking is only done while cruising so that the engine can easily generate enough power so as not to run our battery bank down.

We moved slightly on Saturday afternoon to one of our more favourite moorings where there is access to some lovely walks..

My little toe is still painful, but I can walk fine as long as I don’t go too fast.  In any case, it would take an awful lot to stop me from walking out!

A phone call on Saturday from Annie (NB Moore2Life) to tell me the sad news that their beloved cat Tara had died.  She hadn’t been too well for a few months though, and Charles and Ann had to make that awful decision to put a precious pet to sleep at the vets in Penkridge.  I was pleased that they were only a few miles away, they would join us on Sunday after lunch.

Yep, Sunday roast, and the pic is a bit blurry because of the steam coming off the roast spuds!!..

MINE is on the right, note only 2 roast potatoes!! Tis only me who had cabbage too, and with the cabbage I sliced up a mushroom and a bit of onion for a change.

With Moore2Life now joining us we pulled the pins this morning to make for the Shropshire Union Canal, affectionally known as The Shroppie.  It was a tight turn round the dogleg into the entrance under the bridge and straight into the lock.  It wasn’t until I was under the bridge and right by the lock till I could see that there was a boat already in the lock coming my way!!

We hadn’t seen a boat for a couple of days, and there was one in the lock! 

I didn’t know it then, but it was Carrie with NB Blackbird! I backed off so she could come out of the junction and then used the lock myself.  She popped along the towpath after we had stopped just up from the lock for water.. we would have chatted longer but Vic was getting impatient with all the mud and doing water hoses and the like on his own while I chatted!!   Will catch up with you again Carrie, nice to have met you at last!

Ho hum, “Rural Watch Area” the sign says.. oh well, at least he is facing the right way for a long stay!!

I’m chatty tonight.. better stop!  Ha, well we have put the pins in just above Hunting Bridge 7.  Depends on the weather tomorrow whether those pins come out or not…