On Surveys and Winter Warmth (Listeners' questions - 6)

JOURNAL ENTRY

7^th March, Thursday.

“A grey wind blows
From a grey sky
Troubling the surface
Of the canal.

Damson blossom
Torn from branch
Spun snow-like
With each gust.

Sweet smell of woodsmoke
And the throat-catch of coal
Crosses my path, head high,
And is lost along the towpath.

þæs ofereode,
þisses swa mæg 
(That passed over…
so may this)

[MUSIC]

WELCOME

It's the night of a new moon, but heavy clouds blanket the dark skies and an easterly wind furrows the water's surface. Besides it will not rise before daybreak tomorrow, so for tonight we make do with a darkness you can almost touch with your hand.

This is the narrowboat Erica narrowcasting into a mad-March, Spring-touched, night to you wherever you are.

You made it! Thank you for coming, I was hoping you'd be here. Step aboard and come inside. There's a seat saved for you and the kettle has boiled. Take the weight off your feet and welcome aboard.

[MUSIC]

NEWS FROM THE MOORINGS  

The lengthening days continue their stride. Most walks can now be completed without the aid of torchlight. We are now, not too far away from the vernal equinox – the balance of daylight and night. A time when, in the UK, the sun rises and sets due east and west, at very nearly 6 am. and 6 pm - for this latitude it's more like 6.15 am and pm.

So far, March has certainly been living up to its Anglo-Saxon name, Hlydmonath (the loud or noisy month). Eleanor Parker in her book Winters of the World, quotes the Menologium, an ancient poem about the cycle of the year that appears in a manuscript of the Anglo-Saxon chronicle:

[READING]

But the Anglo Saxons also had another name for this month and sometimes called it Lenctenmonath to mark the lengthening of the daylight. It is where, it is thought, the word ‘Lent’ within the Christian calendar most probably derives. Both names have been very much in evidence.

Our old friend and guide to the seasons, Miles Hadfield, notes that “Romulus [the founder of Rome] placed this month as first in his calendar and until 1752 it closed and opened our own legal year.” This association of March with newness is reflected in Chaucer’s ‘The Nun’s Tale’ where we are told:

"When that same month wherein the world began,
Which is called March, wherein God first made man…”

Some days this week, along the canal, it does seem a time of newness. The air warm and blurred with minute insect wings. Lambs appearing in the emerald counterpane of adjacent fields; tottering with spindly, nock-kneed, legs on the still spongy soil. The blackthorn blossom is just about to burst, tiny polystyrene pills, still tinted green, are getting ready to unfurl, and mint-green elder leaves are beginning to spiral out of their buds. Happy times for squirrels. New-growth grass is starred with the warmth of dandelion yellow coltsfoot and a sprinkling of forget-me-not blue. Couch and nettle, sword spears of sedge, frilly cow parsley and trowel-shaped cuckoo-pint, large and glossy all lighting Dylan Thomas’ ‘green fuse’ of Spring. Though I have to admit to little recognition of my ‘green age’ at the moment. And above our heads, rooks and crows gaggle and spar with buzzards kestrels, and kites. This time, in earnest and no quarter is given in that scolded clamouring air. And the small wood, copse and hedgerows blossom with spring songs.

However, other days, feel heavy and forlorn. Wrapped in the damp wool of mist, the cold world drips. The fields and the towpath present a battered and threadbare look. Litter, broken twigs and branches knotted in barbed wire, torn stretches of glutinous mud. On those days, Maggie and I lope along our walks, silent in our own worlds picking our way through the all too evident debris of winter and storm. A pale sun glows coldly from an in indifferent sky that seems to not care a fig for the coming of Spring and light.

“March, blow by/ With your stormy grey eye” wrote Eleanor Farjeon. It is a good couplet for this March-tide.

But the brown and silver-greys are being replaced by the green and blues. The wheels are turning. A.E. Housman’s words still ring true

“Braver notes the storm-cock sings
To start the rusted wheel of things.”

And this year, through my eye, the turning wheel does feel a little rusty and stuck. But I too have heard the missel-thrush expand his repertoire of riffs and musical volleys and there is no denying the power of it. 

 And for all its noise fierce Hlydmonath there is warmth in the sun and softer lights dance upon the stirred waters. Even though, for me at the moment, I don’t seem to find much energy for either, I am content to be carried with the tide this time. “This wave will bare my weight”, there are times to be carried, Spring does not need my help or constant commentary and it is good to step back and just be reminded of that fact.    

Perhaps these days are best summed up by observations of John Clare, the self-taught peasant poet (though he rightly railed against that title), in his ‘The Last of March written at Lolham Briggs’:

[READING]

[MUSIC]

CABIN CHAT

[MUSIC]

ON SURVEYS AND WINTER WARMTH

Lee Thomas, high up in the still snowy Colorado mountains asked me a couple of really good questions recently and I thought that they might be of interest also to others too.

I’m going to answer her second question first as it sort of fits with a question that Jason asked quite a few months ago and I nearly answered it at the end of last year, but ran out of time.

So, first, Lee wrote:

“We are of course in the deepest depths of winter here at 8,000 feet, but I see from the various canal vlogs I follow that not only canals but waterpoints periodically freeze in winter even there in relatively balmy England. It seems that you and most other narrowboaters heat your boats almost exclusively with your solid fuel stoves, just as I heat my little house/cabin almost exclusively with a wood stove. I have a single unit natural gas stove in the central living area and in winter have taken to plugging in an electric radiator in the bathroom where most of the plumbing is, but when it gets seriously cold, like last month when it got down to minus 17 F one night, I still had a pipe freeze (although fortunately I was able to thaw it with a hair dryer and it wasn’t damaged). If the electricity went out during a significant cold spell, I would have to set an alarm and get up a couple of times a night to feed the wood stove fire, as that stove is not big enough to hold a fire all night and is not rated for coal. Even then I might end up with frozen pipes. For this reason, I am very reluctant to leave my house for more than a few days in the winter.”

It is a great question. It is often stated – and I think I have done it here – that the first question a liveaboard is usually asked is ‘Gosh, isn’t it cold in winter?’ To which the answer invariably is ‘No, far from it. We are usually much warmer and cosier than if we were living in a house.’ While that is true, I just want to push back on that answer a little as it can be rather misleading. Boats in winter are not naturally warm places (like, say, a cave, a house built underground). In other words, you have to work at keeping them warm. While it is true that it is far easier (and quicker) to warm and maintain the heat of a 60ft by 7ft by 7ft tube, than a house, left to themselves, they can be really cold places, and will settle down to perhaps a few degrees above the outside temperature.

Earlier in the year, we had a couple of nights of -10° C (14°F) and a couple of our friends nearby, who had to leave their boat to attend a funeral elsewhere in the country returned to find everything frozen solid – including the water in their dog’s bowl! It is also not just cold, but also damp, which can mean all the furnishing and bedding can feel cold and clammy.

For the winter, our main source of heat is the solid fuel stove which is located in the bow end of the boat. This is normally more than enough to keep us very warm and we have now learnt its foibles enough for us to be able to bank it up and damp it down so that it lasts through the night and means that if we need to be out during the day, we can safely leave it. 

There is also a smaller stove in the stern, where the study is and where I do the recordings for the podcast. However, this is really only lit when it is extremely cold.

This way, we can keep more than just warm during the coldest winter days and nights, but feeling very snug. Because of the nature of boat design – and one thing I like most about them – is that you are physically much closer to the elements. This does mean that you can encounter what, at first, might feel real strange things. For example, on very cold nights, even though it may feel pleasantly warm in the boat, it can be quite common to wake up with ice on the inside of the windows (particularly the bedroom ones – which tends to be the coldest area on the Erica). Actually, I quite like lying in bed and feeling the stickiness of frost on the window pane just above my head – it reminds me of when I was a lad and huffing at the ice ferns that swirled icily across my bedroom window!

However, as Lee’s question suggests, using this form of heating is not possible if, like us recently, have to be away from the boat for a couple of days. Fortunately, we also have a diesel-powered central heating system, although, we tend to use this only in spring and autumn when it is too warm to warrant the stove being lit, but you need something to keep the chill of night at bay. We also use it as a frost guard (with the thermostat turned down low) for those times we have to leave the boat overnight and can’t therefore use the stove. This is enough to avoid pipes freezing or returning to a boat that feels too cold and damp. The problem came this year, when it suddenly developed a fault and couldn’t use it. Fortunately, the temperatures haven’t been too bad. Nevertheless, when there were below zero temperatures forecast, we did employ the added measure of draining the water from the system – just for our peace of mind. It does still mean that there are some vulnerable pipes, but the mains ones are covered. The other relatively exposed area is the engine bay. And the problem with chatting to experienced boaters about winter hazards is that you hear all sorts of nightmare stories – like engine blocks splitting. The first winter we bought the Erica and before we move onboard, I lived totally on tenterhooks devouring each weather bulletin and forecast and imagining all sorts of horrendous things happening while we were away. I’ve never drained the engine or fully drained the water- tank (something I am loathed to do with a 20 year old tank as it can cause more problems than the one you are trying to avoid). Living aboard with the heating on keeps those exposed areas above freezing anyway, so it is not too much of a problem. If we were to have some significant low temperatures, the type that Lee encounters, I think I would simply avoid leaving the boat without anyone on board, for exactly the same reason as Lee.

Small electric heaters can be an option. However, most boaters tend not to use them, as they can gobble up the electric and consequently means you are constantly keeping an eye on the battery levels. If you are on a landline hookup, it is not so bad and I know of a few boaters who keep a small electric heater for emergencies. However, generally, they are not seen as a viable option – particularly if you are on the move.        

While we don’t have anywhere near the extremes of temperature that Lee describes, it is for this reason that normally we try to avoid being away from the boat for extended periods. So, I think, Lee, apart from our considerably milder climate, as far as dealing with cold weather, there is a lot we share in common. However, perhaps it is a little easier for us in that our smaller size makes things more manageable and that boat design means that most vulnerable pipework is inside the living space and therefore benefits from being inside a warm cabin. But, like you, leaving the boat unoccupied in severe cold can pose challenges.   

Another long-time listener, Jason Politte from over in Arkansas. Jason and Karen are coming over to the UK, if I remember rightly, around Easter time when they will be hiring a narrowboat for a cruise. Jason, I’ll answer yours first as it is fairly straight forward and it is, as you suspected, ’it all depends.’

Now, I know that is probably not much help at all, so I will try to enlarge on it and will take as my starting point the assumption that you have found the boat you want to buy. The actual process before that can take quite a long time. In all honesty, I am not sure what the current state of the market was. I know that just after the pandemic there was a significant shortage of boats on the market. I think partly from people re-evaluating their lives, partly from the upsurge in interest and appreciation of the natural world that began to arise from the lockdowns – and canal walks and nature vlogs were instrumental in highlighting this aspect of canal-life. There was also a plethora of articles online and in the Sunday supplements – as well as a fair few vlogs – extolling the joys of life afloat and that it was a cheap solution to all the many woes of the modern world. Consequently, there were lots of people seeking to buy a canal boat, a narrowboat in particular, which made it very much a seller’s market. Boats were being sold almost before they went on the market and their price was rising alarmingly. They were certainly out of our price range. I think that the market has settled down a bit now. I certainly don’t come across so many adverts from brokers soliciting potential boat sellers.

Having said all that, it can take a good few months – may even be over a year – before you actually find the boat that you want. It all depends upon what you are looking for and how flexible you are and how open to compromise.

However, if we take as our starting point that you have found a boat, then the process of buying it can be a matter of how long it takes to agree the price and then transfer your money over. That is probably not the best way of doing it, but it can be done that quickly.

In that sense, it is a little bit like buying a car. Check it over, kick the proverbial tyres – which in this case is peering into the engine bay, giving it a test run, looking over for signs of wear and tear. Then putting in an offer (if you want to haggle a bit), and then transfer the money. There’s no log book as such, so get an appropriate declaration that she is now your property, register and licence the boat in your name with the CRT and sort out the insurance – actually, I don’t think you can get a licence if it is not insured, but could be wrong. You could do it – if all the ducks line up – pretty much in one day.

Now that IS one way of approaching it. However, I would recommend that rather than approaching it as you would buy a car, that you approach it much more as if you are buying a house. This offers you far more protection, but it also does mean that the process can take a fair bit longer. If you view it as if you are buying a house, it is a house that not only has an engine, but – arguably – the most important part of the house is hidden from you as it will be under water. Therefore, always go for a full survey which includes lifting the boat out of water or taking it to a dry dock and for a complete inspection and survey of the hull, as well as the rest of the boat – electrics, gas (if it is equipped) and other important structural components. As I say, this does slow the process down – and again is dependent on a number of different factors – but generally I would say, factor in a month. The surveyors report also gives you much more information about any work that needs to be carried out and so it makes sense to wait until it is done before you put in any firm offers. The other factor is that it does cost money. One of the things we were particularly concerned about was the fear that, if a survey did show that there was something significantly wrong with the boat and we decided not to go ahead with it and that happened a couple of times, we would be seeing our pot of money begin to drastically dwindle and therefore placing the type of boat we needed out of our price range.

However, that didn’t happen, but don’t let that fear put you off going for a survey!

We bought Erica through a broker and from the time we put down a deposit to effectively take her off the market while we had the survey done, to her becoming ours was, I think, about three weeks. Again, this can be subject to a lot of variation, good surveyors can be very busy and therefore be booked up, also, if you do want a full survey, hiring a crane or dry dock can also entail having to wait for the next available slot – particularly at busy periods.   

However, once you have the survey, you are then in the position to take the decision about whether or not to proceed with the purchase and put in an offer. If the survey throws up work needing to be done this can affect the price you might be willing to pay. Again, if you go through a broker, this can make things a little easier for you.

Once the price has been agreed, then the process is pretty simple and quick. If I remember correctly, I think it took us a little over a month from first seeing to owning the Erica. We were fortunate in that lots of things all fell into place at once and the survey threw up only a couple of things which the seller was more than happy to cover in the cost. So, in that regard, the whole process took a bit longer than buying a car, but nowhere near as long as buying a house!   

SIGNING OFF

This is the narrowboat Erica signing off for the night and wishing you a very peaceful and restful night. Good night.

WEATHER LOG