Grey Days

Here is Caxton's foredeck in its first coat of many colours, oops,.. Grey. You can see that there is no conventional hatch cover on the deck but rather doors from the well deck into the bow locker.
This is because the gas bottles/locker will be at the back of the boat.

I am off to Essex this morning to see my family and a new edition, Ramsay, an eight week old Cocker Spaniel puppy! I am chief puppy sitter tonight as my brother Bob and family will be attending a concert at the Cliffes Pavillion in Westcliffe-on-Sea. Photo's of Ramsay at the weekend.

It seems ironic that I am celebrating the arrival of what will be a much loved pet whilst John of Marmaduke is posting today about the death of much love family pet...

All steamed up

Moving onto a boat means that I will be leaving behind the convenience of the electric kettle. Reverting to the kettles of childhood, the whistling, rattling monsters that used to sit on the old gas cooker. (Yes, there were NO electric kettles when I was a child, at least, not affordable ones for my family.)

So, I am in a bit of a quandary; do I go for this little retro number that apparently uses 25% less energy to boil water because of the wirey bit at the bottom (techno speak)

or this rather fetching one?

Getting Wired

Caxton was having his wiring loom fitted yesterday so the day started with a couple of calls from Stuart; "How do you wanted the saloon lights switched, individually or all four together?" After a few, 'what about this' and 'how difficult would that be' we resolved to switch the lights in pairs, starboard and larboard -right and left- forgive me, I'm just being silly and nautical.

Next call, to Joe this time, something about the thickness of cable, at which I wandered off to buff my nails...

Fenland Warrior

I have just found photographs taken last August at the IWA Festival of, guess who? Yes, Sarah of NB Warrior. So Sarah, no other way of getting them to you - here they are..

And also...

Another old chestnut

We've had the classic 'portholes' or 'windows' post now it is time for the other old chestnut, loos, tank or cassette?

We decided to sell up last June, we had created a rough specification (wish list really) and found a builder by July. From here on in we researched everything including, loos. We went to the Inland Waterways Association extravaganza at St. Ives in August and spent quite a time talking to people on the Lee Sanitation stand.

Right sorted, a pump-out, with a DIY pump-out kit then.

But hang on, what about the space taken up by a large tank of .. well, you know?

Perhaps a cassette then?

Anyway, having arrived at this state of indecision, we set off to visit Lee Sanitation where they have working models of their products. They were really helpful and having seen the goods, we settled on a vacuum cassette!

What convinced us was the proper ceramic pan and the minimum amount of water used in the flush. (We already are used to using the Thetford cassette system because we have one in the caravan, so saw no problems in emptying cassettes). We really didn't want to give up space under the bed or dinette to a large tank that could be better used for storing things we wanted rather than, well, ...you know. So we are having a Vacu Flush cassette system attached to a Sealand 4848 ceramic pan with electric flush! Decision made, phew.

Caxton is in the altogether, the altogether..

Caxton is currently being dressed in his new 'suit of clothes'. Arriving at the Barnowl workshop one week ago in a fetching shade of MOD green, he has now been rubbed down and undercoated.

And below in his first coat of gloss. You can see where Stuart has left the areas of undercoat ready for the sign written panels. Two more coats to wear yet..

Energy Efficient White Goods

Caxton is going to be our home for the foreseeable future; there will be no land base. We therefore tried to be practical about what living in a bathtub will mean, however, I start by making NO excuses about our wanting modern day conveniences on board Caxton.

I fail to find washing up dishes therapeutic at home and I see no reason why that would miraculously change on a boat and as for himself washing up - Yer well, I don't think so...

So, given that we are not prepared to beat the washing on stones at the water side, or hang damp clothes and linen all over the boat, we have had a long search for energy efficient white goods to take the load. The criteria has been:

• Power consumption
  
• Water consumption


• Cleaning efficiency


• Simplicity
  
• Load

Most of the searching has been done on the net but you still need to go and 'kick the tyres' so to speak so we have visited retailers to look at the goods, press buttons and open drawers etc. Following a trip into Peterborough last Monday we have finally settled on the following:

John Lewis Washing machine JLWM1407 1.02kwh/cycle - 56litres of water per wash

John Lewis Condensing tumble dryer JLTC01 2.1kwh/cycle

Neff Dishwasher S44E43 1.05kwh/cycle - 14 litres of water per wash

We have run all this past the electrical whizz kids that are setting up Caxton's systems and it meets their approval so here's hoping that we have done our research properly.