Narrowboat AREandARE

From the 2009 & 2010 tantalising tales, traumas and stunning photographs of Barry (photographer) and Sandra (writer) from New Zealand aboard NB 'Northern Pride', to the stories of their 2013 return journey, purchase of 'AREandARE', progress on sustaining their live aboard continuous cruiser lifestyle, and Barry's quest to gain residency and 'Indefinite Leave to Remain' in UK ...

Monday 20 April 2009

Still in the marina...

First night on the boat last night, Barry slept like a log, unfortunately I didn't but hopefully I will get used to feeling like I am sleeping in a floating coffin along with the strange noises that the boat makes. Barry assures me that the canal isn't deep and even if the boat sank we wouldn't be in enough water for it to drown me, I think I may have to invest in an axe under the bed so that I could cut my way out if necessary, but maybe I'm just being overly dramatic as usual!


The hire car has been returned which took up most of my day, so now we've just the narrowboat and public transport to rely on. Unfortunately the welding still hasn't been sorted, so it looks like we are in the marina for another day but hopefully no more. Barry kept himself busy doing more sorting and cleaning and purchasing maps and sundries from the local boating shop. The boat is certainly starting to look like ours now, and happily no longer smells of mothballs.

We had our first visitor for tea, my daughter Lisa came and joined us, how fabulous that we bought a boat so close to her. While she was here we were treated to a bit of a show from 2 of the local swans - they seem very tame and Barry fed them bread from his hand and took some cool shots of them. Last time we were on a narrowboat he fed swans mashed potato off a spoon! Maybe they're not so dangerous after all...


Tomorrow it'll be planting seeds for me, maybe a bit of sketching, enjoying the sunshine, just chilling waiting for the men to weld, it's a tough life...

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