Sunny Saturday

Following a wet and windy afternoon and evening yesterday, this morning has turned out to be beautiful. Ducks quacking, the smell of coal burning and the sound of a blow lamp roaring! Minnow's off this morning, heading up 'ampton locks and round the BCN. 'Ampton is the boatman's name for Wolverhampton and the flight of twenty one locks there whilst BCN stands for the Birmingham Canal Navigations.

Here's a picture off Blossom, just after he'd kicked off with his lovely assistant Dawn on the gunnel!


The engine in Minnow is a 9hp (Pup) Bolinder - more about these another day!

And here's a picture of them heading off towards Gnosall, into the bright sunshine.



The other boats visiting for our Open Day last weekend headed off yesterday afternoon and I would imagine that they are now nearing the top of 'ampton already. They tied at Brewood last night and I went and fetched them by car and trundled off to the Red Lion at Great Chatwell for their firework and bonfire party. Simon and Amanda came over to join us too and a good night was had by all.

One of the day boats went out at 9 this morning with a happy crew aboard and we've got two boats out this afternoon. The engineers and cleaner are busy getting them ready for the next customers, who will arrive about 3pm. We reduce our hire prices right down for the winter and do publicise massive late minute discounts. Details of our hire boats can be found at www.norburyhire.co.uk.

There's a lot of activity in both of our docks too. The boat that is currently in our Wet dock, that Simon told you about a couple of days ago is being prepared prior to being painted and Paul's removing several of the cabin fittings so that the paint can be applied underneath them. These will be replaced once the paintwork has been completed. I'll post some pictures tomorrow...

Fred's busy down in the dry dock. He has just painted the counter bands on No Problem and has just started to apply the second coat of International Intertuff. This is a bitumen based product that we highly recommend. Each boat docked is pressure washed with a 3000psi steam cleaner and left for 24 hours to dry. Three coats of the blacking of the customers choice is then applied with adequate drying time in between coats. I must say that Fred does do a thorough job and he prides himself in taking the time to look after each boat that we have on the dock.

Here's a picture of him hard at work! You can also see that the large rubber fender is back in place and a set of anodes have been fitted.



Bernard's also busy in the engine bay of No Problem, checking the engine over and doing some jobs that Sue has asked us to do.

It's time to press 'Publish' and get back to work.

Until tomorrow ...

David