A busy day

It was a cooler start to the day this morning, but by lunchtime it had warmed up nicely. We had two day boats booked to go out this morning, but unfortunately one party couldn’t make it, so only Defiant has been out today. Victory has been sat on the end of the Wharf attracting a lot of interest.

We have turned thirteen boats around today. Bernard, Mick and Graham have been checking the engines over and have completed four services. Billy, Ralph and Becks have checked the internals and have showed the boats out this afternoon whilst Lorraine, Amy, Nat, Cheryl and Jean have cleaned the internals of the boats. Pam has been wading through the washing in the laundry. The shop and tea room have been manned by Jay, Ange, Lorraine and myself. Everyone has worked really hard today as this is the biggest turn round that we have had this year and it has gone without a hitch. It has been a very satisfying day for all concerned, although I think we are all ready for a sleep now!

Carolyn and Ira who are residents here at Norbury Junction on their narrow boat Albion managed to get a picture of me getting my hands dirty a couple of weeks ago. Yes, I do still get my hands dirty from time-to-time, but quite often now it seems to be when I’m not at work! So here you go, a picture of the fleet lined up prior to leaving for the National. We were in the process of loading pre-packed coal onto Clover and Fazeley in Tamworth. They also have a very interesting blog of their boating events here.



The line up from nearest the bank is Clover, Fazeley, Emu, Kangaroo and Australia. The Emu won the Alfred Ritchie trophy for the best turned out (working) boat at the National Waterways Festival 2011. I think that you will quite rightly agree that she along with her steerer (Michael Pinnock) deserved the award. In just under two years Michael has transformed her from this



to this... Well done Michael!



I’ve just looked back through this post and noticed that I haven’t mentioned Fred! Now how could I forget to him? Fred has been flat out today, pumping boats out, dieseling them up, changing gas bottles, filling water tanks and last but not least applying a final coat of bitumen to the boat on the dock. He seems to be getting a bit stressed recently with the pump out machine as he believes that it taken longer to pump the toilets out, but to be honest I think it is just down to the fact that he gave up smoking recently! Thanks for starting work at 8am today though – it is appreciated…

That's it for today folks.

Regards,

David