Redhill Marina
The advantage of being on hook up is hot water first thing in the morning, so a nice hot shower was enjoyed. My morning was filled with trying to catch up on the blog and making phone calls to social services.
Jim arrived a little before 9 to do the engine service. Mick asked him to check the engine mounts, the stern gland and that the half tank of diesel that’s been in the tank for 11 months was still okay. He started the engine up to warm the oil, this meant that Tilly found her way behind our pillows under the gunnel, it’s nice and cosy there for an autumnal cruise. Sadly she wouldn’t wake up to a different outside today. We provided him with filters. However, when he opened one box the filter inside it wasn’t the right one, another box was the same! It looks like Beta sent the wrong filters last time Mick placed an order. Thankfully we did have enough of the correct filters for the service to be completed. Jim went away with the incorrect ones as he’d have more use for them than us.
Now all we needed was the fridge to arrive, then we could be off.
A bit more unpacking was done. Mick bumped into Tom who had a delivery for us! It was something we were expecting a Fund Britain’s Waterways banner, but sadly the fridge hadn’t as yet arrived. If you haven’t already signed the petition here is the link again. For the banner to go up I needed to clean the cratch window first. I then moved onto the galley windows, they were a touch misty. These are our original windows and I suspected they’d got a dusting of primer at some point over the last few weeks and it would take a bit more than elbow grease to clean them. I also spotted a little scratch by a galley window, eek!
Next the anchor went back on its holding prongs (for want of a better term) some weed hatch tape was put down behind it to help protect the new paintwork. Good job done.
As we’ve been on board for a few days it was time to empty the yellow water tank. We’d considered moving across the way to do this so that the portside was against the bank, but we really didn’t want anyone else to steal our mooring or miss out on the fridge being delivered. So the long hose came out, everything connected up. ‘Ready?’ ‘Ready!’ I flicked the switch. The pump made some noise. The pump didn’t however make the right noise! It was doing something but not pumping any yellow water. Mick came inside, we tried again. Still nothing! Well there’s another thing to show us how much Oleanna didn’t appreciate being left over the winter!
Mick decided to access the gulper and see what he could find. Tilly decided to close her eyes some more. I decided to go for a walk, via the shore based facilities.
Today I headed to Ratcliffe on Soar village, back along the marina road, then along the track under the A453. Here a hot rod hearse sat, most probably a fisherman’s car. Then on to the village and towards the church, Holy Trinity. On my way I was caught by an old chap who asked if I had joined them, meaning had I moved into the village.
I quickly realised that I could be stood here for quite sometime! Thankfully after about 20 minutes or so someone else walked along with their dog and gave me the opportunity to politely leave and head into the churchyard.
Several new graves, some lovely headstones, a mesh door to keep birds and a local cat out of the church. The church dates back to the 13th Century and had major restoration work carried out in 1886 at the cost of £830 to Earl Howe. It’s a small simple church, but with several carved memorials dating back to 1539 for the Sacheverell family.
Two stones lay side by side for sisters. The younger sisters stone looks like every font was used possible, every line different, whilst the older sister got just the one with no swirls.
The village runs into a manor house not much further along the road, so I turned and walked the other way. Only pretty boring houses, nothing of much interest at all. But when I started to head back towards the boat a mosaic in the bus shelter caught my eye. In fact there were two, one on the wall the other the floor. No idea who had made them and Gaby who runs the community mosaic group in Scarborough would have been a little critical at the amount of grout needed. But none the less, they are a very nice addition.
Big dark clouds were starting to loom, I picked up my pace back to the boat. Mick was midst thinking. He’d taken the yellow water pump to bits, but not found anything obvious. We’d be needing a new one. I hunted round found several at varying prices, we decided to wait and see if either Sawley or Beeston chandlers might have one in stock in the morning.
Mick then hunted round to find a means of emptying the yellow water tank manually. We’ve had to do this only once before when the original gulper pump gave up on us as it was 12 volt and should have been a 24 volt one. There is a manual pump, but the pipes and top to it have perished in the last ten years, so this wouldn’t help. A more basic pump was at hand, but the pipe too thick to get down into the tank. He hunted round for narrower pipes to attach. In the end he sacrificed some pipe from the engine coolant overflow which was then attached to the pump with some self-amalgamating tape. The pipe reached far enough and whilst I cooked our meal Mick slowly managed to empty the tank. Now we need a new gulper, a new hand pump and some new pipe.
I think we’ll now have reached the £1000 in remedial works that ‘Bring Out Another Thousand’ that BOAT stands for!
I tried a new recipe to use up some of our roast chicken, Rice with Chicken, Tomato and Beans a very handy find as I had everything for it onboard. It took a little longer to cook with brown basmati rice, but it deserves to be added to the recipes section of the blog.
TV signal hasn’t been found, so we’re watching the box via the internet sat in the dark. I should really look back at the blog to see what thumb sign was shown for this mooring last year, just incase the TV aerial has gone faulty too!
0 locks, 0 miles, 0 fridge, 1 broken gulper, 1 bored cat starting to dig, 1 banner, 1 ball of string required, 1 anchor back where it belongs, 1 bow thruster locker checked, 2 windows not quite clean, 2 mosaics, 0.5 hours to empty tank, 2 boaters using shore based facilities in the dark, or crossing our legs!