Like most people of my generation I remember England doing well in a certain football tournament.   It was a big thing.   I remember the winning goal which was heard loud and clear on a Ferguson transistor radio somewhere on the Thames.   This was during our first holiday on a boat that belonged to  the family.

A modest windfall that spring meant we were able to buy a 16 foot,  two berth “Rutland” cabin cruiser which the owner said was an Uffa Fox design.   As a nine year old, I hadn’t a clue what that meant but I was sure it was a good thing.

The boat was powered by a 10 horsepower Albin petrol engine, had a few creature comforts and bore the name “Lady Jena.”

All seemed well apart from the fact that there were four of us.   This meant we needed 2 extra bunks and some more storage space so out went the water tank and sink.   Given the tank was corroded and the sink scratched and cracked, it didn’t really matter.   Out too went the petrol stove which my mum decided was dangerous, to be replaced by a succession of methylated spirit stoves, some of which definitely were!

With a bit of fiddling about, we were good to go on holiday up and down the Thames again.   That’s when we discovered that the motor wasn’t too reliable, often stopping in midstream or refusing to start when we had to exit from a lock.

It was our boat and we were on holiday in her so, to me, she was the best craft on the whole river despite the discovery of a couple of soft spots in the plywood hull.   On a good day, the motor had a good solid twin cylinder thump that sounded as though it could run forever and we plodded the familiar route to Lechlade and back, pausing to hear the famous words “They think it’s all over… It is now,” whilst waiting to go into Penton Hook lock.

The next year, mum and dad decided to explore the canals (beginning my lifelong love affair with the things).

With a few more modifications, which included an escape hatch, removal of the mast, a transom bunk, a new and even more dangerous methylated spirit stove and an upgraded  toilet (which was truly evil) we set off.   Our trip took us to Napton and back, with a quick trip to Lechlade thrown in.

The next year, we got a bit beyond Braunston, becoming a bit more adventurous with each passing holiday.

Modifications to the boat were planned and executed during the year, the most major of these being the covered cockpit.   This changed the appearance of the craft and, to my eyes, made it look a bit ungainly.   It did at least provide a space that didn’t leak when it rained.   The old pram cover was little better than being out in the open, and we never did get far with stopping the cabin top leaking.   This wasn’t helped at all when a gust of wind somewhere near Somerton deep lock caught the back of the boat causing the cover to be ripped on the arch of a bridge during a thunderstorm.   We carried on undaunted whilst Mum sewed the thing back together with an embroidery needle and white cotton as the storm continued unabated.

When my brother and I were old enough, we were given the privilege of operating the locks, this also being the first year we had a go at the Hatton flight.   I found the mechanisms rather odd after the rack and pinions of the Oxford canal and, whilst easy to work, the things gave me a good few blisters from the rough cast BWB standard windlass that I was using.

This, I think, was also the year that our holiday nearly came to an abrupt halt at Henley on Thames when a small hourly hired aluminium motorboat put a hole in our side.   We heard someone shout “Slow down.”  They sped up and the sickening thud followed.   We had a hole you could nearly put your head through just a few inches above the waterline, and the occupants of the motor boat had done the proverbial runner.   The yard helped us out with some plywood to patch the hole and we were on our way within a surprisingly short time.   I’m not sure what was paid by who or to whom but we still had a decent holiday out of it.

I remember one year where the engine didn’t break down, the sun shined (no problem with leaks) and just about everything went well.   I also remember that during the following winter, Lady Jena sank.   She rose from the watery ashes to return to the river with a new sheet of plywood replacing the one with the soft spots, and new blue paintwork.   Also, because of the need for space, and water damage to the motor, it was decided to power her with an outboard.   The first of these, an “Ocean four plus,” lasted us from Kingston upon Thames to Kiddlington in Oxfordshire whereupon it seized up solid and was returned under warranty.   The replacement, a 1967 Mercury 3.9 was an absolute gem and powered Lady Jena until another young family bought her from us in 1972.

Overall, my memories of our first boat are very happy ones.   I could forget about school and let myself be fascinated by my surroundings even when I had to keep a diary one summer for a school project which was forgotten about the following September.

The diary became the backdrop to my first book “Mayfly” and the little Rutland cabin cruiser appears in my third book “Emily’s Journey” as “Willow Wisp III.”   In the book I decided to give her a rather more reliable motor though.

For all these reasons, I remember 1966 as the year Lady Jena changed my life.

There was something about some football match too I think.

This strange year has cost our country many things so far. By no means the most important loss, but one that shouldn't be overlooked, has been the country shows that have been cancelled in their droves.

It might seem a trivial thing on the surface, but for the exhibitors it's a heavy blow. Months of preparation wasted, prestige for their businesses lost, and of course the social occasion that for many is the only respite from a relentless and sometimes lonely job.

Boatmen 100 years ago would have related to this very well. They were no strangers to competing against each other for the swankiest turn out as a distraction from the grinding pressure to get 'em ahead. Long before the advent of the show, christenings, weddings, even funerals would see the boat drawn by an a horse in full turn out, and May Day for one had been traditionally a day when “more brass than 'oss” would be presented to the world regardless of where you were. Indeed it could be profitable exercise even if there was no show to attend, as one man at Cannock Chase had a hobby of giving 10 bob to the horse he felt was the best turned out that day.

Of course today's shows are heavily biased to livestock, but 100 years ago the horse was still at work; a common sight on our streets and, more importantly for this magazine, on our towpaths.

Given how many miles of canal grace Birmingham, it will not surprise the reader to learn that horse shows in Birmingham had a high proportion of canal horse classes. The West Bromwich Horse Show held at Dartmouth park on Whitsun was a popular one for 34 years from its inception in 1905 as a sideline to a charity fete.

As with the heavy horse shows today, judging for turnouts involves a parade of the participants; but unlike today where they're confined to a show ring, the West Bromwich horses took a turn around the entire borough.

We may not have a photo of them, but we can picture them non the less; powerful animals, eyes bright and ears pricked, held in check by practised hands as they stepped out with muscles rippling like frogs in oil beneath coats as fine and gleaming as spun silk.

Harness catches the afternoon light, blinding those unfortunate enough to look directly at the shining brasses and glinting chains, and the ground trembles as mighty hooves shod in iron clatter on the cobbles and heavy oak wagons rumble behind.

You, reader, unless you are familiar with a stable of heavy horses, may be a little overwhelmed. The smell of hot horse alone may surprise you, but the noise is tremendous. Leather creaks, chains jingle, men call in broad accents and clear voices, their charges answering back with high whinnies and baritone whickers, and the improbably delicate tinkle of terret bells lays over the scene like a fairy herald.

It's affecting to look at the newspaper reports and see the names of horses long past; in 1927 for example, Fellows Morton & Clayton's “Duke” won 3^rd prize in the Heavy Cart Mare or Gelding (radius 7 miles from Smethick boundry), while Cooper & Co took first place in Cleanest & Smartest Canal Boat Horse with “Snowball”, Leonard Leigh's horses “Prince” and “Toby” taking 2^nd and 3^rd respectively, Hingley & Son's “Blossom” taking 4^th and Midlands and Coast's “Jack” taking 5^th.

Shows like these gave the boatmen a rare holiday and an opportunity to really show off. Their womenfolk would send the horses off with a new set of lovingly made lace ear caps and the men with a colourful spiderweb belt, and children would have been set to cleaning every inch of the harness. Not only were there there their fellow boatmen,  the judges and the RSPCA officers to impress with their horse but the boatmen's company was invariably were too; as today, a prize at a show was a little mark of prestige a business could use to its advantage- Midlands and Coast, for example, managed to bring home quite a lot of prizes in its short life and successfully held an excellent reputation for the welfare of it's men, the education of their children and cruelty prevention for the animals within it's reach for its entirety.

Some companies offered a small cash incentive to the boatmen who successfully brought home a prize to make sure they had a decent shot, and a few even shuffled their stables round to make sure the best looking horse was available for the class.

Disagreements with the judges happened then as now. Cooper & Co (who cleaned the table in the 1927 show) entered “Roger” in the 1925 Cleanest & Smartest Canal Boat Horse class, and after he'd successfully gained 2^nd place from the judge, he had a fit, collapsed and had to shot. To add insult to injury, they then gave the second place to another horse on the grounds of breathing being a vital part of the turnout. This shouldn't have caused as much friction as it did at the time, Cooper's having already secured first place with a different horse anyway.

The war saw the end of the shows. 1939 was the last West Bromwich Horse Show, and quite possibly the last time there was a dedicated class at all for boat horses.  At the end of the war the West Bromwich Show resurfaced as a horticultural show, and staggered on for another 23 years in that format until 1968 when it was finally cancelled. Other shows embraced the heavy horse following the war, recognising that the days of the working horse were numbered and they needed to be protected, but the boat horse fell through the cracks and the boatmen clung to motor boats in the vain hope of keeping the trade.

where are things going to go? - the drawings

The start is not what batteries you are going to have; it would be lovely if it were. That would make it too easy and this is a boat and boats are rarely easy.

The starting point is with the electrical items and where they are going to go. How we connect them to the batteries that are going to supply the power needed.

Begin with a scale outline drawing of the boat. Mark in where the cabin walls are going to go, doorways and what the rooms are. Then mark the drawing in 1 metre sections stern to bow. If you have a side view also mark that in 1-metre sections vertically from the base plate up.

Now breathe and make several copies of the master diagram. It is now is the time to involve the other half.

Starting with the lighting, mark the positions of the lights on the diagram, giving them a number etc. Don’t worry about cable routes etc just mark the lights position. Where their the switches are going. Mark the switches in someway. Do not forget about wall lights. Lights over the cooker and kitchen sink, Bathroom sink lights etc in the bathroom.

Also mark on the drawing where you would like 12vDC table lamps and standards lamps. Again mark and number. Join up each light that will be operated by the same switch/switches and link to the switch/switches and you end up with a diagram like this.

Using another boat outline, mark where the water pump is going and its local switch so it can be turned off when the tank is empty. Same with the shower pump and it maybe a good thought to think about the shower pump being an automatic pump so only one hole is needed through the hull. But this may not be possible if the kitchen is on the other side of the boat.  Don’t forget about the Bilge pump it needs to draw its power from the Domestic bank not the Starter battery. Remember to give them an identity.

Now the bit I find the most difficult, where to put the 12V power points. Think about where you want 12V power points for charging etc. Mark them on the drawing then add where you want USB charging points and mark them.  Then go back and look, have you put one in the kitchen area? If not I would suggest add a 12V power point and a USB. Think about someone cooking from a recipe online.

Bedrooms, I suggest that you make sure both sides of the bed have access to a USB charger for the mobile phone, and Kindle. Do not forget the navigation lights. I know they are not a requirement on the UK canals but rivers etc require them. Regardless of that a red & green light come towards you at night gives you the beam of the boat and its outer edges. It making it a bit easier to pass in the dark.

Below my version of the outline with the sockets etc marked and numbered if more than one.

Now is the time to think about how you are going to get the cabling from the stern of the boat to the bows and everything that needs power. Do not just think about the 12V DC cabling but also the AC mains cabling. There are various ways to do this, some people make a duct under each of the gunnels to take the cables. Others put a duct down each side of the boat in the ceiling. Along the edge where the ceiling meets the sidewall. You will also need a route from Port to the Starboard side of the boat. You also need to think how you are going to get cabling up and down the boat vertically. For switches this can be done inside some conduit behind the panelling. Once you have decided how and where it is going to go, mark it on the outlines.

The next stage is building the circuits, adding the cabling. But first you have to decide where the electrics cupboard is going. In it or adjacent will go the 12VDC Fuse board (Distribution Board) any inverter, charger etc. So don’t skimp on its size 🙂 Mark the fuse board on all the outlines.

Now the next thing to do is to draw the electrical diagram. Lets start with the lights, first split the lights up roughly into two halves or even three or four if there are a lot of lights or long cable runs; so that each fuse has lights from every area of the boat. The each section will run from its own fuse, i.e. Lights 1 fuse and Lights 2 fuse. Doing it this way means that if one of the lighting fuses blows there is still lighting available close to hand and one does not have to stumble around the boat looking for a torch before the lights are back on. Then you can sort out what caused the problem and sort it out.

To draw the electrical diagrams it is easier to use one of the free drawing apps. I use draw.io, all the drawings in this article, as well as the ones I put on the group are drawn on draw.io. It allows for a clear simple drawing that can be altered and bits moved around with no problems.

So lets get started; the first thing I do is a symbol chart for everything that is going to be on the drawing, switches of the various types, the different types of lights etc. No complex electrical symbols that you do not know or understand just simple symbols. A Symbols list is to remind you what they are and what they do. Do not worry if you cannot think of everything you need or you miss some. They can easily be added to the Symbols list as you go on. But do it and do not rely on your memory. When you have to find faults the drawing becomes the map of what is there. Also when you come to sell the sell the boat the new owners will be impressed that there is a set of electrical drawings. It could get that sale, where it was only 50/50 in the buyers mind before. It shows that care has been taken of the boat from day one. How often do you hear boaters grumbling that all they have a jumble of cables and no drawings to tell them what should do what, please make sure you do Electrical Drawings for your boat, it is not difficult and will make installing them easier as well as fault finding is easier for whoever follows you.

So lets start with Lighting one. I normally start at the stern and work my way forward doing a separate section of the drawing for each fuse. I split the lighting into two or three sections so that the volt-drop is at a reasonable level and never less than two sections. Then if one lighting fuse blows there is light in every part of the boat albeit reduced. This is going to need to be three sections to keep the volt-drop to reasonable limits.

Start with the two rear deck lights. The most complicated electrical circuits that you will encounter in the whole of your wiring of your boat. There is the need to be able to switch them on and off from two different positions. If it is confusing I have written an explanation of how it works in the Appendix of the article.

Label each of the cables, as an example, the positive cable from the Lighting 1 Positive busbar to the common of the first of the two-way switches. I have called it L1P1 as it is for the first lighting section on the drawing.

Having drawn the first of the lighting diagrams you need to work out how long those cables are. Remember if the boat is a Narrow Boat, it will have an internal beam of 2 metres approximately.  Your drawing will have marker lines spaced at 1 metre apart. Using these to measure the L1P1 cable from the switch the through the cable ducts back to fuse board, which is where the Busbars will go measuring the distance, mark the distance on the cable on the drawing.  Do not forget the ups and downs the cable has to travel. Now continue to measure and mark the length of every cable on the drawing. Label the cables from the lights to the Busbars both negative and positive and you will end up with a drawing that looks like this.

©Graham Mills, 2020

After a company decision for some of the team to return to work Aqueduct Marina’s Marina and Operations Director Phil Langley outlines what the executive team has experienced to get to this point and what the future looks like for the marina.

Following the government lockdown announcement, we split our engineering operation into two teams working on a rota basis to protect staff and reduce the risk of spreading COVID 19. This, along with strict social distancing rules, worked very well but after a week it became apparent that the supply chain issues meant we could not continue to operate. Working with an already reduced team due to some staff having to self-isolate we then made the difficult decision to furlough the remaining engineering team.

We looked at our engineering schedule to assess the workload and what was deliverable, we also then took into account employees personal situations and risk assessed who were higher and lower risk. The main reason we have chosen three team members to return at this time is because this number allows us to safely monitor and implement safe systems of work on a manageable scale. We also wanted to do as much as we could for one particular staff member who only started working for us the week of the lockdown and did not qualify for furlough so has been unable to earn for the last three weeks.

Staff who are placed onto the governments furlough scheme have to be furloughed for a minimum of three weeks and we always planned to use this time to take stock and risk assess our operation in order to get staff back to work as soon as safely possible, which is what we are now doing.  

Now strict social distancing rules have been put in place and the engineers will be working alone. We have also closed all shared areas such as the engineers welfare building (brew room). And staff are to bring their own food and drinks which is to be consumed in isolation.

We have new specific COVID-19 related risk assessments which has helped to reduce the risk for staff. All the engineers have their own sets of PPE which as per normal rules isn’t to be shared and they have all been given hand sanitiser to use and carry around with them. Staff have been asked to wash their hands more regularly and government hand washing advice posters have been put up in the toilets. Disinfectant spray is also supplied to clean door handles etc across the site and staff are encouraged to use this.  

We are extremely fortunate to have a fantastic team at the marina and all the staff have been very understanding during these times. The engineers are indeed pleased to be back at work and back to some form of normality during these uncertain times.  As a leisure business we have qualified for a full rates relief, Cheshire East were very quick to implement our application. The furlough scheme was easy to apply for and paid out promptly, the bank was responsive to our request to put the loan repayments to interest only for three months.

We will continue to monitor the current working group and then look to safely introduce more staff members back into work. We aim to work on a 12-18 months plan that enables the marina to operate as we move into what will be a different environment in the future. Each area of the business mooring, caravan site, café, chandlery, brokerage and boat repairs will all have different obstacles to overcome. We understand that there will be challenges ahead and will continue to follow government advice as well as seeking support from trade bodies such as British Marine in order to first and foremost ensure a safe environment for staff and customers.

before putting to sea after such a long period of inactivity we recommend that boat owners should:

1. Take extra care to access their craft safely and in accordance with government guidance on travel and social distancing

2. Carry out a check to ensure that their craft has remained seaworthy and mechanically sound. In particular check for fuel contamination resulting from condensation in the tank(s) blocked filters and fuel lines etc

3. Check that emergency equipment such as Lifejackets, flares, VHF radio, PLBs etc are still in working order and remain in date

4. Give due regard to the prevailing and forecast weather conditions

5. Pay due consideration to the risk that their activities may result in their having to depend on emergency services particularly at a time when social distancing is impacting on lifeboat crews, Coast Rescue Teams etc

6. Bear in mind that some marine leisure facilities in the area may still be closed and therefore unavailable

7. Make sure you always have a means of calling for help (such as a VHF radio or mobile phone in a waterproof pouch) and keep it within reach.

Clive Edwards, RNLI Water Safety Officer Weymouth Lifeboat Area