Mike, not his real name, had all the euphoria of a new skipper; he’d asked if I’d look at his engine, which was giving him some trouble but couldn’t resist showing off his new boat. “Only cost me seven grand - a bargain!”

It certainly was a bargain but I knew the history of this boat, the Nevando. Irish Jim had bought it, about a decade ago, for a thousand pounds, cheaply bought, for it had only recently been dragged up from the depths of the Worcester and Birmingham. “We’re taking it to Stoke.” Mike explained, I wished him luck, sincerely, doubting it would ever reach Stoke and, recalling uneasily that the most famous Captain to come from Stoke-on-Trent was Edward J. Smith of the Titanic, but I dismissed my fears as undue pessimism and asked “Have you had it surveyed?” “Nah—four hundred quid for the crane, can’t afford it.” I saw Mike three days later, when he pulled up beside me in his van with a face bent on murder. “Boat sank in Selly Oak. Seven grand - gone! What a rip off!”

His language, appropriate to his dismay, was a good deal more colourful and the murderous look in his face made me feel uncomfortable. Later, I heard, he stormed the snug of The Crown pub and vented his wrath with the same colourful language he described the sinking to me minutes before, which, so I was later told, resulted in Irish Jim ‘pontificating and looking sheepish,’ while Mike, ejected from the pub remained ‘an extremely angry man outside.’

The chain of ownership was complicated. Irish Jim had lived on the Nevando for several years, the boat was static, remaining at Orchard moorings in Alvechurch for the best part of a decade. Then the landowner decided property development was more lucrative than narrowboats and promptly ejected the boats from his land. Irish Jim (so called for his work in the troubles as a double agent identifying IRA sympathizers for British, or so the legend goes) applied for, and was granted an alms house by the parish council. I was moored beside the Nevando for some time and met the first, unfortunate, new owner, a young lad, called Bill, albeit only once. He’d purchased the Nevando from Irish John for £10,000, no doubt as a project boat with a view for selling it on as a profit. Realizing the Nevando was a hopeless case, the hull was pitted, holed, and hadn’t seen a lick of Bitumen in years, he then sold it on to Mike for £7000, no doubt rueing his three grand loss; the third sale of the boat within six months.

When I asked Liz Sollars, CRT officer for the Midlands, about the wreck she did not attempt to keep the exasperation from her voice but remained tight lipped, “It will all come out in the wash.” Due process had not been followed. Mike had bought, and sunk the boat, without being registered as the new owner, a real headache for Liz. A captain who loses their ship must expect a court martial. In this instance I can only feel sorry for Bill and Mike, who inherited Nevando, and its insuperable problems from Irish Jim. Yes; they should have had the boat surveyed before full purchase, yes, they were naive and cutting corners, and if anything it serves as a salutary lesson in the value of a survey.

For me, the real villain of the piece is Irish Jim. He knew the hull was damaged, perhaps beyond repair. He had his alms house. He had his pension. There was a marina just two hundred yards away from his mooring where he could easily have taken the Nevando and sold it for scrap, and, with rising steel prices, would still have made a profit on his £1000,even for scrap value. Motivated by greed he sold that death trap of a boat for maximum profit to buyers, naïve and greedy, but in doing so, endangered lives. What good fortune that the Nevando sank in Selly Oak. It was January, the water was below freezing and, with the two miles of Wast Hill tunnel in-between, I dread to think what would have happened if she foundered there.

A few days later I paid a visit to Selly Oak, expecting to see the wreck of the Nevando, waterlogged, listing and abandoned but was surprised to find her, engine thumping, the bilges spewing water, and Mike aboard, fiddling with the wiring. “I’ve had to re-float her several times. Kids keep coming along cutting the wiring and she sinks again.” The trouble with sinking, is one cannot chose where to sink and may end up in a less than salubrious district. “I’m still gonna get her to Stoke,” Mike elaborated, “Well, I’ve got to.”

I’m not sure whether to put this down to determination or desperation. Mike, intending to live-aboard this vessel, and having no-where else to live other than his van, or at least, as far as I could tell, wasn’t going to give up on his investment easily. I at least admired his optimism. Buy cheap, buy twice, and it never does to cut corners with boats, especially if you intend to make them your home. With narrowboats in such demand at present, I fear stories like Mike’s may become increasingly common. My only hope is that this tale of the wreck of the Nevando serves as a salutary tale. Buyers Beware.

A couple of weeks later, I received a brief message from Tina, Mike’s partner which read simply; ‘We made it to Stoke.’ A happy ending, I hope, and given the state of the Nevando, I hoped it had been hauled up onto a hard standing, like an in-movable, beached whale; Never again to travel but never again to sink