Dry dock days 6 & 7

The Epimastic needs at least 48 hours from the final coat before immersion, so we have no more painting to do. On Saturday we drove down to Bristol to see Heddi’s dad in hospital. Then back again in the evening. On Sunday we went for a walk around Hartlebury Common then, in the afternoon, moved

Dry dock days 3 & 4

Working with a whole tin in one session meant that we were taking nearly the whole 4 hours workable time to complete the task. So we decided to only mix half a can at a time and to the second coat in two goes, one per day. So on Wednesday we did just one side

Dry dock day 2

Today we put the first coat on one side and part of the other side. We are using a two part epoxy product called “Epimastic”. The two parts have to be mixed before use, then there is about 4 hours of working time before it begins to set. This means that we cant stop until

In the dry dock

We were up fairly early as they re-fill the dry dock at 8:00, were were told to be ready to go in by 9:00. We moved round to the pontoon above the first staircase to await instructions. There was a bit of boat shuffling as two have to come out and two go in. Also

Stourport Basin

We drove up in two cars yesterday, left one at Stourport then went on to Kinver. We are booked into the dry dock at Stourport next week. We didn’t want to be stuck there without a car as Heddi’s dad is in hospital and we wanted to be able to go back to Bristol if

On our Bikes

We arrived yesterday afternoon and just did a few jobs and chilled out. Heddi saw a poster advertising the Black Country Boat Festival which is on this weekend. We checked in Nicholsons and found that it was about 10 miles along the towpath to the festival site at Netherton, so decided that we would cycle

Kinver

The day started cold and wet, though the rain wasn’t as heavy as yesterday. We went up through the staircases and into the basin. Breakfast was taken on the services pontoon while we waited for Limekiln to open, as we needed to top up the diesel. An uneventful run up to the home mooring at

Hampstall Inn

I spent most of yesterday afternoon installing a new calorifier. The previous repair had lasted about a month, but then it started leaking somewhere else so we decided it wasn’t worth trying to repair it again. I bought a new one from Surejust who were extremely helpful and patient with my many queries. The install

Wightwick Lock

The sun was shining and the sky was blue so we set off not long after 7 o’clock. Unfortunately that was the best weather of the day as it gradually got greyer and spotted with rain at times. As we came up through Gailey lock Heddi called out “I’ve got no power!” I could hear the