Canal Boating including narrowboats

 

Canal Boating including narrowboats

I am writing this article as a land locked person. Located just about directly in the Middle of the UK. This eliminates the North Sea and the Irish Sea. However, we have a perfectly good and well used canal system in my area of West Yorkshire.

In my youth days this was a perfect place to go fishing. So, we could find a place on a quiet canal and fish all day without seeing a single person. There is nothing like sitting on the canal bank fishing on a beautiful summer’s day.

That’s when I was young! Nowadays the canal system is used for many things. Including walking, cycling and yes of course boating.

Especially narrowboats

Narrowboats have always been a visible feature in the big cities such as London and Birmingham. These craft provided people with cheap places to live. Although not cheap to me they were compared to the expensive housing of the big cities.

Marinas started to pop up everywhere. Including a small one in my hometown of Mirfield. TV programmes made this way of life look feasible and many sold their homes and bought a narrow boat to live in. Some boaters lived in the same mooring and some took trips and investigated the local canal network.

Britain has a fantastic network of canals. Boaters can travel to most places using the river and canal network. Holiday companies were set up renting out the narrowboats for a week’s holiday or more.

Repair yards cropped up on canal sides and marinas

Most boats are powered by a diesel engine. Because these engines could breakdown then some marinas had canal side workshops. Sort of a garage on the water for boats. These yards are often equipped with a crane for lifting the boats out of the water.

These can be used for many things including insurance inspections of the boats hull. A friend of mine bought a narrowboat for what he thought was a good price. However when it came to insurance the company had the boat lifted out of the water for inspection.

The complete underside of the boat was rotten and ready to collapse in on itself. The boat was scrap and the guy he bought it off vanished. A complete waste of money.

These yards also carry out repairs to boats and often carry spare parts and even starter batteries and storage batteries.

Batteries are the life blood of these vessels. 

Consequently they supply power to start the boats engine and usually have a bank of batteries to run the electric items when moored off grid so to speak.

 In my experience most boat owners use leisure batteries for this purpose or deep cycle semi traction batteries. The “jury is out” on which are the best as every boat owner uses different battery type from different battery manufacturers.