(above) the ‘Kelly’ or ‘Ghillie’ kettle in action…

(above) the ‘Peacham Volcano’…

(above) a ‘swiss army’ volcano…

(above) ‘Sirram’ kettles….

From ‘volcanos’ to ‘rockets’….

(above) a ‘rocket’ in action

(above) the ‘rocket’ effect, in principle…

Aren’t they gorgeous?!?

For me, one of the (many) simple pleasures of our weekend away (freed from the responsibility, and broken nights!, of the kids) was lighting the fire in the cottage. I’m a sucker for a good fire!

It’s a shame that living in London makes it so difficult to enjoy a fire. Despite our flat having stunning fire places, a combination of clean air legislation, health and safety regulations and a frankly nervous Co-op landlord, means that it’ll probably be a long while yet before I’m allowed to ‘risk’ a ‘real’ fire in any of them.

Still, undaunted, last night I hunted out and dusted down my Kelly Kettle, the wonderful ‘volcano’ type solid fuel kettle that’s brilliant fun to use camping out on the boat in summer; when everyone loves hunting down some dry kindling for the ‘fire box’ underneath the kettle, and then watching the drama of the smoke and flames licking up the central ‘chimney’ – wonderful stuff!

If you’ve never come across one before, Google or YouTube more information… they make a great present for any budding ‘pyrotechnic outwardbound-er’ in your life!

The painted decoration, both inside and outside 18686, has fired up my interest in narrowboat brightwork in all its various forms.

In her original form, as a basic cabin day boat, 18686 wouldn’t have had the elaborate painted decoration lavished on many of the longer-haul live aboard cabin boats, nor indeed would she have had the decoration that’s found on her today.

(My excuse for keeping the current interior painted decoration is simply that I love it! And, as we’re not undertaking a full restoration, I enjoy the fact that she has an evolving story with a rich history that all needs respecting and acknowledging, even where it’s a little historically inaccurate…)

She would nonetheless have had what might be called functional design rather than decoration, with the lettering, colours and shapes combining to enable easy and accurate identification of her by boatmen who, in the main, would not have been literate and could be faced with finding an individual boat amongst countless similar boats.

I’ve  started to describe this type of (mainly external) painted brightwork in a previous post (click HERE).

In this post I’m starting to look, in a little more detail, at the kind of interior painted decoration created by and for boat families as increasing numbers of boatmen, mainly  through economic circumstance brought on by competition from the railways, were forced to bring their families to live aboard.

These early family boats saw a transition from scumbling and more basic identifying or functional symbols and motifs to something more decorative. It’s relatively easy (once you get away from romanticised notions of links to Romany caravans etc. suggested in early reference materials on the origins of narrowboat painting) to see the impetus for the transition.

When moving into the tiny living cabin it would have been natural for the boatman’s family to bring with them the bric-a-brac they had accumulated over the years on the land, however, as there was so little room on board, it is also possible to understand the hugely practical response to adversity that saw many of these objects – over time – replaced, to be substituted by paintings on the side of the cabin that took up none of the precious available space and were easy to maintain and clean.

During the early to mid 19th century many popular household items and furniture would have had a highly decorated finish, often featuring flowers and romantic landscapes. These were often simplified and stylised version of 17^th and 18^th romantic paintings and contained many of the elements that would, in time, come to characterise narrow boat painting. They included the castle or ruin, the lake, the wooded mountainous landscape etc. Popular versions of these romantic landscapes were to be found everywhere, from the dials of long case or grandfather clocks, to japanned and papier mache tea trays, from glass paintings to bone china plates and cups, to Christmas cards.

The new form of painted decoration (rather than the previous practical design) found mainly in the living cabin interior, was a response to the popular styles of the time, and might be broadly described as a  flowers & landscapes (often river scenes) style. It was a style that evolved, within the closed and conservative community of boaters, through the mid to late 19th century as a very human response to the harsh realities that the new boat families experienced in the cramped living cabin.

To be continued…

On Saturday afternoon, in a break in the pouring and icy rain, we drove down to the Daneway Inn below Sapperton village, and walked along the old Thames & Severn Canal up to the Daneway Portal of Sapperton Tunnel.

These photographs record our walk (simply click on any picture to open up the gallery)…

Though this is a well-trod route, it’s fascinating nonetheless, and to stand ‘where the boat would be’  in the mouth of the tunnel, listening to the hauntingly distant echoes, was really memorable!

Haywood, S. (2009) One Man and a Narrowboat – Slowing down time on England’s Waterways Summersdale Publishers ISBN 978 1 84024 736 7

Haywood, S. (2008) Narrowboat Dreams – A Journey North By England’s Waterways
Summersdale Publishers ISBN 978 1 84024 670 4

Haywood, S. (2011) Too Narrow to Swing a Cat – Going Nowhere in Particular on the English Waterways Summersdale Publishers ISBN 978 1 84955 065 1

For years, at Pete Downer’s mooring at Grimsbury Wharf on the outskirts of Banbury, I moored next to Steve’s boat Justice. We moored in the shadow of the dragon of the Kenco Coffee factory. Old Bill, who did so much excellent woodwork on my previous boat Onward, also did work on Justice and on Steve’s London home.

Despite coming to the series late, I felt I knew Steve a little; having moored alongside him, met him, and read his monthly thought-provoking pieces in Canal Boat, I knew what to expect from the books, and they didn’t disappoint.

Steve’s passionate and articulate, hilarious and intransigent and writes in such a beguiling and direct way that it feel at times as if he’s regaling you with the stories over a few pints on a good night down the pub.

The first book (a re-packaging of an earlier one published in 2004 under the ambiguous title Fruit Flies Like a Banana) does succeed in establishing the mix of rant, humour, travelogue and wry ‘state of the nation’ observational commentary, but doesn’t have as coherent a theme as the following two volumes. Instead One Man and a Narrowboat is a messier mix, vaccillating between boating and on-off journeys in his beloved Triumph Herald.

To me Narrowboat Dreams, with its description of the newly re-opened Southern Pennine Ring, and Too Narrow to Swing a Cat, describing his adventures on the way to a number of waterways festivals over the course of a long summer, are a much more satisfying and coherent read.

But, perhaps I’m quibbling, as each book in the series is actually a delight. Steve wears his erudition lightly, and between humour and calamity, there are fascinating insights, vivid commentary on the state of the waterways, and astute observations on life in general.

I’ve come away from each having been both challenged and entertained in equal measure; you always come away having learned something new, even if it is about the inner workings of that Triumph Herald!

I’ve read the three books pretty much back to back over the last few weeks, and they really have provided a powerful antidote to the frustrations and gloominess of late Winter. They’ve never failed but to make me ever more determined to get out there and get boating again.

As an antidote to Winter blues, and as a valuable addition to the literature of our modern waterways, I can’t recommend this series highly enough.

Today, with little spare time, I’ve just been able to round off the post ‘All about Arun’. It describes 1990, and my second boat. Click HERE if you fancy reading it.

None of the following images come close to doing it justice. However they do record the start of another small part of 18686‘s renovation. And, in getting something practical done, it somehow brings Spring, and the thought of actually getting out and using the boat, just that little bit closer.

(ps. the gallery’s loaded back to front, so the first image, of grey primer, is the last so to speak…)

Having been an art teacher for years before I became a primary school headteacher, children’s artwork has always fascinated me.

Todays post is simply a collection of Joe and Fin‘s (our 3 year old twins) watery-boatery paintings.

Many of the paintings here were painted shortly after they’d first visited 18686 last Autumn. In talking to them, as they enjoyed slopping about with the poster paint, it was evident that the afternoon on the boat had made a big impression of them.

So these are their impressions of water / trees / sky / stormy days and ‘our boat’. I reckon, in many ways, they’re just as legitimate as the countless colour photographs I take!

I’m not making any huge claim for the paintings other than to say that I quietly envy a 3 year old’s technicolour vision of the world – long may it last I say…

Even if the marina, and surrounding canals, defrost in the next few days, all the work that needed to be completed before we set out has slipped behind schedule.

After such a mild winter, it’s such a shame that this cold spell has arrived, for us, at just the wrong moment. I was really looking forward to 18686′s transition from a rather tatty storage shed to boat-under-way.

Now she’s back in the water, I was very tempted today to turn the engine over, but didn’t, as in the current freezing conditions, I don’t want to leave any residual water in the system to then freeze and potentially cause damage.

Here’s what Great Heywood Marina looked like this mooring:

(above) frozen solid…

(above) the renovated elum and sheet ice…

(above) For Molly the ice just adds to the adventure!

(above) the view from the back cabin over the frozen tundra of Great Haywood Marina