A whizzy new toy

Dave has just spent a couple of days aboard to charge the batteries and do a few jobs.  Rather him than me!  This was Calcutt on Monday morning …..

Not the view from Chuffed unfortunately.  Dave went up to the office to say hello and pick up Towpath Talk and Tillergraph and took his camera with him.

The ducks were on their way to a tiny patch of unfrozen water:

But some wildlife was stuck where it was.

While the sun was out, Dave washed the whole of the outside and waxed one side, which is now lovely and shiny again.  Inside we continue to have problems with condensation.  The woodwork below the windows and portholes will be fine after rubbing down and re-varnishing once the warmer weather is here, but the top of the wardrobe door under the edge of the sliding hatch is proving intractable -

Last summer Dave managed to remove most of the staining using oxalic acid and after re-varnishing it was almost as good as new – now look at it!  Maybe we will just have to cover it while we are not on the boat. 

The mushrooms also drip condensation onto the cooker and table, which we have to leave covered when we come home.  Dave left a couple of bowls of salt out in the hope that some of the moisture in the air will be absorbed rather than condensing out.

And he brought me home a present! 

I prefer to use my long-handled windlass for stiff paddle gear, but it’s too long to use on most gate paddles and it’s a pain to carry around as well as the normal one (which has the plastic whizzy sleeve thing round the handle which makes it nicer to use than the ones without).  We have seen people using this new-style kind, which give you extra length when you need it, but haven’t been able to find one with the whizzy handle – but there it was in Calcutt chandlery and now it’s mine!  Can’t wait for our first trip!