Brick House, Day 20.


Whooo Hooooo!!!!!

A random picture.



I have in my hand a piece of paper - well several actually - signed not by  Mr Hitler but by Andrew Bailey, Chief cashier.
This means we are on the fast track back to Ubique .


Yessssssss,  Images of two people leaping around and punching the air should now be in your mind


Until next time.....................




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Brick House, Day 17.

An Enforcement Officer cometh........Ooooerrrr.

Before heading off we went to see the men at the BW yard to make certain we would be ok to stay put for a couple of weeks whilst we sort things out. Fine, no problem just keep us informed say the men on the ground.

Phoning recently to let them know what we are doing, a call centre picked up and a sweetly voiced operator said she would connect us to the enforcement officer.

Enforcement Officer ???

This is not exactly in keeping with the fluffy bunny, soft white cloud image that BW likes to portray whereby all of us boaters are "customers" and therefore their clientele.

Enforcement officer conjours up images of Jack Boots, small black moustaches and straight arm salutes, or dare I say the lowest in the food chain......county court bailiffs!

He wasn't in his sentry box at the time but we were promised he would call us when he returned, he did, much to our dismay.

I wont go into details  but I can see where Sue on No Problem is coming from in her latest post, when boats are just left or moored for weeks on end with no valid reason and are never moved on.

I suppose keeping them informed makes you an easy target.




Until next time.....................



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Brick House, Day 15.

Waiting for the phone to ring.

There is the bonus of a quite different expanse of water to look at though.

That dot out there is seven eighths of a mile off shore, it is all that is left of a once proud and busy pier where day trippers from London would land from a paddle steamer and be whisked ashore by train.

There is a decided dearth of potential tenants at the moment, those that have been around were just on weekend "jollies".... having a nose around for the sake of it.

I have sold quite a few items in my time and whenever you here these immortal words - Ok, we will just go and have a chat about it, we are very interested and will phone you back straight away - you know you will never see or hear from them ever again.

Why people just can't bring themselves to say "No, not interested, goodbye" is beyond me.

So here we sit with sinking hearts and our fingers crossed that there is someone genuine out there.



Until next time........................





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Brick House, Day 10.



A pondering.

Wish we were there.

After the dongle debacle it makes you realize just how much we depend on the Internet,
even here at the house we need it to order food, book hire cars and even find out how to change the lock in the front door, let me explain...

Being fairly practical I still could not get the Euro cylinder out of the UPVC front door, a quick call to the local locksmith and they could do it for a mere fifty pounds.
Before committing to that, a trip to the ether yielded a step by step instruction page as to how to do it properly.

Five pounds for the new cylinder, and if you really take your time and being very careful you can remove the old one and replace it in just under sixty seconds.

A forty five pound saving!

Thank you O orange coloured one.




Until next time......................





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Brick House, Day 9.

Woe is me, woe is my dongle.

It matters not what anyone says, central heating is not a patch on this.


We returned the hire car on the wettest day we have seen for a long, long while.
Walking -yes walking - through the downpour we made our way into the city to the shop that is "Orange", a new super fast dongle was then acquired and pocketed. Buying shares in the bus company (by way of a ticket) we took our new prize back to the house.

Needless to say....... it didn't work!

Phoning a help line is akin to wading through mud up to your neck, you know you are in deep when they ask if you have turned it off and then back on again.
An hour on there got us nowhere other than it must be a signal problem in our area.
Five bars on 3G is not a problem.

It turns out their software doesn't work but I can still connect through windows, sorted!




Until next time..................



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Brick House, Day 6.




Rattle, rattle, rattle. Shiver, shiver, shiver.








Well, that was a busy few days!
After a five hour trip by hire car with a cat yelling in your ear most of the way we were a bit fraught when we arrived to say the least.
Thankfully the house was habitable and the power was still on.

It certainly seems is a bit large after Ubique and we are rattling around in here like a pea in a whistle. It also feels cold, very cold after the cosiness of the stove back aboard.

Not so much to do here this time, so hopefully we should be back aboard as soon as possible.

I will try and get a nice picture of a bus or something for tomorrow.



Until next time....................




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Ellesmere, Day 44.

Plan "C"....

How's this for a nice quiet Sunday afternoon at Ellesmere?

The sun is out, the wind has dropped, the ice has all but gone and the male duck has spotted a female duck bobbing about.

Now that's a bow wave!

Don't you just love tenants and their timing to leave?

Back we go again to our brick home, we are so far away this time and being  "with cat"  a hire car is the only option.

The train journey from here to there is an expensive and very time consuming....joke!

The rail network........ just isn't a network any more is it?  if you are honest.

Until next time.....................

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Ellesmere, Day 42.

Ohhh Noooo!

 

This was the scene that greeted us this morning, not quite as thick as before but still there never the less.

The boat on  the left is NB Pole Star and crew who have made it in from the cold. They were moored an epic walk from the services and must be jumping with joy to be able to get here by boat again.

The ice took on the look of folded cloth here today, it couldn't hold the weight of a duck but still managed to hold together as it folded up.



One day merging into the other now, but I was still surprised to realise it is the seventh already.



Until next time...................



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Ellesmere, Day 40.


An escapee.......24 down to 23 boats.




Our little community is down by one today, NB Bendigedig made a break for Llangollen and got away.

Is it over?.........doubt it.

We, on the other hand, are changing to Plan "B" .
Plan "A" was to be down near Chester by now and therefore clear of the BW stoppages that are now in force. Plan "B" in real terms means we are stuck up here now until March........!
When you think about it, we only stopped here to go shopping. This must be the longest trip to Tesco's in history! 



Until next time......................





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Ellesmere, Day 39.

A bit more movement..... 

Another couple of boats have been ice smashing, but.......say no more!

I got myself roped into a "Diesel Run" today.

Riding in a car again was a bit strange, covering twenty miles in about half an hour had the head spinning, but the disappointment in finding the garage had whacked six pence a litre on it's price took over.

I know that this is still twenty two pence cheaper than the local bandits in the boatyard are charging, but it still sticks in the throat.

This red diesel price seems to be out of control, if two petrol garages had such wildly varying prices one would be very very quiet very quickly and be out of business before you could actually say "Crooks". 

A treat of a sunset this evening.

I couldn't decide which one to put on, so here are all three.




Until next time...................







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Ellesmere, Day 37.


A touch of movement.



       Happy New Year, by the Way!

Halcyon days, hopefully soon to be with us again.



Someone had to try and smash their way out, you just knew it.
On and on he came, then, just when he had done enough damage to the ice (and his boat) to give him a chance of actually getting around the corner........ he gave up and reversed back to his place on the bank!

There are a few boats here who are champing at the bit to get up to Llangollen for the delights of electricity and water on tap alongside the winter moorings. I did think at least one of them would have gone after this mornings crunchings, but it was not to be. 
Maybe tomorrow.......


Here we sit.


Until next time......................



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