70ft narrowboat for sale: liveaboard

This boat has now been sold, but here are some more narrowboats for sale.

Our beautiful narrowboat Violet Mae is now for sale. Life has taken an unexpected turn and we are heading off on a different adventure.

This boat is everything I had dreamed of in a boat: light and airy, wooden floors, side hatches to feed the swans, a big double bedroom, a washing machine, and at the stern a beautifully painted boatman's cabin. More photos to follow.

If you are seriously considering living on a narrowboat this is a very comfortable live aboard. She is currently moored near Tring in Hertfordshire. She does not come with a mooring but if you act quickly there will be an opportunity to bid on her current residential mooring when it goes up for auction with the Canal and River Trust in August.

70ft Colecraft trad narrowboat liveaboard £37,500

Built: 1988

Engine: BMC 1800 (Rebuilt 2002)

Last survey: 05/09/08

4 berths: 1 double, 2 single.

Beautiful boatman’s cabin.

Contact Peggy

The full listing with LOTS of photos is on the Boatshed Grand Union website. Colecraft Narrowboat for sale.

PS. If you have any questions about living aboard download my free ebook: Living on a Boat.

What is the cost of living on a narrowboat? Check out my review of the Narrowbudget software.

50ft trad narrowboat for sale

A friend of mine has just finished 'doing up' and refurbishing this beautiful narrowboat. It's light and airy inside with a fixed double plus a dinette. Full details and pictures are here: Beautiful narrowboat for sale. There is also a full list of the work recently completed.

She is currently moored near Milton Keynes.

£34,950 ono

If you're looking for a live-aboard boat or a leisure boat for holidays and weekends this one is lovely. Even if you're not, have a look at the photos, for some gorgeous inspiration of how light and airy a narrowboat can seem inside!

If you have any questions about living aboard grab yourself my free eBook Living on a Boat.

Narrowboat 50ft with Wheelhouse #BoatForSale

This is my friend's boat, now for sale with Boatshed.  He fitted it out himself as he's a professional carpenter, and the work is beautiful. I always remember that Reflex stove was toasty in winter too. We had some good times on board that boat; he lived on it happily for years, but now no longer lives in England. This is a great opportunity to get an unusual boat. The wheelhouse means you can cruise in all weathers.

Narrowboat 50ft Cruiser Stern with Wheelhouse

Features

• An unusual and very attractive fit-out in cherry, chestnut and sycamore.

• Open plan with separate bedroom cabin at front. Large living space with kitchen and wet room shower/toilet.

   Gas water heater. Diesel reflex heater and solid fuel stove.

• Fixed double berth

Phil says,

"This is an unusual looking Springer, with a great new fit out. Recent engine replacement 2008. Replated 2004.  She would make a fantastic live-aboard, with plenty of space for very comfortable living. Choice of efficient diesel heating or multifuel stove, with gas water heating makes her very warm and cosy."

See lots more photos at Boatshed Grand Union

#CrickBoatShow in pictures

Many thanks to Waterways World for our tickets to the Crick Boatshow. Read the full story here.

See the bigger collage on Google+

Recommended Narrowboat Books

When I’m not writing, business blogging, parenting or narrowboating I like to get my nose stuck into a narrowboat book.

Terry Darlington, author of Narrow Dog To Carcassonne will be signing copies of his book Narrow Dog to Wigan Pier at this year’s Crick Boat Show. The new book sees him travelling the north of England with his wife Monica and their two dogs. Narrow Dog to Carcassonne was the bestselling travel book of 2006, and this latest will be his third book.

Terry’s first book is the only modern boating travelogue that I’ve read, so Steve Haywood’s books are quite high on my reading list. He’s written One Man and a Narrowboat: Slowing Down Time on England's Waterways and Narrowboat Dreams about his own travels and the history of the canals. I have however read the original boating travelogue: Tom Rolt’s Narrow Boat . This is a lovely lyrical log about Tom and Angela’s travels in 1939 through an idyllic rural England.

I tried to find books about narrowboat women and so discovered The Amateur Boatwomen (Working Waterways) by Eily Gayford. This is a fascinating account of the author’s experience training women to work narrowboats during the Second World War. I like the bit where they sit in a cabin laughing at the seemingly impossible thought that boats might one day have “a bathroom with hot and cold taps, fitted carpets, a Hoover, (and) a telephone!”

I then read Ramlin Rose, by Sheila Stewart: This is probably one of my favourite books ever! I met some travelling boat girls up the River Stort a couple of years ago and asked them if they’d read anything about narrowboat families: They recommended Ramlin Rose. Sheila Stewart had wanted to interview a Banbury boatwoman and write her biography, but ended up compiling a number of true stories into a fictional life story.

This month I have read my first historical boat novel; Water Gypsies by Annie Murray. This is a sequel to The Narrowboat Girl, but I was told the cut does not actually feature that much in the first book, so I went straight for the sequel. Water Gypsies begins in 1942 and describes a series of tragedies that befall the heroine, who is tormented by a miserable past!

Marie Browne’s Narrow Margins is a modern tale of a family aboard, trying to make a new start after losing their IT company and large house when Rover went bust. They move their children and dog onto a dilapidated narrowboat called Happy Go Lucky and teach themselves about narrowboat life and boat refurbishment as they go along.The sequel, Narrow Minds describes their return to the water on another run down boat. There's an interview with Marie Browne on the Sunday Mercury website.

Next on my list of books to read about families on boats is For Better For Worse, For Richer For Poorer by Damian and Siobhan Horner. This husband and wife team have written a memoir about leaving their careers and lives ashore, to travel the French canals with their two young children.

Of course, if I didn’t spend so much time reading narrowboat books I might finish writing my own: The Real Life of a Narrowboat Wife. Then it could be me signing copies at next year’s Crick Boat Show…

Come and say hello to me at the Boatshed Grand Union standat Crick this year.

For more information about this year’s Crick Boat Show visit www.crickboatshow.com or call 01283 742972.

Disclosure: I wrote this post for Boatshed Grand Union, and it contains affiliate links to Amazon.

Narrowboat For Sale

If you are dreaming of a life less ordinary, living afloat, my friend has decided to sell her current boat; a 61 foot narrowboat. It has one fixed double and a single berth. If you like the look of her living room (pictured) then contact her by email alice (at) alicegriffin.co.uk for more information. 

Don't dream it, be it! ;-)

Update: This boat has now sold. Find narrowboats for sale at Boatshed Grand Union.

Why not top up the canal at the water point?

We still haven’t had enough rain to make all of our canals fully operational, with only 38% of the long term average rainfall for February being experienced in Southern England.

Still, I had a good laugh when I discovered this April 1st article on PennineWaterways News. It describes an innovative BW scheme to bring water from the north to the south, carried on specially adapted working boats. 

“BW spokesperson Allie Sash revealed that they had been considering topping up the Tring summit level from the water point at Bulbourne, but the recently-announced hosepipe ban has sunk that idea.”

On a more serious note, Sue from Retirementwith No Problem, recently asked 'Do boaters really care what happens?' She counted 18 boats coming down the Buckby flight on their own in one morning: i.e. without sharing locks.

To save water we have been asked to wait to share some locks at the beginning of this season, but that is ok isn’t it? These are unusual times. We will just have to allow extra time for our journey. Boaters are going to have to slow down to an even more leisurely pace than usual. Amy from nb Lucky Duck pointed out that sharing locks is fun.

I’ve had many a good chat with a random person while sharing a lock. It’s a great way to meet other boaters, and you share the workload of winding the paddles and opening the gates too. Everybody wins.

Of course you don’t have to wait for two hours for someone to share with. Simply use your own discretion. Or do wait, if you have the time…

BW reports that reservoir levels in parts of the Midlands and South East are still at record low levels for this time of year, and the water management team continues to work with local businesses, boating organisations and other interested parties to manage the problem. We have many canal boats, barges and narrowboats for sale on the Grand Union and so this issue affects our business and our customers.

BW has issued details of overnight lock closures at targeted locations on parts of the Grand Union and Oxford Canals. Special openings will be considered at busy times such as Bank Holiday weekends. BW has published a map showing the risk of drought impact on navigation in the midlands and south east.

So I’d like to end this blog with a final thought, in the style of Jerry Springer. Let’s share locks and save water. Sharing is nice. Make new friends. "Until next time, take care of yourselves and each other".

And the water.

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