The only way is up !!!!

As you can see Jim and Craig have done well to get the stern sides on up to the gunwale, so Derwent6 is starting to look like a home...(all be it, a small home)

The bow top plate has been fitted and Derwent6 is starting to look a bit neat at the front end now.

As you can see Al is very keen to get at the helm.

and also polishing the outside. lol

Here you get a feel of the 65 foot length with the shot taken from the bow with Del at the stern.

This is a picture taken of the base plate at the end of the swim which will hold the engine and drive train.

Lucky Seven's 07/07/07

God we are so lucky having Jim And Craig putting Derwent6 together..... she is just starting to look so wonderful.

We could both tell that Jim was really proud of how Derwent6 was looking and we were just getting emotional knowing this will be our home.

So far he has fitted the side panels at the bow and the ribs to the side and floor. The sides go up to the gunwales and when looking down the side look as straight as a die.

Del knows a bit about welding, as he is in the car body repair business and he has not seen cutting and welding like this. Just take a look at the welding from the floor to port side panel (there's no way that's going to leak)

We have left Jim a camera so he can take shots at random, but Craig will probably take them as he is the techno wizard. As you can see Derwent6 is only at half it's length at the moment, because we are waiting for the rest of the steel to turn up which should be with Alexander boats on Tuesday.

We will be back up to Jim in two weeks time to see progress (keep up the good work mate!)

Meanwhile, Jim has given us a few tasks to do, like what type of Houdini hatches do we want (as he needs to make up the frames), where we stand with the cratch locker doors and the regulations, and rechecking the porthole pitches.

Derwent6 is Born

What a weekend we have had....

Yahoooooooooooooooo !!! the base plate is laid

We went to see Jim Sparks at Alexander boats, as we were told the steel had arrived for Derwent6. When we got up to him, the workshop looked empty, we asked him when was Derwent6 going to be started and he said " that's her over there"and the base plate had been laid. Wow !!! We both looked at each other and could have cried......

Here you can see the 10mm bow base plate with the two front bow sides over the top. Jim was at the ready with the coffee, but we felt we needed something stronger. We run through all the changes to the hull with Jim, and he felt none of these would be a problem.

We also went to Beta marine to see the engine build process and was met by Andrew Growcoot who took us round the factory showing us the assembly line for the engine going into Derwent6, and all the guys involved.

We saw the painting of the engine being carried out and also the testing where a technician had a engine running on the test bed. What a great bunch of lads... they can build our engine anyday.

Andrew then checked our engine build slot which is in thier books for September !!

All systems go !!!!!!!

Owl about that then !!!!

If anyone is interested in owl's then check out Cliff and Lou's blog, http://louisecliff.blogspot.com/ who does alot of good work in teaching the kids of today all about our feathered friends on the canals.

Well done mate !

Boats (Braunston and Bon Jovi)

Another hectic weekend for the Heasman household, just to take our minds off the sad occasion of last week. On the Saturday with boats in mind we decided to jump in the car and head up to Braunston to the historic boat rally, and did we pick the right day for the weather. We had a wander up the towpath looking at all the very old working boats testing their steering skills and polishing their brasses. We tested the real ales and good food, and had a really enjoyable day.

Then on the Sunday we wanted more boats, so we went up to the O2 dome as we had tickets to Al's greatest band ever......Bon Jovi

We walked around the dome glaring at the Thames, waiting for the next boat to come along and guess what....the Band had turned up to do their sound check for the concert that night so we had prime position for all the best pics
We then run up to the car they were getting in and got a few more

The Dome was very impressive with loads of bars and places to eat in a brick paved walkway that went all the way round the venue. There was lots going on, with street entertainment to celebrate the opening.

The concert was fantastic and will leave a memory forever. What was weird was they played "It's my life" (which is a song about living your life now, to the full, following your dreams, because no one lives forever) to a back drop of canals and rivers !!!!!

If this ain't telling us something I don't know what is, we had tears in our eyes.

Marmite 1990 - 2007 (Our mate Marmite)

A sad day for us today as we lost our beloved cat Marmite (marmity) He has brought us so much joy and has been such a wonderful cat, always around us day and night. We will miss him terribly and the house seems so empty without him.

It was like he knew of our plans and decided it was time to call it a day. Our house now will always be his and it feels it is the right time to move on

God bless..

Start spreading the news!! we're leaving today (well, September anyway)

Isn't this month just flying by...

Well we've made some changes to the plan in the saloon with taking out the corner bubble and now going for the Morso squirrel solid fuel fire, also the radiator has been moved from behind the sofa to the bulkhead on the galley.

We have also looked at the lighting plan and have used n.b Balmarha and n.b Belle's advice in to using LED lights wherever possible. We are still looking at the wattage of everything on board and we feel that the 700w gaming PC may have go, along with the surround sound speaker system and a substitute put in is place ( we don't know what yet)

Derwent6 will be running 10 batteries which are the latest quick charging batteries from Varta and we are now looking into solar power, which will be a mobile system which will just lay on the roof. (still trying to keep it simple, n.b Hadar)

We still have not heard from Fernwood on the start date, but are still working hard on getting the scrap book together for our first big meeting with Ken and Julia on how we see Derwent6 looking inside and out.

As for the spreading the news bit.....we have been to a few BBQ's and party's and have been letting everyone know about selling the house and all it's content's and already we have had alot of interest from potential buyers.

Don't go boating if you don't like water!

Well !!

We had a great Crick show!!

Lovely day Saturday, (but it was so busy) and wet Sunday and Monday (but it kept the crowds away) This gave us the chance to have a good look round and get on all the boats, and there were loads of them. Funny enough, we didn't buy much, but got loads of ideas.


We have been working on the scrape book and putting all the things we like in it, to show Fernwood what we want Derwent6 to look like inside.


Talking of Fernwood Craft, they celebrated their 10th Anniversary at Crick, where all their customers and suppliers got together. Food, drink and fun was had by all and it gave us the chance to get everyone's experience of the waterways. I'm sure something will be in one of the magazines. Here is Julia holding the cake.










What did we get out of the Show!

We now know what floor we want, what mattress we want, how we want the engine room to look, what generator, what radiators, insurance and the list goes on. But we now can't decide on the woodburner fire, we like the corner bubble for space, but love the Morso squirrel for looks and effectiveness.

We had a long chat with Beta marine about the engine because they have just brought out the new travel pack with the 5kW generator. We got the chance to hear it running and it was very impressive, so quiet, with no vibration. Got to have one of them!!!

We got to meet up with our hull builder, Jim Sparks but not with good news. Jim is now ready to build our shell but Ken and Julia don't need it until August so the start date may not be until the end of June now. We were so disappointed, but we will probably need the time. Jim does not want to start the shell and then it has to be sitting out in the elements, waiting to get into Fernwood's workshop, and we certainly don't want that either.

One good thing about the show is you get the chance to meet people, bloggers and all.

Hi to Fiona & John from n.b Epiphany working hard on the Bath narrowboat stand....it was great to meet you guys, and Hi to Lorraine and Mark on n.b Lorimar....it was great to meet you too and your boat is stunning!

Hello and thanks to all our friends at Fernwood for a fun weekend. We can't quite believe that come the Crick show next year we will be living on Derwent6 and starting our new adventure

BORN TO BE WILD !!!

May Day (a Hull could be built soon)

Can you believe it !! It's May already!!


Well we're dancing round the may pole already, but we Maybe getting a call soon, saying the steel has been ordered by Jim Sparks' our hull builder, so we have been looking at all the changes that we want Jim to make.

These are things like the size of portholes, size of cratch lockers, bow deck drainage, bow design, position of mushroom vents and houdini hatches. Also how the fenders are fixed and their location, side door positions, roof rail cutouts and stern deck and roof hatches.

Difficult to get your breath back after all that lot!!!!

We have drafted up a little booklet for Jim to use, so he knows exactly how we want Derwent6 to look.

For example! Jim has these rails fitted to the bow sides which we don't want, so I have drawn it how we want it.

We also want roof fenders with cutouts in the roof rails, so the fenders can be put up when travelling.

and a square roof hatch fitted to the side doors.

We are now working on a scrapbook for the interior.

More soon !!!!

Brass,Builder and Bikes

After a great week on N.B Thema it really focused the mind onto Derwent6.

God! we so want to do this !!!

So after leaving the marina, we headed on up to the guys who will be doing the 15" grand union portholes and watched liquid brass being poured into casts. Hopefully we will be able to help pouring Derwent6's portholes soon. We were asking about some double glazed portholes which are in development..watch this space !!

From there we went back to Fernwood Craft as we need to confirm build start dates and some other issues we had with stern deck height and manual pumpout points. We found out that our engine build slot has been booked with Beta marine. Derwent6 will have a Beta BV2203S which is a green line engine encased in a box to make it as quiet as can be, but we still haven't got the generator sorted out because Beta do a 3.5 kVa which will be too small for Derwent6 and a 7 kVA which is to large. We understand that Beta marine have a 5 kVA generator in development...watch this space !!!

Well it looks like it could be all go in early May (and don't worry, we will be there to watch the base plate go down). So we are working hard again, double checking the shell spec's and now looking at interior fabrics etc.
Our next meeting with Fernwood will be in June after the Crick Boat show which is at the end of May.

We have now purchased two of the bike's featured earlier in a 18" and 20" frame which had to be brought over from the State's, and are very difficult to get. So we now have our old bikes up for sale! ( a good buy for somebody)

We have made some slight changes to the plans of Derwent6, one being that we were going to have glass panels made up for the side doors, but now feel we will have perspex panels instead because of the weight, and also they don't have a condensation problem, and won't smash when dropped.
N.B Thema has perspex, and it won't scratch if looked after. Thema is fourteen years old and they still look as good as new. Also these panels can be swapped for fly screens, for those hot summer night's.

More on the other changes soon !!!!!

N.B.Thema at Easter

As Pat and Keith decided not to use Thema over the Easter period (due to bad weather last year!), we had the opportunity to take her up to her new home at the Welford arm marina, and unluckily for them, what a fab week it was. Apart from the boat traffic which we knew would be heavy, the sun shone everyday and spring blossomed, and spending time again on the cut gave us a new burst of excitement about Derwent6 and our new life afloat.

Setting off from Calcutt on Thursday evening we moored at bridge 103 for the night, and then moved, on Good Friday, to Norton Junction.

Check out our back garden !

After a few beers at The New Inn we slept so soundly only to be woken up by the cows licking the condensation off the side of the boat !!!!!

Saturday saw us up the Leicester branch of the Grand Union and the Watford flight. Knew this would be busy, and you can see from the picture, it's a tough life waiting.

Easter Sunday, after the Grand Prix, we headed towards Crick tunnel and had a pleasant surprise the other side by seeing N.B Balmaha outside the marina. We have followed their blog for many months and it was great to see them on our travels. Hi Mo and Vanessa ! (thanks for the photo on your blog...it's a first for us !)

Foxton loomed, together with the crowds..... Gongoozlers in their thousands!. Did a bit of people watching as the crowds went by as we moored at the top of the fight for the night.

When the crowds had left we put the wine away and then walked around the locks and the new attraction, the incline plain.

After a good meal at the Foxton Inn we stumbled back to the boat.

Up bright and breezy the next day (Easter Monday) we put out name down for our 8.00am descent. Through the locks, no problem, and headed up the harbro' arm, and had another pleasant surprise.

We passed another boat, whose blog we follow, N.B Gypsy Rover. Hello Dot and Derek, thanks for the mention on your blog as well. It was great to see you. Carried on up the harbro' arm but no mooring available in the basin, so turned and and headed back to one of our favourite spots....... the middle of nowhere.

Tuesday morning we passed N.B Gypsy Rover waiting to go up the Foxton flight as we carried on to Debdale. This is where Derwent6 will be launched so we were keen to suss out the area.

Back up through Foxton late on Tuesday (thanks to a kind lock keeper) and had another great garden at the top of the flight.

Wednesday was a beautiful day, and we moored up just before the Welford arm, after going through the Bosworth tunnel, and watched the gliders seeking out their thermals in the sky.

We had to drag ourselves away as we took N.B Thema back to her new home at the end of a fabulous week, which left us so looking forward to Derwent6, and a time when we don't have to take our boat back.

March Hares

Well !

We've been busy again this month,what with the sad loss of our Step Nan (Rose). A double 50th Birthday party, and Dad's 7oth Birthday party.

We are also annoucing our new website

heasmans.com

As for Derwent6, we have been out and looked at folding mountain bikes and think we have found the one we want .. this should save us having the bikes on the stern of the boat and now we should be able to get them in the engine room.

We have found two folding chairs for the dining room which should fold and fit behind the L shaped seating and also found a small ironing board which will fit in the same place.

We had our 24th wedding anniversary last week and got some lovely cards from everyone and great present's from our mum's and dad's (thank you to you all)

We have still had no news about the start date, but feel it will be the beginning of May (fingers crossed)

Still chucking out loads of rubbish around the house and continuing with the sorting.

Don,t forget to watch Waterworld on ITV1 on either Monday or Tuesday evenings at 7.30pm as this will give you some idea as to what we are letting ourselves in for..

Speak soon!!

Busy! Busy! Busy!

Well!
We've been to a boat jumble at Paddock wood in Kent, where we brought a mallet for hitting the pins, and a grass cutter for those long grass moorings.
We've also been back to Jim Sparks at Alexander Boats and discussed bits and pieces on the hull build like Bow well deck height, Bow door lip height, cutouts in roof rails, etc. We really feel we have got to know him now and are confident he will put 100% into Derwent6.
Our build slot for the hull is dependant on Fernwood as they are running a bit behind schedule so Jim has us booked for April and will only start it when he gets the nod.

We've been to see Chris and Stelle on Belle who are very welcoming, nice people and they have a great boat !! (thanks for the tea, cakes and biscuits)
We've been to the Birmingham outdoor, caravanning,camping and boat show (which we felt was far better than the London boat show) with ten narrowboats on display. Picked up more bits and pieces and loads of ideas.

As for the house.....
We have now done a brochure for the sale of our four bedroom house in Snodland, Kent, so if anyone is interested we can send it on to you. We have still been itemising all the things in each room (so much to go through) but we are getting there.

We are both still really excited and we can't believe we're into March already(don't time fly !!) hence the reason for doing this.

Another new addition

What about the Derwent6 new addition then!

Del's Birthday present from Mum & Keith (N.B Thema)

Keith will now be doing all the Rose's and Castle's on both port and starboard doors and also the stern doors for Derwent6

Still very busy !!

Been looking at Cratch sizes(ie depth, cover height and width, lockers, and door threshold)and all things related to the hull like stern deck hatch, Stern roof hatch, fender points, tillar height and all the fancy bits which which we will need to speak to Jim Sparks about when we go up to see him. Blimey there is abit of a list !!!!

Also we've looked at Sinks, Electrical equipment sizes(that we''re supplying) and the hidden wiring plan have been worked on. I am looking for a on board motor for Pumpout (if it's ever required) so if anyone knows of one please post me the details.

We are still working on the interior material and fabrics but may have found the leather for the two seater settee so we now have something to go on.

More soon !!

Oh! My God

We've done it !!!!!!!!!!!!!
We've signed contracts Ya Hooooooo and we both feel really good about it. Ken and Julia were Fantastic...We were at Fernwood for about 10 hours, but went through the whole specifications for Derwent6.
The blueprints for the hull build have been signed, and it's all systems go, we need to see Jim Sparks at Alexander Boats now, to check with him the hull changes we have made, and for him to add his special touches.

Mind you we are a bit poorer, but to hell with it it's only money.

House prices

Well what a busy start to the year !!!

We've got the house valued, looked at house prices in the area,(new and for sale) and now have a pretty good idea of what the house should go for.

We have packed away the Christmas decorations and now have a box of Christmas bits and pieces for sale (if anyone is interested)

We have also been to the London Boat Show at Docklands so we now have a better idea on the engine, generater and toilet for Derwent6

Lets hope we can keep it up !!!

Happy Christmas and a Happy New Year !

To everyone who now reads this Blog !!

A Happy Christmas and a Happy New Year !


From Ali & Del
(To Derwent6 and all who sail in her)

Two foot longer

Well sorry we haven't blogged for at least a month but we have been very busy every weekend!
We saw Bruce Springsteen, Bon Jovi, and George Micheal just to show what music fans we are, and still had time to go to a 60th Birthday party and 40th wedding anniversery!

So has Derwent6 been on the back burner?

No Way !!!!!!!

There has been a few changes since our last meeting with Fernwood, one being that we have decided to go with a Corner Bubble multi fuel fire and we are now going to have Gas on board for cooking.

We went up see Julia and Ken and discussed the plans (and we thought the price) but again changes were made.

Derwent6 will now be a 65foot Trad with a extra foot added to the engine room and 6 inches to each, the dining room and study. We came out of there with our heads swimming, but we did come out with the hull build booked in April 2007.
We also went back up to see Jim Sparks (the hull builder) and are still convinced he is the way to go.
We have done little to the house at the moment with Christmas looming up on us and the shorter days but have still been planning 2007 with precision.

Our build slot moves forward

Great News!!!!!!

We went up and spoke to Julia and Ken at Fernwood and the people in front of us on the build list can't sell their property so have asked to swap places with us which now means Derwent6 could be finished by the end of 2007.

We were on the cut traveling down the South Oxford early in October for a week and had a great time soaking up the mild weather and being attacked by the swans.
We are lucky enough to have the use of N.B Thema which is in the family owned by Pat and Keith,which is a 62 foot Colecraft shell which Keith fitted out himself. Derwent6 will be designed with this boat very much in mind.

We have still been working hard on clearing the house out cupboard by cupboard, draw by draw,
as we have a busy month in November and December with things going on.....More next month!

September Horn

Well !!
We have now acquired a new addition as promised last month "the horn" This was made especially for Derwent6 and will go on the roof of the stern, port side. We are really really pleased with it and it was all hand made and is so loud it would blow your head off.. Bridges on the cut may need to be modifidied!!!!

We have been to our first boat jumble and spotted loads of bargains but nothing we really need at this moment in time. We are moving on with the plans and have been looking at colours and interior designs, room sizes and electrical equipment.

The inventory has been drafted for the bits and pieces in the house for the time of sale, and we now have the hugh task of deciding what stays or what goes.

We will be on the cut next month for a week and will post some pictures then.

A busy month

August turned out to be a busy month, we went up to Fernwood craft and saw Ken and Julia who have another boat close to launch day. We then met up with N.B Huff & Puff another Fernwood boat.
We have been working hard on the plans and been getting lots of suggestions from N.B Quidditch, N.B. Belle and N.B. Hader who's main advice was "KEEP IT SIMPLE"

So simple it's going to be !!!!!


As you can see we got the lamp back and don't it look just grand!! We went it the IWA Beale park boat show and got alot of information from all the narrowboats at the show this year.

We then checked out N.B Jasper another Fernwood boat to see what it looked like after three years down the line, and it was still in very good condition.

We have purchased some bits and pieces for N.B. Derwent6 like brass hooks, barrels and fenders and in the process of purchasing a solid brass horn for the roof (more details next month)

Moving on with the plans

It is with thanks to Chris and Stelle's website ( belle@railwaybraking.com) and their boat "BELLE" that we have used their excel sheet to get the plans together for "DERWENT6".
We found their website because they are also using Jim Sparks of Alexander boatbuilders and we have found the site so useful with hints and tips before our build slot.

The lamp has been sent away for dechroming to Procast in Nottinghamshire and should be ready in about a couple of weeks.

We have heard from Fernwood that the build slot could be brought forward so we plan to go up there this month.

1960's Francis Fire Engine Lamp

Well we found it !!
A 1960's Fire engine searchlight which we wanted to go on the front of Derwent6..We found it on Ebay and had to collect it from a fire engine collecter, who had a fire engine (Dave) in Oxfordshire. What a great house they had it full of old collecters items and memorabilia of the 60's.

So now have to get it de-chromed as it is made of solid brass, it still has the original 100 watt bulb and can give a beam up to 1006 metres (should light up the tunnels)

Crick Boat Show

This really should have been posted in May but we've been a bit behind with our blog!
We had a really fantastic time at Crick. It was our first show and we went for the whole weekend.
The weather on Saturday was dismal but we didn't let it put us off and we managed to see loads of boats that day. This has given us plenty of food for thought and its great to see different designs and Ideas.
Sunday the sun shone and we spent the day looking around the trade stalls(again really useful for ideas) stayed at Crick that evening to see the live band The Platforms. They were Fab !
Back again on Monday (we just can't get enough!) and revisited a few boats that we wanted to take another look at.
All in all a very useful weekend which has got us really excited.

Still working hard on the design and planning the layout for Derwent6 but still finding it hard having to wait so long

Well we've done it!!

Well we've done it !!
We found a boat builder in Jim Sparks at Alexander boatbuilders and someone to carry out a quality fitout with Ken and Julia at Fernwood craft...We have now booked our build slot and it's all systems go..
We are now working hard on the design.


So much to think about !!!