Of Fire And Ice

 I haven’t written much about the boat recently. To be fair until the past two or three days I haven’t written much about anything. I think I’ve caught up with the most recent busking news, but I’m going to bypass a lot of what I missed out last year. It’s not as though anyone needs to see a blow-by-blow, day-by-day record of the life and times of old man Marsh. Although I may have to share some of the many ways I didn’t die during the past twelve-month, as recorded in my nine-minute song, “Breakfast For The Creepy-Crawlies” … I’ll have to get back to you on that one.

For most of last year, I had no heating inside the boat. Of course given the record-breaking heat we experienced during the summer that didn’t always matter, but my back boiler burst in March, soon after I got home from hospital after the stroke - did I mention the stroke? I’ll have to look back and check. 

Over those heat-crazed months I tried to find someone to effect some repairs for me. I suppose there really is a labour shortage because I couldn’t find anyone able to help. The closer I examined the on-board log-burner with integral back-boiler, the more I realised I was completely out of my depth even to try. So many bits had fallen off the stove, lighting a fire was going to be risky. Even the wooden frame surrounding the tiling was being scorched and I didn’t fancy being another statistic. Friends offered to help, but many didn’t have marine experience. I wanted a bona fide job carried out by an engineer who could be properly accountable. I spent months waiting for heating engineer after heating engineer to get back to me as promised or simply to return my calls. I approached the engineers at the boatyard. They build boats, for heaven’s sake, but they wouldn’t touch the job, they’re not allowed to do stoves any more! Eventually I put out a plea for names to other single-handed boaters on Facebook. I received one promising suggestion. To cut a long story short, Des from Ship Shape Stoves came out to the Fen, dismantled my stove and took it away to refurbish it. A fortnight later, at the end of October he came back and reinstalled it. When I say “refurbished” the only salvageable parts were the two side panels. However, he did a great job and I’d recommend his work to anyone. It was such a relief not to have to put on extra clothes to go to bed! Since then I’ve had heating more or less as required. 

The past couple of weeks has seen the river frozen over and the boat frozen in. I was certainly pleased to have the stove back working. 

Then there are mad dogs and Englishmen. C was someone I didn’t know although I was to find out later that we had met each other across the table during the 2018 Middle Level Bill discussions in Parliament. He was trying to get his boat through to Ely, but in the words of Ernest Shackleton, “Oh deary, deary me!”

He’d passed my boat one day, but didn’t make it as far as the lock. He was stuck in the ice for several days. The day after he’d passed my boat I cycled up to the lock and saw he was stuck. I checked he was okay and we had a long chat. He didn’t need anything at that moment. Over the next few days he tried shunting ahead and astern, but didn’t make a lot of progress. In the end he gave up trying to get to Ely and decided to ride the thaw en route to March. 

I heard the ice breaking long before I saw the boat come round the bend. He stopped in the middle of the river and was sometimes standing on the bow and sometimes balancing dangerously on the gunwhale thrusting his barge pole in and out of the river to break up the inch-thick ice rather than risk damaging a neighbour’s grp cruiser by crashing straight through it. Not bad for a septuagenarian cancer survivor, I thought, but still barmy. I started up my engine and began shunting forwards and backwards in an attempt to break up some of the ice around me to relieve some of the pressure around his boat. Eventually he drew level and said he’d had to try and get back to March because he’d been stuck in the ice for ten days and ran out of water several days ago. I knew having no domestic water was a serious business so we manœuvred his boat alongside mine and tied him to me. I connected my water hoses together and within an hour we’d filled his water tank. At least he could wash now!

We may still see some of the world from different points of view, but I am very pleased to have got to know the man a little more. My memory of our previous encounter was not particularly positive. We probably have more in common than that which in the past has divided us; a good lesson to learn, I think.