A busy day

Thursday was a busy day as I went by train and bus to Rose Narrowboats to see progress with repainting our boat.

The first few photos are from my previous visit.

Most of it was back to bare metal with Paul (the painter, not me) busy on the roof.

I was pleased to see the sides were lovely and smooth with no significant damage. They will look good when the painting is finished.

The roof has several rust spots which have spread from damaged areas.  I was aware the rust was there, but I hadn’t realised how far it had spread as most of this was still covered in blue paint.

The tunnel bands show signs of rust, still to be treated.  Despite blacking the bottom 5cm (2 inches) of the lower band instead of painting there’s still water damage there.

This week’s visit shows two coats of primer makes a lot of difference to the tunnel bands and the general appearance of the boat.

Paul (the painter) busy applying the second coat of primer with a long handled roller.  The primer is rolled on, but the undercoat and top coats will be hand painted.

The sides look lovely and smooth, any apparent unevenness is just the recently applied second coat of primer dryer in some places than others.

After the visit it was a quick phone call to check where another blogger was, then a walk south along the Oxford Canal towpath to see them.

This is the front of the boat I was looking for, it’s No Problem rounding the corner.

Vic already has the kettle on, producing a mug of tea as I stepped aboard, leaving Sue, Meg and Penny looking out for me.

We chatted about all sorts of canal things as we cruised northwards, back towards Rose Narrowboats where Sue and Vic had a chance to see narrowboat Waterway Routes in the paint shed.

I shut the swing bridge for them and left them heading north as I went to catch the bus to Coventry and train to Birmingham in search of more bloggers.

The first boat I spotted was the famous Granny Buttons, from a former blogger.

Then I spotted Valerie (disguised in her plain green paint scheme part way through repainting) and Waiouru.

I spent time with Jaq, on Valerie, and with Tom and Jan on Waiouru before catching the train back home.