Mousie!

Willow so enjoyed playing with my short splice, that by this morning it was reduced to six separate strands. So I tied some of them together to make him a new toy, which amused him for all of about two minutes.

Short and sweet

My very first attempt at a short splice - its success rather spoiled by Willow getting hold of it and unravelling it from the other end, but take my word for it, it was actually very good.

Looking like a proper boat at last

As Paul on Prince said. Made me wonder, when did Chertsey last have a full set of cloths on? My guess would be circa 1964.

Yes, at last today the rain stopped and the wind dropped for long enough for us to tackle the topcloths. In the end it was fairly straightforward, although terribly hard on the knees (mine). The positioning of the rings over the notches worked perfectly and hooking them from a kneeling position on the top planks was dead easy. Jim then slipped the hook in on the other side, balancing on the gunnel, braced against Bakewell, and helped pull it tight. I then improvised a tying up technique as best I could, based on a combination of instinct and half remembered examples from the Topcloth and Tippet video.

The cloths fit beautifully; there are four of them, each thirteen feet long, which allows for a foot overlap between them. The tippet however is in only three pieces, and the overlaps haven't lined up with the strings the way they have for the cloths, leaving an end or two flapping. The solution I think may be join the three tippet pieces together; traditionally I think it would have been in a single piece. For the time being I have joined the worst place with black gaffer tape. The tippet by the way is the narrow strip of cloth that goes on top along the top planks, to reduce wear on the cloths themselves.

Unlike traditional cloths, Chertsey's have eyelets in them. This will be useful for keeping the corners down (we went and bought a great deal of black elastic this afternoon) and may enable us to use them more flexibly. I decided to have them on a 'might as well/better safe than sorry' basis.

We hadn't quite made up enough strings, and it was interesting how we can now just nip in and make a couple up. I must say that the splicing had taken a lot less time and effort than I had anticipated. My eye splices have definitely improved with practice, and if you see Chertsey you can have fun working out which were earlier and which later efforts. My back splices too now are lovely although I do still need to refer to the diagram to get started. My next project is to attempt a short splice, whereby you join two lengths of rope together.

Brassed off

It is a well known fact that if you don't polish brass, it goes yellow, then dull, then tarnished. The easiest way to keep it looking good is to polish it every day; that way it only takes minutes.

The process of degradation is speeded up considerably by heat and by exposure to moisture. So the brass bands on the chimney really have a hard time of it. I had got Chertsey's back up to a decent standard, by cleaning them every day, or as nearly as I could. I didn't try to get them shiny in one go, but after a few days, it became easier each time to remove the new layer of tarnish and make some inroads into the underlying ones, and last week they were looking pretty good.

I noticed some interesting things in the process. The tarnishing was far worse on the starboard side of the chimney, away from the outside of the boat. Is this because this side gets warmer, owing to the very slight tilt of the chimney? Or is it because the prevailing winds deposit more damp on it? After a damp night, this side would have a thick, soft layer of tarnish whilst the other remained almost untouched.

Then other things intervened, and the chimney got neglected for a few, damp, days - to quite stunning effect. The fresh layer of tarnish is so thick, verdigris-like, that it is peeling off on its own. I'm not sure the scaled down versions of the photos I took this morning will truly convey the effect, but on the big screen they look like photos of an oil painting, the chimney bands impasto, marked with brush or even knife strokes. It almost seems a shame to clean it off.

Licence talk is really boring isn't it

There is probably something that is more boring to hear bloggers talking about than the process of licencing their boat, and that is hearing them talk about how they get online, and the problems they have with their dongle/software/internet provider. So I (rashly) promise I will never bore you with that (even though it is being 'interesting' at the moment), if you will bear with me for one last heartwarming licencing story, in which NOTHING GOES WRONG SHOCK HORROR!!!

Chertsey was licenced in June 2010, for the first time since 1983. You may recall it took quite a while to sort out, although this was mainly owing to my insistence on keeping its original five-digit index number. Bakewell's licence was due for renewal at the end of December. But here's the catch. A butty, with a nominated motor boat without which it never goes anywhere, gets a 50% discount, but only if both the motor's and the butty's licences run concurrently. I thought this was going to be a nightmare, and initially rang BW with a sinking heart. But no! The lovely Joelle worked out all the sums for me, and said that if I sent back Chertsey's old licence and applied for a refund, this would then be subtracted from the cost of the new licence and the butty licence, and a cheque for seven hundred and something pounds would sort me out til the end of next December. The sums included Bakewell's 50% butty discount, Chertsey's 10% historic discount (which Bakewell doesn't qualify for on account of being converted), and, somehow, the fact that Bakewell is registered as being under 70' long (well, I didn't want to confuse matters by arguing about it).

We picked the licences up at the post office the other day and are now not only legal but seen to be so. What's more, I now get two votes in the C&RT election! (If they ever get round to holding it.)

Cutting costs

I had my hair cut in Cannock last week. It cost me £9.50. The same wash, cut and blow dry in Lewes cost £35. The cut is every bit as good, and the conversation was better. Thanks, Dawn, Lauren and Sian!

Stringing along

It's been far too wet today to actually try and fit Chertsey's topcloths, but we have completed a fair few of the strings that will, hopefully, hold them in place. Some of our splicing was still a bit hit and miss, and some of the results not the prettiest, but whatever people think, at least we will be able to say that we did them ourselves.

Each string is about eighteen and a half feet long, with a hook attached by an eye splice at one end, a free hook running on the string, and a back splice at the other end. This is just one possible way of doing things. Originally, it seems (at least from watching 'Topcloth and Tippet') that the strings were spliced directly onto the rings along one side of the boat, and once passed over the top planks, were threaded through the rings on the other side. This of course requires you to have a hand at gunnel level; not so easy if you're out from the bank. Also, It was hard to keep the strings clean and tidy when not in use. So boatmen developed the innovation of hooks on the end of the strings. In this way, the strings could be put away when not required, and, when clothing up, with a bit of practice, the ring could be hooked from the top plank. The idea of a second hook, to hook the ring rather than threading through it on the other side, was not something I had seen done before, but I had thought about it, so when Pete suggested it, I didn't have any trouble agreeing. As it happens, we didn't actually have to do the splicing with the hooks in place, as they are 'S' hooks, crimped in place afterwards with Jim's largest slip jointed pliers.

Because I still couldn't get the hang of the crown knot (until I looked it up here), I concentrated on the eye splices; Jim, conversely, couldn't do eye splices to his satisfaction, so an efficient division of labour emerged, and by lunchtime we had completed fifteen strings. We will need slightly shorter (and possibly ceremonial cotton) ones for the cratch, and a couple of longer ones in which to fashion a loop to carry the long shaft, although I've no idea yet how that's done. We're using 10mm Hempex which is OK to work with, although the ends have a tendency to go fluffy and it's bloody hard to cut. It looks really good when it's done though, and is strong.