I’d been looking at buying a boat for a while, a search that started with narrow boats, instigated by too much noise from the neighbours in my flat and the realisation that even though I’m reasonably well paid, I couldn’t afford a house that I would be at all happy to live in and indeed give the majority of my wages to do so. I can’t remember how but I decided that living on a narrow boat, on the relatively quiet canals around Lancashire, would be a life perfectly suited to me. Well, perhaps not my taste in loud techno and rock, but I could have compromised a little.

After much research and even viewing a few boats I depressingly realised that I couldn’t afford it. The cheapest boat I saw was £16,000 and that was in dire need of expensive welding work and a partial refit. I simply didn’t have that much cash lying around and the three years following my 18th birthday created a not so marine mortgage friendly credit history, so I reluctantly gave up that idea for the timebeing (I’ll be back on it later in my life with more money!).

Still, the outcome of my barge hunting did plant a little seed in my head. I wanted a boat, no matter what it was. I looked at all sorts, from yachts to motorboats, but everything was above my budget, so eventually I was forced to the conclusion that boating is for either rich people, or those with a nice chunk of equity in their house.

Time passed but oneday while casually browsing ebay, I stumbled accross Jalina. She was a Leisure 17 sailing boat, and at just £900 was kind of n my price range. Well, actually I didn’t even have £900 lying around, but had a £300 deposit and decided I could raise the rest oneway or another, so I bought her. I do things like that – live life on a whim and worry about the consequences later. It’s really pisses some people off, who like to plan every little detail, and while it does drop me in the shit occasionaly, it does make for an interesting life, if not always enjoyable.

Having viewed the boat and paid the deposit I had one month to find the rest of the cash. Hmm, easier said than done. I had enough spare income to pay the remaing £600 in two months, but not one as the seller demanded. Actually, that’s another one of my non-virtues; impatience. I can’t wait for anything, if I’ve set my mind on something I have to do it right away, and so set about doing so. My girlfriend at the time hated my distaste for planning anything but was always up for an adventure or two, so with minimal effort I sold the idea to her and she graciously lent me the entire contents of her student overdraft and even drove up to York with me to pick it up – thankyou Sarah.

Great! I now own a boat, what do I do with it? Well, I towed her back from York to Preston on an unstable trailer that I later found out had partially siezed brakes, ran out of petrol on the M65, and eventually got Jalina to Douglas marine boatyard at Hesketh Bank, just outside of Preston. I spent the following two weeks sanding, painting, varnishing and anti-fouling until she’s was finally ready for the water.

I was the happiest man alive on that day. I mean, I’m sure it’s a fantastic feeling to take delivery of a £100,000 Benetaeu, but you’ve not spent hours in the wind and rain, scraping, cleaning, painting, struggling to put the mast up, rewiring bits of radio coax, and probably not spent every spare penny you didn’t have to do all that. Nope, this boat was as good as any £100k cruiser in my eyes.

Now, before I continue with Jalina I’m going to head off on a tangent for moment. During my hunt for a boat, and even when I’d dismissed the idea as a dream, I was going out on sailing lessons with a chap called Geoff from southport sailing school. He’s a marvelous guy, an ex school teacher who’d, in his retirement, ended up teaching people how to sail dinghys on Southport marine lake. I remember the first time I went out with him, which was the first time I’d set foot in a boat since partaking in an ocean youth club weekender when I was in school. It was blowing a force 4, and whilst Geoff was happy to take me out on the lake, he was a bit reluctant to let me on the tiller, because dinghys don’t have keels to keep them upright, and Southport marine lake isn’t the kind of water you really want to get a mouthful of. I think the wind must of calmed very slightly while we were out, so he decided to let me have a go. I was hooked instantly, this was great fun, and despite nearly dunking us both in the water after failing to let out the main sheet when a gust hit, I thought I was getting the hang of it quite quickly.

I went on to do a few lessons with Geoff, and basically now knew how to sail… obviously, sailing on a lake requires far fewer skills than sailing in the sea, and I’m not stupid enough to think otherwise, but I could sail in any direction the wind allowed and was thouroughly addicted to it all by now and wanted to gain some experience for myself by buying my own dinghy. Although I can’t recall exactly, I think looking for a dinghy is probably what landed me on ebay when I saw Jalina, who’s by now looking rather sexy (seriously, the Leisure 17 is a beautiful boat) tied to the pontoon at Hesketh Bank.

So, back to Jalina… Every night after work I’d head up the boatyard, just to sit on my boat and watch the ducks and the river coming and going. I even spent a night on her with Sarah and a bottle of wine. Even though it was only March at this point and still quite cold, I was happy to be out in the countryside doing something different, something constructive instead of sitting in the pub all weekend and feeling crap the following Monday.

The weekend after spending the night on Jalina, I planned to take her for a little trip down the river. The rivers Douglas and Ribble joined about a mile away from the boatyard, so I thought I’ll wait for the tide, then sail down the Douglas and up the Ribble to Preston docks, where we could grab a quick coffee at Preston Marina before sailing back. I say sail but it was mostly under power because both rivers point pretty much towards the prevailing wind, so anything other than a dead run require way to much tacking or gybing to make it practicle, at least with my inexperience.

A couple of minutes after the bore hit the end of the pontoon, Sarah, me, and Jalina cast off on our maiden voyage. I pointed the boat in the right direction, and Sarah kept me plied with tea. We soon got to the Astland lamp, a marker at the confluence of the rivers, turned to starboard and began to head up the river Ribble towards Preston.

We were now heading almost downwind, so up came the Genoa, and we motor-sailed nearly all the way to Preston. It really was fantastic, I occasionally cut the engine to listen to the near silence as the boat cruised downwind, but knowing that I only had so much time to play with because of the tide, kept having to fire up the engine again to keep the speed up.

Actually, before I continue with the story I’d better explain Preston marina. The marina is built in what used to be Preston docks, a once busy shipping venue that’s now bordered by large DIY and leather shops, supermarkets, fast food places and on the oposite side, posh (ish)flats. The marina populates about a third of the docks, and the rest is an open area for berth holders to sail about in as they like, regardless of the tide. To get into the docks requires the passage through the outer lock doors, accross the outer basin, past the debris boom and into the inner lock, wait for the swing bridge and then finally, into the docks proper.

So here we are, about 1/4 of a mile from the outer lock, which we could now see was open. Not long passed before we dropped the sails and motored in through the lock. Now, the following may sound entirely stupid to people who have sailed for years or indeed know Preston at all, but I really had no idea. Since this was just a day trip, the objective of which was a quick coffee then return to the Douglas, I turned left (sorry, to port) immediately after entering the outer lock, the intention being to moor up along the wall and walk to the marina for said refreshment. Well, it turns out that only a channel directly from the outer lock to the inner is dredged, and the rest of the outer basin is full of mud, hidden by a couple of feet of water. Needless to say, Jalina was aground. I quickly spun the forward only outboard around 180 degress and began to try and reverse the boat off the mud, but it wasn’t working, so I turned the outboard from side to side to ‘wiggle’ her stern a bit, which did the trick and she was back afloat again. Around about that time, the outer lock started to close, which really confused me since I thought it was always open…see, there’s the stupid bit. The only place that was left to go was through the now opening inner lock, so faced with little choice I headed into it and tied the boat up. Shortly after climbing up the ladders and out of the lock, a guy from the control building walked over and was obviously thinking ‘what the fuck is this moron up to’ but politely asked what I was doing and why I hadn’t answered his radio calls. “Oh, it’s not switched on” I replied “I don’t have a license to use it”. He looked a bit miffed, but was still very polite and explained he was going to move the swing bridge for me and let me into the marina in about ten minutes after the train crosses (there’s a steam railway that shares the road bridge). Ten minutes passed, the train puffed it’s way accross, and the bridge opened, which made me feel quite special, I mean, they stopped the traffic and swung open a 100ft bridge just for me in my little Leisure 17. Wow!

I moored up on the visitors pontoon and went to the marina shop to proclaim my stupidity. To be fair, they were really cool about it and gave me a coffee while I filled in the paper work to keep my boat there for a week… as it turns out, the lock doesn’t open regularly until summer unless somebody prebooks it, so had I arrived on any other day at any other time, the outer lock would have been closed and I would have gone back to Hesketh without a problem. Sods law would have it that somebody else had booked a ‘locking’ on that day, and the guy in the control building had seen me heading up the river so held the outer doors open just for me, presuming it was my intention to come in – fair enough, why else would I be that far up the Ribble?

Since I was at work the rest of the week I had to book the lock for the following weekend and pay for a weeks mooring, which at that time cost as much for a week as a month did at Hesketh. Still, a lessoned learned, and I did get to spend a few evenings down on my boat at the marina, which was now moored next to some very expensive yachts and motor cruisers. I’m not sure me pissing in a bucket in the cockpit went down ever so well though.

As with most great ideas, this one came about by chance. I was 22 and had been living with my girlfriend in our first proper flat for almost two years. We’d been slowly building a collection of crockery and assorted kitchen paraphernalia, as well as furniture, pets, and general house filling junk. It was a bit of a dive, and never really felt like home, but it was a house and it was not our parents’. Our neighbour was an absolute arsehole too, he used to listen to Boyzone at full volume on a Wednesday night after the pub, a worrying trait for a 40 year old builder I thought.

Then one day, out of the blue, it all changed. She left. I, of course, took it like a man and cried for days, but little did I know at the time, that that event would be a catalyst for everything that happened since. Now everything that happened since is a lot, and I’m not going to go into it all since this is not a book about my life, it’s a blog about my boat; but to suitably introduce why I’m writing a blog about my boat requires I tell at least a little.

So back to the scene. I’m all miserable and feeling sorry for myself after the loss of the only thing that made the flat that never really felt like a home just about bearable. I needed to move, but not to another flat, I wasn’t going to risk being stuck next to another 40 year old can’t quite get out of the closet built like a brick shit house Boyzone fan!

Then the thought occured. A canal boat! I lived in Chorley, I’d spent most of my life growing up with the Leeds-Liverpool on my doorstep, why not? It was quiet, it was peaceful, it was cheap. It was perfect!

Now I feel that this introduction is dragging on a little and as it is still a blog and it is still not a book, I’ll axe a huge chunk of this tail, skip by some facts, and jump on to the juicy bit…

Narrow boats are bloody expensive! £55,000 was the best boat I found; not pocket money, and to my dismay, I found marine mortgages are not very poor person friendly. 20% deposit and a maximum loan term of 10 years in this case. I looked for progressively cheaper boats; narrow boats as low as £16,000. Small motor cruisers for £7,000. Sailing boats for £6,000. I had the cash for none of them. I had to abandon the dream, along with my newfound freedom as I moved back into my parents house.

That period in time had one outcome, it firmly planted a seed in my head that I absolutely had to have a boat, a sailing boat. Since I was now back at my parents I managed to scrape together enough money to buy my first boat, a Leisure 17.

Ok, I can’t sit here and pretend I was a reformed spendaholic. The aforementioned ex girlfriend lent me a considerable amount towards the boat out of her student overdraft. I towed the little dayboat back from York to Douglas Marina at Hesketh bank, near Preston. There she sat on a Pontoon in the the River Douglas and I loved her. Jalina was her name, and she was my pride and joy. In fact there’s a couple of lengthy stories to tell about her, but now is not the time.

Axing yet more story; I ended up selling Jalina in a fit of stupididty, and for reasons I shan’t disclose, and thus paused my boating career.

After about a year of boaty dreams interrupting my thoughts on at least a weekly basis, I finally succumbed to the temptation and bought a Thompson T24, placing the winning bid on my mobile phone in a layby somewhere in Gloucester, as I drove to my Grandads for Christmas. The Thompson, ‘Pirimela’, had been in an accident and the mast had smashed through the cabin roof.  I thought I could manage the job easily, but it turned out to be much bigger than I thought and well beyond my ability and timescale. After removing ALL of the cabin and decking from the mast bulk head to the transom, I gave up and sold her, to a lovely chap who had both the ability and time to restore this wonderful boat. I still would love to sail a T24 by the way, I imagined she would cross the biggest oceans with ease as I walked around her huge keel where she lay at Preston Marina…. perhaps not, but pride in one’s boat seems to add quite a lot to it’s performance figures.

Then, the liveaboard dream came back proper. Having just sold the T24, I spotted a Stag 28 for sale at the same yard in Preston. It had been taken by the marina after the owner vanished for years without paying any fee’s. I didn’t have ANY money, but put in an offer for the boat anyway – half the asking price. To my surprise the boat yard agreed, and I set about finding the money to pay for it. I went in to the brokerage office at Preston and handed over the £700 I got from selling the Thompson. I then had a month to find the rest of the money under the terms of sale. I financially contorted, convulsed and sweated until I raised the money, and a month later, to the day, I paid the remaining sum.

Now you may be thinking that I must have robbed a bank to raise, in a single month, enough money to pay for a Stag 28, a very fine boat for a 28 footer, but the truth is I’d taken on another project. The boat was essentially brand new. It had never been in the water since the hull was moulded in the late 80’s. The previous owner(s) had fitted her out almost completely down below, but she needed finishing. Standing rigging, running rigging, stern gear, the engine needed plumbing in… the list was endless but I didn’t care. I finally had a boat that I could feasibly live on. She had standing headroom throughout AND room for a shower in the heads. Brilliant. All it was going to take was hardwork and every penny I would see for the next 2 years…

.. but then fate stepped in again. “Nathan, we’re closing the Preston office. You can either work from home or move to London”. It was a no brainer really. I couldn’t work from home. I’d go stir crazy being sat in my bedroom at my parents all day. I just couldn’t do it, so I sold the Stag and moved to London, which brings me almost towards the end of this lengthy introduction (my apologies if this has eaten your entire lunch break).

You’d think that living in central London couldn’t be further from anything with a mast and sails, but oh how so wrong you would be. Everyday for the last year, on the way to work, just before I get my morning Mocha from the French guy with a coffee machine in the back of a rickshaw (best coffee in London by the way), I stroll along the dockside of St Katherine’s. Once a working dock bringing all kinds of exotic wares to the capital, it’s now home to everything from the huge ‘Playbuoy’ (sigh) motor yacht, to even a Thompson T24 (If it’s yours, PLEASE let me come and have a look ). Once again I’ve found myself nagged by boats each and every time I walked to work. I finally cracked a few weeks ago and started looking with a vengeance for another boat.

Since moving to London I have quite literally doubled my salary, but once again my spendaholism prevailed and I had no savings. Whatever boat I got had to be cheap, and it had to be complete; I didn’t have the time to be working on a project boat anymore. I was spending most evenings browsing boatsandoutboards.co.uk and the other sites who’s names allude me, and had narrowed my list down to a few potentials. Then the though occurred to me. Where the hell was I going to keep it!? I made some inquiries and found the price of moorings in London was almost as much as the rent on my house.

Once again my dream was smashed with a cold wet dose of reality. I just couldn’t afford to pay £400 a month on mooring as well as my rent. The only way I could afford a boat in London would be if I didn’t have any rent… wait a minute! If I LIVED on a boat in London I wouldn’t have any rent. I could afford the mooring. Oh this is perfect, I thought. The plan was back on.

But hold on, I have no savings, and the boats I’ve been looking at are circa 21ft. I can’t possibly live on that, can I? I had almost convinced myself that I could when I started reading Ellen MacArthurs book, she told of her little Corribee ‘Iduna’ and how after sailing around Britain she lived on it for a while. A Corribee was on my short list. “Hell, if Ellen can do it, so can I”. I booked a train ticket to Leicester to see the Corribee and within 10 minutes and a brew had agreed to buy her.

Which, to your relief I am sure, brings me to the point of all this ranting. My little Corribee, Kudu was delivered to my parents house in Lancashire in May and I have set about preparing her to liveaboard. I’ve been traveling up from London as many weekends as I can muster, and working on her for two days before heading back down to the smoke for a working week. The blog will follow my progress, the troubles and achievements along the way until the end of August, when she’ll be transported to the South East coast and sailing up the Thames to our new home. The question is, can this 25 year old software analyst actually pull it off? We shall see.