Life Afloat

I’ve been living on land for the last couple of months while Bristol Fashion is at Whilton Marina, lined up with dozens of other boats for sale. What with all the rain we’ve had lately I thought I should check on the boat so I travelled up to Whilton.

As it happens she was fine, there wasn’t much water in the bilge and nothing leaking anywhere. It was strange to stay on an empty boat with no pictures on the walls, empty cupboards, no food in the fridge.

I miss my boat. Not knowing where I’d be mooring at night, life used to be so delightfully random, just heading in one direction until dusk then staking the boat to the towpath.

James Shipley is trying to trade some paperclips for something better, then trade that for something else and so on and so on until he owns a canal boat.

So far he’s traded 1) paperclips for a bouncy ball 2) for a kids’ book 3) for a golf bag 4) for gym equipment 5) for a radio-controlled plane 6) for a motorbike 7) for a speedboat.

He’s not doing too badly! James continues to blag his way to a narrowboat at www.onepaperclip.blogspot.com.