Battling The Elements

With falling snow and heavy frosts, winter calls for preparation for liveaboards who don’t want to get caught out if the Big Chill arrives.

- Kevin Blick

Despite the annual apocalyptic predictions of the Daily Express, by and large Britain has escaped those winter blizzards for the last few years.

But that doesn’t mean they won’t happen this year – and when they do we we live board boaters had better be prepared because it can be no fun at all.

About seven years ago we were completely iced in for the best part of two months: the ice on the Coventry Canal was so thick we could confidently walk on it. Fortunately we were in a boatyard. Unfortunately, we weren’t as well prepared as I thought we were. I discovered that on Christmas Eve!

I’d done all the sensible preparations for Christmas: made sure we had full gas cylinders, topped the water tank, laid in stocks of Baileys for the ladies. But I’d completely forgotten that when you’ve been running your Refleks stove 24/7 for a month your fuel tank is probably getting dry.

I felt the temperature in the boat dropping as I shivered under the icy stares from the rest of the crew who were already imagining the prospect of eating Christmas dinner wearing overcoats, hats and gloves. The boatyard was shut and the staff long gone home but I managed to dig out an empty 20-litre fuel container, got a lift to the only fuel station in town still open and Christmas – as well as my skin – was saved. So, rule one: in winter, always keep your fuel tank full.

In fact, the big freeze that year had come quickly and caught many boaters out. Ice forms fast on the still waters of the canals: I recall being on a previous winter trip when one morning’s film of ice had turned, by the next morning, into an almost impenetrable layer.