Task oriented.
Hola! It’s me. Hi!
How’s it all been going?
I’ve been back at Castelsarrasin for…counts fingers…FIVE DAYS!
How, you ask, was the journey down to Bordeaux and back?
Three words.
Multi-level fabulous.
The canal & river were both beautiful, mostly serene and peaceful. The canal particularly.
Me and Ruru got to park riverside in a very very beautiful city. Prices were very reasonable. We appeared to be the only visiting pleasure boat.
Our project was audacious & risky. I got to bask for a while in the quiet pleasure of a goal achieved.
Ruru played along superbly, steering straight as a die and easily handling the soupy swirling tidal currents on the Garonne.
Some of the weather was crap. I’m not going to lie. But Ruru’s canopy offered protection from the rain, and inside we were always warm and dry.
Then on the way back, on the final morning, Ruru’s water temperature gauge went berserk. The ‘raw’ cooling water wasn’t circulating. Not good, but caught in time. Pulled over to the canal side, checked & cleaned the filters, checked the pump (seemed OK) and bled the system.
Cranked the motor and everything was fine again.
Until the next lock, when the problem recurred.
We were achingly close to Castel — just 10km away — and I briefly considered calling Sebastien at the boatyard for some roadside assistance.
Yeah nah. It’s not rocket science. If the water pump was kaput, I just needed another way to pump water into the motor. How about a repurposed bilge pump as a running repair until I got back to port
It was actually super easy. The hose diameters were even the same.
A roving eclusier from the VNF (France’s waterways agency) noticed me working & stopped to offer assistance. “I’m checking the locks around here all day — call me if you need anything.”
Nice to know the VNF has your back.
Got stuck in, plumbed & wired the bilge pump in. Done in 20 minutes, and it ran faultlessly all day.
A good hack to have up my sleeve.
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Back in Castel, David the mecano said “just take the pump off the old motor” (though in French, obviously). I did, and that particular problem is now in the past tense.
I had two big goals for Ruru on this trip: oversee the motor transplant, and finish the bathroom reno.
The motor is definitely mission accomplished. Great piece of kit. Very happy.
But I still had plenty to do in the bathroom. I’d gotten the new second-hand electric toilet working when I first arrived, and most of the plumbing was already done & leak-free.
But there was the small matter of sourcing and fitting a basin and lining/ painting/ finishing the space.
Nothing for it but to buckle down and get on with it.
Four days of grind, made extra-spicy by 30C+ days.
But it’s been great!
Using the quayside as a workshop. Riding to the commercial centre for paint and solvents. Weka-ing bits of wood from various semi-derelict piles around the boatyard.
Marvelling at the pure perfection of swifts in flight as they feed on the abundant sprat population in the canal.
Drinking 5–6 litres of fluids each day and hardly ever needing to go wees. Crikey!
Being seen in public covered in paint (dunno how the French view that kind of thing).
And getting the bloody job done.
Now, two days before the night train back up to Paris, it’s very very close to being finished!
It’s a tiny space. Literally 1.2 square metres. But it packs a punch.
An adult-sized toilet (a bit of a novelty on a boat), new basin, holding tank, and lots of new storage made from boatyard scraps.
Undercoat and two top coats on everything. Sanitary silicone to hide gaps.
As I write this post, virtually every surface is still drying or curing. Still needs towel hooks and a toothbrush holder, but apart from that it’ll all be good to go tomorrow.
Very excited.
Jeff
