Caxton and Yarwood Joined at the Hip!

Russ and Tracy are still travelling with  NB Yarwood  and no Caxton hasn't broken down, they are rafted together which enables Russ to help the girls with the locks to enable a quicker and more efficient transit through the flight. Plus he can take some pics! Plus some exercise!

Today is the day of settlement on the house, 12 noon to be precise.

For the first time ever we will be debt free and fancy free.....woohooo

The Meeting of the Old and the New!

Brother Russ and crew rendezvous with the NB Yarwood.  Click here to see what they have been up to!  

Work Leaving Do

I had my work leaving do last weekend, it was held at Ripples restaurant located at Whale Beach.

30 people attended and a good night was had by all, its quite nice when you have a do like this and they say all nice things about you. Hopefully they will say nice thing when I leave :-)

The restaurant is located right on the beach, a perfect location plus it was a nice warm evening.

The eagle eyed amongst you may have noticed that I have been wearing this particular red shirt on a few of the later blogs, this is because it is a new shirt and everything else is packed!

I was presented with a very nice pair of binoculars, for bird watching I presume

Also my boss has been talking to brother Russ in England and has arranged for an engraved coal bucket to be delivered to Caxton.  

Very appropriate as cruising the canals is the first tick on the bucket list!

At the end of the night it was time for the thank you speech, next day was a virtual all day hangover......A great night.

Caxton (aka The Manly Ferry) is on the Move! (Part 2) !

 Pics from Russell and Tracey on their adventures so far ... 

Setting off ... 

Concentration !

On the way ... 

Not much room !!!!

Zooming along (not!)

Giving her a bit of spit and polish

Early Sunday morning ...what a lovely looking day !

Fits nice and snug !

 More locks did 30 in one day, Tracy said their shouldn't be so many on Monday !

 The last locks of the day as the sun goes down, almost in Dudley 

Well - looking at those Locks ... Elaine is glad they are doing it !!! Today (Monday) Tracy tells us that :"Today we have a 3000 plus yard tunnel, looking forward to that!"

Phew --- we are exhausted just looking at the pics !  Give them a wave if you see them :) 

Paul and Elaine 

Caxton (aka The Manly Ferry) is on the Move!

Brother Russell and his crew have now taken charge of Caxton for her delivery cruise to Yardley Gobian.  I think this is the first time she has moved since last August.


This is from Russell's facebook yesterday and today ... 

Russell Macey

will be setting off soon on my adventure on Paul Macey and Elaine McBride narrowboat and the merry crew of Frank Thomas Tracy Macey Kimberley Speshal Macey and Chris Stroud. but not all at once.

Yesterday at 5:19am ·

Comments: 

Elaine McBride God speed on your journey .. and look out for icebergs ! Yesterday at 9:39am

Russell Macey Had a good day. Only met 1 boat today it's easy to manover with the bow thruster.

3 hours ago 

Martin John Macey dont go "showboating" with those bow thruster's "Captain Schettino"

... and I nicked this entry from Tracy's facebook a few minutes ago ...

Tracy Macey

Wow, what a day! Started off in Stourport on Severn with a quick trip to Asda to stock up on rations for the boat trip back to MK, i set off with Russell and Frank on the boat showing Frank how to do the locks until we got to Kidderminster. I got off and got the bus back to the car, then drove ahead of them to Kinver, got my car padlocked in a car park! Luckily found someone who could let me out, then i walked back miles to meet them, got back on the boat until we reached the car, went out for dinner then a 2 hour drive back home. Am knackered now, but was a fun day anyway, gonna chill for a bit and then bed I think!! xx


We also noticed that Lesley had her spies out (click here to see NB Yarwood Blog) !



It's all happening ... thanks Guys!

New Order

Last night we went to see New Order, they were playing at the Horden Pavilion, which is an older venue where you can still stand up and jump around etc.
New Order have always been one of our favourite all time bands and with some of the band members having a link with Macclesfield always makes it a bit special for Elaine.
They finished playing at 11.00pm but we couldn't get out of the carpark till nearly midnight because the roads outside were flooded we got home at nearly 1.00am on what normally would have been a 30 minute drive!
Which brings us to the weather.....never in my 30odd years in Sydney have I seen so much rain, it just doesnt stop, plus it is very heavy rain. Its at times like this that we are so glad we live on a hill, no chance of us flooding!  You have to feel for the bloody tourists, personally I love it!
Back to the moving......we have now sold the washing machine and the rest of the bedroom furniture, plus gave away lots of knick knacks so by this weekend we should be all packed. I have today off, plans are to go and see the quack to get medical records etc, Get Elaines car rego,d (MOT) specsavers for new specs for Elaine, plus deliver the washing machine and bedroom furniture.
Off we go into the monsoon.......    
  

Still Bloody Packing

Another week and still packing! Never ever will we surround ourselves with so much crap again!

We are still selling off a lot of stuff on Ebay and Gumtree; major items gone this week are....our bed, the fridge, one tallboy plus smaller knick-knacks. We can see light at the end of the tunnel but it is about the length of the Blisworth Tunnel!  We reckon about another 4-5 days and we should be ready for the shippers to pick up the boxes to ship and some to store. Whilst Elaine was packing today I finished off cleaning out under the house and sorting out the remainder of tools and general handyman stuff. Also checked out my snow skis/boots etc and packed them for shipping ... I am determined to go skiing in Europe whilst we are over there.

On the positive side, the pet crates were delivered by Skypets; he was a nice chap and gave us a full run down of when and how the boys would be shipped, it all sounds very easy but it is going to be a long 24 hours waiting for them to arrive.  I have booked a hotel at Heathrow for one night and tonight I will book up a van.

Poor old Bombo sits on the boxes as Elaine is packing, he is determined not to be left behind!  How sad can a dog look ?!

You are not going without me!

We got the crates a few weeks early so they get used to them; I suppose you could say the boys will fly 1st class ... at least they can lie down! 

Shipping crates with food outside them.

(PS:  Note the rainy day outside ...it was like that all last week (and actually most of the summer !) - the Warragamba Dam overflowed this week for the first time in 14 years .. see the report here .. 

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-03-03/overflowing-dam-forces-power-cuts/3866996?section=vic

Anyway, I digress!  On Friday night we went out with our friends, Matt and Margaret, to a very nice seafood restaurant; we are not sure that we will be visiting seafood restaurants in the UK once we are on our new budget.  Mind you nothing wrong with the chippy! 

That's our lot for now ... back to the packing ... ! :)