Here are my personal Top 10 Tips as a summer cruising live-aboard on the cut.
(You are free to republish this, with attribution to us)
1. Take a plastic carrier bag with you when working locks (and when walking the towpath). Use the time waiting for locks to fill or empty to do a quick tidy around the lock, and return the bag (and rubbish) to the boat.. (I used to rely on always finding a discarded plastic carrier to collect rubbish in, but thankfully the banning of them has greatly reduced the number littering the banks. :) )
2. When down the weed hatch clearing a rubbish-clogged prop, put the rubbish into your rubbish bag. (I have seen boaters just piling it on the bank, but that'll it'll get blown back in when it dries!)
3. Use a sea-side shrimping net on an extra long pole to scoop out floating bottles etc. as you motor past. This is a good one for kids wearing lifejackets! Warning: do it when standing securely in the fore-well or semi-trad, don't lean out over the side, don't do this if steering or approaching locks, bridges, low trees etc. and don't try to pick up bottles full of water or expanded-polystyrene lidded takeaway boxes - the water in them makes them too heavy for the net and pole.)
4. Rubbish in the water at or near lock gates can stop them opening fully or clogging culverts and sluices. This is especially likely at locks at each end of a long pound where wind and water movement floats them to the lock gates. Use your net for scooping plastics, boat hook for wood from the boat or banks. (Do not learn over or reach down too far from the banks - if it's in the lock, scoop it out when the lock is full.)
5. In canals where the water is clear by first thing in the morning you can often see plastic on the bottom of the canal. A short walk and quick fish with net, boat hook or litter picker will harvest these and help avoid prop-clogging and wild life.
6. Make sure your fenders, boat hooks and keys float, so if dropped they don't litter the canal bed. Fill hollow handles with long chunks of expanded polystyrene (from the canal!); or add floats.
7. Hard rubber pipe fenders last a lot better than rope fenders but can be lost on the bottom if the knot at the lower end pulls through. Make sure you've got a bit knot and a thick galvanised steel washer at the bottom end.
8. Keep a tough carrier bag or bin handy to the steersman so your own sweet wrappers etc.go straight into the rubbish rather into a pocket. Make sure it can't blow overboard.
9. Canal-side re-cycling bins can be far between, so have a recycling bag in a locker so bottles, plastic and cans doesn't become rubbish. (Some supermarkets have recycling bins in their car-park.)
10. Don't fill up bins intended for litter with your domestic rubbish; keep it for the next CRT rubbish area. If the bins there are overflowing, text a photo to CRT so they can get their contractor on to it, and keep your rubbish for the next one.
Bonus tip: make sure lids on CRT bins are shut to avoid rubbish blowing away, and put any loose rubbish in the area back into them.
Keep up the good work!
Cheers,
Bill & Daphne,
n.b. Jabulani
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