AND 37 years on

AND 37 years on and many narrowboat holidays, we are just about to move on to our own narrowboat “Burnt Oak”, after both taking early retirement.

 

Why Burnt Oak?

Martina’s dad was born in Burnt Oak. John moved there from Archway, when he was 13 and after leaving school joined London Transport (LT) in 1974, so spent many years getting on and off trains there. Martina was born in Edgware and first met John at the Burnt Oak LT sports ground. We lived there for a couple of years after we got married.

So when we were thinking of names, which is harder than you think, Martina went through the Northern line stations, needless to say she didn’t get too far down the line. Burnt Oak is the second station!   

After a good bit of research we decided to have Colecraft construct our boat’s shell and Braidbar fit it out.

NB Burnt Oak was transported by road from the builder and put into the water at High Lane on the Macclesfield Canal on 7^th July.

It’s been an incredibly exciting 6 months seeing a couple of years planning coming together for our wonderful new floating home.

John's first canal journey

John's first canal experience. 1978

Back in 1978 me and my mate wanted something that would enable us to slow down after a trying time driving underground trains on the Northern line, and boy did we slow down. We didn’t go anywhere, 

except to the pub.

But needless to say we fell in love with canals.
 Picture is Culcutt locks.

John and Ian chilling out!