It’s the 19th of April 2025 and we (Chris Dewhirst & Heather Martin) have just purchased a Piper Barge from Paul and Sue Bowler – who live in the UK – called Lady Sue. It’s currently moored at Chalet-Censoir, somewhere in France. I’ll find out soon enough.
To be honest, we’ve only paid the deposit.
I’m heading to France next week to check everything works and to conduct a survey. Heather just organised my 7-day-no-sleep itinerary. Thanks sweetheart. It’s a totally new phase in our lives. We are selling our beautiful house in Mullumbimby, having been here for over 20 years, and moving onto the water. It was one of those late night, bottle of red wine decisions.
Pete and Liz McKeand (think Lord Gumtree – 1970 – a Mt Buffalo climb) took us on a barging holiday on their boat, Rovi. And we had great fun bouncing off those 14th Century bridges. They’re incredibly tough. It was playing billiards on water with boats and bridges. (The board game for armchair sailors is not as exciting.) However, it was really nice of Pete and Liz to lend me their boat to practice.
We are considering renaming Lady Sue, which could offend the previous owners, and is considered by sailors to be bad luck, so we AI’d why we shouldn’t do it, and were told that:
Renaming a boat is considered bad luck, due to deep-rooted superstitions among sailors. Changing a boat’s name is believed to anger the sea gods and bring misfortune to the vessel. To avoid bad luck, sailors perform renaming ceremonies to appease the gods and ensure safe voyages.
Okay, so we must perform a re-naming ceremony, and I’m inviting suggestions…
