Summer is just the most fantastic time of year, I’ve blogged about it soooo many times that the words are no doubt etched into your eyeballs. Being on a Narrow Boat in the summer is absolutely wonderful Owning a Narrowboat is Awful – Narrowboat Sunny Days, the Truth. However as we somehow now find ourselves in September the colder weather is upon us, and as we are yet to spend anytime on the Boat in winter we are yet to see what that involves.

One thing it undoubtedly involves is lighting the stove. During these blissful (kind of summery) months we have enjoyed an abundance of warmth and cosiness on the boat, the stove has infact become a handy coffee table and candle holder, I’d almost entirely forgot it has another use. The turn in weather brings us smack back down and so the dread of successful fire making sets in.

It would be fair to say our relationship with our stove is akin to Henry the 8th and his many wives, absolute infatuation ensues as the fire lights and our feet toast, this feeling quickly subsides as the optimum operating temperature (Yes we have a gauge that lets us know) isn’t reached and an invisible man quite literally takes a leak on our fire,  and we are left cold, with bubbling hatred setting in.

Back in spring we considered making sacrifices to the fire lords, or giving up entirely in our plight to light a successful, warmth generating, fire Narrowboat Stove – What kind of witchcraft is this?. On the 1st September we found ourselves back there, there was autumn in the air and we decided yes it’s fire time. The joy of fire time lasted about four minutes until we remembered the hell of successful fire making, and the fact that we had lost the art entirely.

So for now, whilst the weather can be described as a little bit chilly we are relying on the much easier oil heater, which just plugs in a goes, we have a month or so to get back to the top of our stove lighting game.

James & Kirsty