Waiouru’s first lock

Dear Tilly,
Thank you for the card. 

Do you think you could get mummy to give us your email address before you leave on your holiday to America?  Remember not to eat black-eyed peas or grits as they can give you wind!  Also, remind daddy they drive on the wrong side of the road!
Back to canal stuff……..  The plan was to fill all three diesel tanks today.  Although the marina fuel hose is long, it’s not quite long enough to reach the stern of Waiouru.  So the first task was to fill the Refleks stove tank in the cratch.  It took 49.5 litres to top up the tank.  Whilst we used the Refleks continuously over Christmas we didn’t keep a record of the actual hours and consequentially can’t calculate the approximate hourly consumption. 
After disconnecting the shore-power and preparing Waiouru we slipped the mooring ropes and headed 200 metres east towards Padworth Lock and the winding hole immediately beyond.  There hasn’t been a boat pass in days but with our luck we happened upon another novice in the narrow section heading towards us. This threw me into a bit of a panic Meant I had to stop Waiouru and hold her in place whilst the other boater sorted himself out!  Jan was down at the lock and I was calling her on our new 2-way radios but not getting a response.  Eventually I was able to manoeuvre Waiouru down to the lock which Jan had prepared.  We then discovered Jan was pressing her radio ‘squelch’ button rather than the ‘transmit’.  Communications restored, Waiouru passed down though the lock and winded.

The winding went rather well although I should have fitted the camera monitor in the cockpit to try it out.

When we returned to Waiouru’s mooring we discovered it had been occupied by our passing boater who was in the process of filling up his diesel tank.  This resulted in yet more effort on my part attempting to hold Waiouru in the middle of the canal whilst waiting for the mooring to be vacated.  The task might have been easier if the bow thruster had been working. (Note to myself…….. press the bow thruster ON button longer if you want to activate it! )
A few minutes were spent attempting to work out how the lockable fuel caps are unlocked and removed.  Got it sorted in the end and we took 61 litres in the Hurricane heater tank and 39 litres for the engine.  The Hurricane has 120 hours on the meter so the consumption is approximately 0.5 l/hr.  I was slightly surprised the engine tank took 39 litres.  However it has just had a 50 hour service and I’m not sure the tank was filled to the very top when first filled back in October.  It’s something we need to monitor.
When I plugged Waiouru back into the shore-power we had no 240v?  This had me scratching my head for a few minutes before remembering we had previously been connected to the shore-power via the bow socket.  Now we were connected by the stern socket.  I just needed to change the transfer switch inside Waiouru from bow to stern and everything was OK.
One other task completed today was to wire the engine management system into the Empirbus system.  This gives us the ability to immobilized the engine remotely by text message.
Waiouru is now facing the opposite direction which gives Nick access to the side hatch.  The side hatch requires a mastic seal between all the metal to timber surfaces.  It also means we are facing the right way for our cruise once the water level returns to normal.