if (boat)
… # All good
else:
raise TravellerAlert()The travellers that occasionally stay in the field next to my house do all of this and more.
Pretending that this difference doesn't exist and that there's some "double standard" just means you have zero direct experience of the matter and just want to have some self-righteous "UK bad" moaning. Like it or lump it reputations are often deserved and caused by experience rather than by random prejudice.
Our local parks are now much harder to get into let alone if you are disabled as they all have a small rampart across any flat entrance to stop cars and caravans being driven onto the park.
There are two common approaches to dealing with human waste aboard canal boats; cassette toilets which you can carry to 'elsan points' placed frequently along the canal to dump semi-regularly (I hear anything from a week to a month depending on how many aboard). They look like [1] - you remove the bottom bit and carry that to empty. And secondly, pump-out tanks with a macerator toilet which chews up the excrement before being deposited into a tank. They're much bigger so need to be emptied less often (over 3 months for our 500 litre beast). They need to be done at marinas or the ever-decreasing number of Canal and River Trust-maintained self-pumpouts. Costs about £10-17 per pump-out. Elsan disposal is free as is covered by your license fee. Hundreds of thousands of words on forums have been written about the pros and cons of either of these approaches, and is considered on the canalworld forum to be a bit of a holy war.
A much less common approach is composting toilets. There's not a lot of room on boats, so storing the waste long enough to turn into an effective compost doesn't seem too feasible. And then once it's done, what are you gonna do with it? You're on a boat, you don't have a garden. And recently CRT informed people that they cannot dispose of this compost toilet waste in their provided refuse bins.
[1] https://marine-deals.freetls.fastly.net/media/catalog/produc...
You get lots of people living on boats because housing is expensive (like my mother and stepdad).
You do get plenty of "crusty" boat people, but generally they keep themselves to themselves.
Maybe this is because people on boats are often in public and accessible places, where people will quickly complain.
I've wanted a tiny house or a skoolie, and I think if I was in Britain, I'd go for a narrowboat just as easily.
[1]: https://qmacro.org/blog/posts/2024/01/09/battlestation-2024/
[2]: https://lobste.rs/s/jrh1od/lobsters_battlestations_screensho...
They make excellent walking and biking routes. They are flat, no cars, often have a pub, wildlife is frequently visible and they are usually quiet. Absolutely loves my time biking them in England.
You can do it for almost zero money (perhaps $100/month) if you put many hours per day into maintaining the boat yourself and making everything you need yourself.
Or you can pay for good gear and get all maintenance done by a professional and your canal boat will be costing more like $3000/month - and when you do that, it becomes a rich persons hobby.
Edit: You wanted a figure - for the sort of boat you'll find on a canal in the UK. Bottom end: buy a small fibreglass boat for £5k, pay £1k a year for your licence (many at this end don't bother. Another £1k a year for maintenance and fuel )
Top end: Buy a big boat for £300k, £2k a year licence, £6k mooring, £1k insurance, £5-10k a year in maintenance.
Also factor in that boats mostly depreciate (though the last couple of years have been an exception). If you spend £100k on a boat today, you won't be able to sell it in 10 years get that £100k back. If you fail to keep on top of maintenance a boat will rapidly lose value.
A few grand a year for a mooring, plus around £1k/year for your license (all boats on the Canal and River Trust's waterways must be licensed). Every few years you need your boat lifting out and the blacking on the bottom re-done (more £££), and in winter you get through a fair amount of coal and other fuel to keep the boat heated (I think we're at about £100/mo for diesel + coal, but some people burn a lot more coal than us).
You really have to want to do it for the experience of living on the canals rather than a way to live cheaply (though it can be done).
Boat pricing comes in a spectrum that very roughly looks like this:
3. £20-£40K Narrowboats are thirty or more years old, or are under 50ft. They have had many owners each of which will have done something to the boat. The engine fittings will be old eg. coolant hoses , the radiators might not work, the fireplace might need replacing, there is rust in important places needing welding and so on. There may be overplating on the hull to repair holes. In general, you can expect to perform regular/constant maintenance and repairs to maintain and keep them in working order. (some people enjoy this, you may not)
4. In the 40-60K range expect the boat to be about 20 years old. Generally modern and most things will be working but it might not have a good electrical system for modern lifestyles. It will have 20 years of wear and tear, and the interior might feel old and outdated.
5. In the £100k-£120 range you should see 5-10 year old boats. It probably will have a modern toilet/shower, modern electrical maybe a solar panel, a nicer kitchen and modern diesel engine/gearbox and propeller.
6. At £160K-180K you can get a new but simple/basic boat fitout probably no solar, no dinette, few cupboards. Or it’s a five year old custom build that has been fully fitted with many extras e.g washing machines, quality inverter/batteries
7. At £200K+ it a brand new boat, built to your specification. An all electric boutique boat is £220K-240K. I’ve heard of narrowboats up to £280K. Luxury wide beams over £350K do exist.
IMO: When the weather is nice, there is no better way to travel than by boat. If the weather is poor, there is no worse way to travel than by boat.
That said, while being stuck at anchor due to bad weather can be frustrating, there is something pleasant about laying next to the stove while you're being tossed about... Unless you're trying to sleep while you're listening to your anchor drag.
I understand the vocabulary that I've never read before but it's like reading a passage from the 18th century. :)
Canals tend to have wildish nature around them (quite rare in England) and they are digged totally flat (with a very subtle incline/decline, apart from waterlocks). They have decent sidewalks that make them ideal to bike along (quite rare in England). They are very long so you can have a daytrip to visit multiple towns. And they don't have cars (quite rare in England).
Canals are great!
It would not be complicated to get a boat, assuming you have the money. You basically need to buy a boat, pay for the relevant licences, make sure the boat has the correct safety certificate, and off you go.
You cannot just stop and tie up anywhere. You either need some private land where you will keep the boat, or you need to make sure you don't violate the rules of the public areas. There is a concept of "continuous cruising", which means you need to move on every 14 days (I think).
Anyway, not complicated, but requires a bit of homework. Easiest if you can find a mentor who is already boating in the UK to help you out.
It was all fairly straightforward, although maintenance cost more than he expected, and he was surprised to find he couldn't just moor it in central London — 'parking' is limited and restricted there.
You'll find plenty of people have written about this, e.g. https://livingonanarrowboat.co.uk/. You could also search "narrowboat holidays" and see if you can hire a boat for 6 months.
I don't think being non-UK will make any difference. You can visit the UK for up to 6 months as a tourist.
Later I saw a depiction of life on such a boat when my wife watched Call the Midwife. It must have been Episode S05E07.
I made WaterwayMap.org, and one of the view is for anything OpenStreetMap considers “boatable”: <https://waterwaymap.org/#tiles=planet-waterway-boatable> I know nothing about this topic, so if there's anything missing, I'm willing to add it.
If you're after more of a modern angle - i.e., stories and insights from people that live on them (or just use them) today, there are many blogs from boaters, but I tend to not read them unles I come across a particular post addressing something relevant to me (usually repairs...). There are also tons of vlogs and youtube channels where people document their journeys which other people in the comments have mentioned, and even TV shows! I highly recommend Canal Boat Diaries by Robbie Cumming, though outside the UK I'm not sure where it can be found. He also has a youtube channel [3] which is less highly polished and a bit more 'real'.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_British_canal_s...
[2] https://canalrivertrust.org.uk/things-to-do/canal-history
Also, I work full-time from the boat.
These days, obviously, all that has passed and instead we have a community of almost entirely leasure boaters - some choosing to own narrowboats [1] purely for pleasure, but a significant amount of us choose to live on them. Some based in marinas but quite a few of us (myself included) preferring a much more nomadic lifestyle - being obliged by law to move every 14 days at a maximum to new areas and consequentially experiencing the richness and beauty of what is, in my mind, a living museum - a testament to our past.
Life aboard a narrowboat is cozy. You never have much space but I don't find myself lacking. It gets cold in winter, but most of us have multifuel stoves which we stuff with coal and (often foraged) wood. Right now I'm sat listening to the wind and rain lashing against the boat (it's almost 4am so I should really get to bed), the boat gently rocking from the weather. And I can honestly say that there is nothing half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats.
[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narrowboat