A surprise Christmas present for Ravensdale

Our sitting room became a workshop

I really thought we’d got the boat all ready for Christmas, but it seems I was wrong...

Ever since we moved on board, we’ve been trying to get someone to service Ravensdale’s two 300hp Volvo Penta engines and, just when we thought there was no way it was going to happen before Christmas, the boat yard said they were coming down to carry out the work.

So, yesterday morning, we carried the unfitted furniture from the sitting room down into the main cabin, lifted the carpet and took up the section of floor we’d previously lifted for Phil to tackle the heating problem.



Two guys from MPM, the boat yard next to the marina at Maryport, then turned up with a trolley load of oil, filters, anti-freeze, and all the tools they needed to carry out the service.

It soon became obvious that the pair - rather confusingly both called John - would also need the other side of the floor lifted to reach the second engine.

Initially it seemed this could be difficult as the boarding we needed to remove disappeared under the seating. However, the relevant section of seating was easily removed so they could get down into the engine room.

In a matter of minutes, the room was totally transformed from its usual tidy state, with a few festive trimmings, to a workshop and I was on coffee-making duties for the next few hours.

One of the Johns in the tiny space between the heater and the port engine

Dex wasn’t too sure about strange people coming in and turning his home upside down.


He seemed to think it was all a game – like everything else in his life – and was keen to join in so he had to be clipped to a long lead attached to the base of the dining room table.

This enabled him to get just far enough to see what was going on without getting in the way or falling down the holes into the engine room below.

All went to plan (except for a screw that sheared off and will have to be replaced before we can move the boat) and the two Johns finished in time to get to their work Christmas party.

The good news is that, as soon as we’re ready to head off on our travels next year, we will now be able to do so as our insurance company insisted the service was carried out before we took Ravensdale out to sea.

Meanwhile, the previous night, the sitting room was plunged into darkness (except for the Christmas lights) when the second 24V light bulb in the room blew and we had so far been unable to find any spares locally.

I wasn’t too worried about whether we got this problem sorted before Christmas as I was

going to put up more Christmas lights inside to provide a bit more light, but we managed to find an electrical supplier in Maryport with just three 24V bulbs, which fortunately turned out to be exactly the ones we needed - so we now have one spare J

And order has been restored ready for our first Christmas on board.

One of Phil’s jobs for the New Year will be to replace the crazy mixture of 12V, 24V and 240V lights on the boat with LED light fittings.

We have also put our names down for a radio operator’s course that the marina is hoping to organise here if enough people are interested.

And we are both going to do the Day Skipper course with Keith Morgans at Whitehaven Marina starting asap in January.

There are a few more things we want to get sorted on the boat, then we will be ready to set off on our nautical adventure next spring/summer...

Dex was very happy when the seating was replaced and he could get back to his favourite spot