The canal notebook

A narrowboat is a long, slim steel boat built to fit the narrow locks of Britain's canals: no wider than 6 ft 10 in, and anywhere from about 30 to 72 ft long. This guide covers what that…

A short, plain guide to living on a narrowboat, and what it looks like in Britain. Written for people who are thinking about it, people who'd never thought about it, and people who already…

Short answer: a narrowboat. Longer answer: "canal boat" is the umbrella, "narrowboat" is the specific type you'll see most, and "barge" and "longboat" mean particular things that will get…

How deep is a canal? Most run three to four and a half feet in the channel: but depth is not the same across the width, which is what catches boats out.

The packing list people forget, the tips that change how the week goes, and the three things worth asking at the handover.

Living on a narrowboat in retirement removes the two things that stop most people: needing to be near work, and not having the time. These are the things to settle before you commit.

Yes, you can live aboard a canal boat legally, provided you hold a valid Canal & River Trust licence and either a home mooring or a genuine continuous-cruising pattern that keeps the boat…

CRT fees are charged by the length and the width of the boat, then adjusted for whether she has a home mooring. A 12-month licence cost is set out below, read from the Trust's own…

Buying a narrowboat: what they cost, what the survey checks, what the running numbers come to, and the downsides. Written for someone about to spend real money.

The cost of living on a narrowboat splits in two: four costs are fixed and published, and two dominate the total while no one publishes them. This page shows how to price your own situation…

A wide beam narrowboat is wider than the 7 ft the Canal & River Trust gives as the limit for its narrow waterways. This guide covers where one can go, what the licence surcharge is, and…

Yes, any narrowboat kept, used or moored on the inland waterways needs a current licence from the Canal & River Trust (or the Environment Agency on some rivers), alongside a valid Boat…

Running a narrowboat for a year costs money across several separate categories: licence, mooring, insurance, Boat Safety Scheme certification, blacking and maintenance, and fuel: and the…

There's no single average price for a narrowboat: second-hand boats needing work start in the low thousands, while a new-build shell-and-fit-out can run into six figures, with everything in…

A well-built, well-maintained steel narrowboat can last for decades: there is no fixed expiry point, provided the hull is blacked regularly and looked after as it ages.

Start with the layout and the storage you need, then choose colour, lighting and the details you want to live with. Use the sections below to work through the cabin one decision at a time.

A lock raises or lowers a boat by changing the water level inside a gated chamber. The boat floats up or down; the surrounding stretches of canal stay at their own levels.

The tiller works the opposite way round, the back end swings out, and there are no brakes. Everything else follows from those three.

The Grand Union Canal runs 137 miles from London to Birmingham with 158 locks, the Canal & River Trust says. This guide covers the route, the branches, the tunnels, the boat sizes the Trust…

There is no single English canal map. The Canal & River Trust, the Inland Waterways Association and a community project each publish one, and each says it does a different job.

Most "waterway signs" are generic: a printed silhouette, a rented mooring number, a rule board. This is a sign for one boat: your boat's actual name, set in the bottle-green and oxblood…

Narrowboats use one of three toilet systems: a cassette toilet, a pump-out tank, or a composting toilet: and which one a boat has shapes how often it needs emptying and where.

A relaxed day's cruising on a narrowboat covers a handful of miles, not a fixed number: canal speed is limited to around 4mph, and locks slow progress far more than open water does.

There's no single fixed fine: the Canal & River Trust can take enforcement action against unlicensed boats and the cost varies by case, so check current guidance directly rather than…

This narrowboat name generator works from the seven naming traditions boats on the cut fall into, each building its names a particular way. Pick the ones you like, and it will build you…

The best narrowboat gift is something about their boat that fits a small cabin: her name, her canal and the day she became theirs, from a name mug to a framed print. We make five things…

Traditional canal boat art has a name (roses and castles: the painted decoration that narrowboat crews developed for their boats, and a tradition that continues on the cut today) and a…

You hired a boat for a week. You worked locks, you slept like the dead, you found a pub with a fire. Now you're home and you want something on a wall that says that happened.

Canal boat signwriting is the name hand-lettered on a narrowboat's cabin side, a craft distinct from the roses-and-castles painting around it. This guide covers how boat names are…

Funny boat names are a proper tradition on the cut: a recognised category alongside birds, weather and places. These are the canal boat puns worth the paint, and the three wells boaters…

The best Christmas gift for a boater is one about their own boat: her name, the canal she cruises and a year that mattered, on a print, a mug or a bottle that fits a small cabin. For…

How to name a narrowboat, and how boaters on British canals choose: the seven categories that have earned their place, the official Canal & River Trust register most first-time owners don't…

You can look up individual boats (CanalPlanAC indexes over 100,000) but there's no name-idea or availability database, because canal boat names don't have to be unique. So this is the…

Hand signwriting is a skilled craft, priced like one. No one publishes a rate, so you get a quote - but the price climbs with length and decoration (cheap self-apply vinyl is a different…

Canal boat painting has a name, a palette, and a history that runs the length of the network. This is where roses and castles came from, what the motifs meant, and who keeps the tradition…

The best narrowboat names are short enough to call out across a lock and tied to something real about the boat or its owner, rather than the cleverest pun on the cut.

Roses and castles is the traditional folk-art style painted on Britain’s working narrowboats: tight bunches of bright roses and small, romantic castle scenes over a dark ground.

Narrowboat signwriting is the hand-lettering of a boat’s name, number and other cabin-side details in enamel paint, traditionally in a shaded serif that reads cleanly from the towpath.

A narrowboat is painted in two distinct parts: the hull below the waterline, which is blacked with a protective bituminous coating, and the cabin sides above it, which carry the colour, the…

Long-form notes on narrowboat life, gift-buying for boaters, and the small particularities of canal culture. Written by humans who own a boat, not by a content farm.

Short, direct answers to the things people ask about narrowboats and canal life: no padding, no invented statistics.