my phone number +32 476 37 57 51

just in case :-)

Good news for the maintenance of the boat

today I talked with an official Mastercraft dealer, since my boat is a Mastercraft. He agreed to do the maintenance while I watch so I can do some fixing along the road myself. It was nice talking with him about my plans and I could see he shared my enthousiasm (as did his children :-) ). He will work something out for sponsorship as well wich is just GREAT news.

Furthermore, I will sell Tshirts to raise enough money and the drawings for them are in the final stage now! I will post a drawing as soon as they reach their definite form.

Again, all other ideas for raising money are welcome

Preparations!

What do I have to do and how will I do it? How will I keep structure in the turmoil of ideas in my head?
I will use money and time as my guidelines to crystalise the ideas for the trip.

Time: I hope to leave by april 2012 and don 't plan a date for returning. I guess the trip will be made over a period of 6 to 12 months.

Money: Since I don 't have any money yet, this guideline will prove to impose more restrictions.


So ... I will work untill I drop to raise enough money by april. Then during the trip I will have to have some kind of "income" since I don 't know how long it will take, so it is completely impossible to save for everything in advance.

I will try to write this list according to priority, so that first things that need to be gotten/done will be gotten/done first.

I need a boating licence, because that will definitely be checked in Germany and probably along some borders as well. The lessons are about €120 and the exam costs an additional €70.

My boat needs a registration number, that involves some paperwork but should cost only about €65 if I am not mistaken.

I need a mariphone, which is a radiophone especially for ships. This is obligated by law and also because the locks are hailed by marifool. The problem here is that you can not just buy one. You need to pass an exam for it first. And after that exam you get some number and this you need to buy a mariphone. What is wrong with a normal cellular phone people? I have no clue what this will cost.

My boat needs a full overhaul, this will cost: "expensive" (I don't know)

The raft needs lots of money as well. (Again I don ' t know how much) I want to shape 2 isimo hulls, coat them and polyester them, they need metal protection on the bottom polyesterd in the hull so i can "beach" the raft, it will have a folding carvan, a fake grass deck, a bbq and kitchen, a springboard, a pirate flag, ....

anything else? Aaah, fuel...

So if I count the total sum needed, it is, euhm, a lot? So I started working as much as I can and accept (almost) all kinds of jobs and errands that give me an extra buck.

I will try to organise wafelenbak, a departure festival, sell T-shirts, try to get sponsoring perhaps, ... just any idea is welcome to raise funds for the trip.

During the trip I will accomodate guests, friends and travellers for €25 a night, including a hot meal. This will help me in the cost for the fuel and food during the trip. I can also sell waterskilessons etc during the trip where ever this is allowed. Perhaps I can also sell pancakes during the trip?? There are many ideas. And perhaps most will not get me a lot of money, at least it will be fun trying it out. One of my goofier ideas is to install a bathtub on the raft and sell hot baths for, €10? I would have to heat water with gas or moor and heat it over a fire or something, but then... You can take a bath, floating in the middle of the Danube, between castles and mountains! I picture myself already :-) I hope I can post a photo later on from me in a hot bath with a panorama surrounding me that knocks your breath away!

I need all the free advice I can get people! I need your practical and crazy ideas both!

I think I finally figured out how to enable anyone to make comments

I just postponed searching how to do this as I don 't like to tinker with computers, I just need them and use them

my lessons for getting a boat license have started and about my raft

After a week of toiling for the money, I did my first lesson this morning for getting a license to navigating the waterways. And although my plans and schemes met with a diverse range of reactions, going from enthousiastic to utter scepticism, I did get a name that I intend to follow up: "Swake Plastiek". Sounds promising to me as to how to make a raft.

Perhaps now is a good time to start describing what I intend to have for raft...
I want a raft that I can push with my little boat, to have more room. I intend to make two flots and connect them wtih a wide platform so that I have stability. (the raft can of course always be towed as well behind, but that limits my manouvrability) The name for the raft will be Lazy Susan, for a lot of reasons, but mainly because it just sounds great! In the platform there will be a folding caravan that can be put up to sleep people in as much comfort as possible. There will be of coarse a BBQ and a fridge on it, bare necessities for survival. I would like to cover lazy Susan in fake grass. People ask me why not real grass. Well, because it is a boat and every square inch will be walked upon  so much that it would be a floating mud field instead of a floating park. I have planned may other features on my beautifull Susan, some of which will be realised, some of which will never see the day of light.

Now, doesn 't Swake Plastiek sound like a man who will be able to help me out with constructing Lazy Susan?

On a sidenote, the surprise I was going to tell today didn 't go through. I was going to see for a folding camper van today, but the dude, Juan, didn 't have time today, so perhaps next week! I really would have wanted to say: look at Lazy Susan 's beautifull heart. From tomorrow to friday I will be grovelling for money again, but hopefully next weekend I can show a picture of the campervan. Juan told me it can sleep 7, is in good condition and he would ask about €400, which is dirt cheap. I just hope it isn't too big. I don 't want to be wider than 3 meters so I can use all locks, some of which will be as narrow as just over 3 meters. I want to avoid using the locks for professional barges whenever possible. I also want to be able to transport Susan by land if necessary without being a "special convoy"

I hope my scribblings make sense but with practice comes skill I am told, so communicating my musings, plans, dreams, events etc. will become clearer over time. It could also be you just understand me more over time by learning "me" instead of my scribblings being written better, over time. But does that matter?

room is luxury

and I want plenty of it! It looks like I might have found something useful for Lazy Susan. Can't say more at this point, I am grabbeling money for the trip in Paris now and can 't go into details because of time pressure. They (the details) will follow! And since this is my first post, it counts as a test as well, goodnight!