Liveaboard berth near london?

[nmeyrick]

Hi, I'm new to this forum but have been sailing for some years and dreaming of living on a boat for long before that. I'm considering buying a sailing boat to live on, initially whilst continuing to work in London, but ultimately to sail off round the world on.

I've got some good ideas for boats, but what I don't know is how realistic it will be to find somewhere I can live on the boat whilst continuing to work. All of the marinas I've looked at in London either say no residential moorings, or have a list as long as your arm for them. But how strictly do they define residential? I'm not looking for something with security of tenure to park a houseboat; I would take sailing trips and spend some of my time away from the boat, and maintain a shorebased address via family.

Does anybody know how amenable marinas are to someone living on a boat under these circumstances? In particular I am interested in St Katherine's Dock or Brighton Marina.

Thanks for your help

 

[mitchc]

shhh! don't tell them....as long as you don't hang your washing all over the boat...
My opinion is that if you've paid for the berth, and it's your boat, why can't you "spend lots of time onboard"?
To be fair our marina has nothing in the contract to forbid it, so it's not a problem, but I think some do.....
You could always have an "extended" holiday on the boat?
Look here for the marinas in the area:
Marinas

This is going to be our first winter aboard.....so far things have been great! /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif So glad we made the jump to being aqau-pikeys!

 

[tarik]

If your are prepared to travel ( and presumably you are if considering Brighton) why not consider Ramsgate Marina, they have a non residence clause, same as Brighton, but ignored by several people. Easy access to main line train to London.


David

 

[nmeyrick]

Cheers for the tips so far guys; my plan is pretty much to keep a low profile, and the risk is that the marina company did put their foot down and I ended up without somewhere. I couldn't really justify the cost of keeping and mooring the boat if I ended up having to pay rent as well! As a worst case do you know whether places would be happy to have me living there for a few months before moving somewhere else?

Tarik, thanks for the suggestion, how well do you know Ramsgate? It is also on my list but I've placed Brighton higher up at this stage as it seems to have more amenities.

You mention Brighton having a no residents clause, do you know how strictly this is followed there? I've seen people advertising residential houseboats moored in Brighton Marina...

 

[albineer]

Port Weburg at Hoo is a residential marina
http://www.barges.co.uk/location_map.htm
Not as trendy as Brighton /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

 

[Carling]

Different sort of Liveaboard, but my mate has lived on Regents Canal for years along with hundreds of others that are not supposed to liveaboard, I think that as long as you do not abuse the situation, washing lines, etc. there will not be much of an issue.

One thing to consider, he had a nightmare arranging a P.O Box for mail, he needed a 'land' address to get one.

Good luck

 

[tazzle]

There's a fair number of folk living aboard at South Dock Marina - I think they tend to put them into Greenland Dock. The fact that they never move and have washing hanging from the rigging and tomato plants in grobags on the deck sort of gives them away. It's run by Southwark Council who don't seem to mind too much. They even have a rather arsey little berth holders association who seem to do a decent job of bullying the council (and, er, preventing nice developer people from building nice buildings on their scruffy boatyard /forums/images/graemlins/tongue.gif)

The BHA chairman's contact is paul@pauljackmanconsulting.ltd.uk - It's not St Kats, but still within a whisker of central London.

 

[PlanB]

Chatham in Kent had long term liveaboards when we were there. Unofficial but they said as long as you had a shore address for mail they weren't going to fuss. 40 mins by train to Victoria, one hour to London Bridge. Great shower block.