Peter doing his excellent signwriting 

The outside is almost finished 

Then just four weeks later things starting to take shape inside 

Lot's going on inside after it had been sprayfoamed 

Suddenly something resembling a boat appeared from the fabrication shop 

This is the boat in week one of constuction - a long way to go yet! 

The plan evolves

Following our family holiday on the Oxford Canal in August 2004 Val and I decided that it was about time we bought a narrowboat. We looked around at a few but then we decided to approach Colecraft. I had been at school with Sam Cole and thought it would be great if he built the boat for us. We went to see him and discussed what we wanted, and in October we signed the contract.

We decided on a cruiser stern at 57 feet, and the boat was to be named after Val's late mother " Maria Jessie"

The first pieces of steel were laid in December 2004 , and delivery planned for May 2005. Now in March we are well on track and getting very excited that we have only a few weeks to go before we take delivery of our brand new boat.