Even more about trailers.

 

I've been having endless circular conversations about trailers resulting in this diagram explaining why and how the boat in question will fit very nicely on this particular trailer, but no in the end the owner won't have it and has decided not to splash the cash. He says it doesn't fit, - Utter Tosh - it did however encourage me to write the following treatise; and it would be a shame to waste it. 

At this time of year, living close to the coast, we start to see the annual migration of the rusty trailer as it is dragged from behind the shed towards the coast carrying its cargo of osmosis ridden GRP Cuddy boat all resplendent with air-horns and dysfunctional spot lamps pointing cross eyed at the sky.  This chariot of the eternal optimist can easily be spotted on the verge of any by-pass from Torquay to Skegness where after the first five miles, the worn and salt encrusted bearings have finally ceased their banshee wailing and given up the ghost. The whole edifice lies listing to port, its cross of St George hanging limp and abandoned while the owner drives off the nearest pub to phone his mate with the breakdown truck.

I’ve told this story many times but here we go again; 

When I sold the Whilly Tern to Willem in The Netherlands he couldn’t use my trailer because it wasn’t type approved, so he bought this huge thing, and I brought my trailer home, which was a bit Ironic as I’d just towed the boat on it all the way from Southampton to Amersfoort at motorway speeds without any problem.

 

Still we all seem very happy about it.

Since then The UK caught up with EU law and introduced the requirement for all NEW trailers to be type approved.

UK has of course now left those European misery monkeys to stew in their own bureaucracy but as a parting snub to the cheese eating surrender monkeys we immediately adopted all EU law into UK law by way of the European Union Withdrawal Act  (ooh Matron!)  Which is why we still need to have new trailers type approved, however the legislation was not retrospective so unlike The Dutch we can still use existing trailers  built from two bedsteads tied together with baler twine, because we are British.

Right now, all over the UK, a veritable flotilla of small craft are being loaded onto their trailers ancient and modern and dragged to the Channel Ports for the bi-annual pilgrimage to The Gulf of Morbihan.  Type approved or more likely not, this cavalcade of British Independence will stick it to La Gendarmerie with a cheery wave of their Blue Passports which exempt them even under EU law from the rigours of Type Approval.  Lets hope they’ve all greased their bearings.

It’s all totally bonkers of course.