Feature: Cruising Alba

If you haven't read our blog about how to keep warm in a narrowboat, you can check it out for some awesome tips courtesy of full-time narrow boat lifers, Marina and Myles, owners of the informatively dreamy Cruising Alba YouTube page. Their lifestyle was growing in popularity before the pandemic began, and has since exploded, with tons of new narrow boaters, off-grid tiny home builders, the van life boom, or liveaboards all seeking untraditional ways of living. We knew that for Marina and Myles specifically, their dreamy lifestyle has really taken off and come to fruition since the pandemic began, so we wanted to reach out to get a better sense of how it's going and how Ecofan has helped them strive through the winter season. Read on for some envy-inducing narrow boat life details! 

Where are you right now? If you could, tell us about the home your Ecofan is in and the surrounding area.

We are in Wiltshire, one of the most beautiful corners of England just outside Bath.

Tell us about yourself. Why’d you choose your lifestyle? Why is it important to live a life that includes heating with a wood stove? 

We have been living on a boat for almost two years now. In the pre-pandemic world, we lived and worked in London. Moving onto a boat was a chance to add more adventure into everyday life and live in a different way. I (Marina) have been obsessed with tiny houses for years and Myles dreamed about getting a boat while growing up. One day we were walking alongside a canal in East London and had the Eureka moment. We realised that by getting a canal boat we will both realise our dreams though in a slightly different format. 

There was a practical aspect to choosing life on the water too. The rent prices in London are high. We calculated that by putting our savings together and getting a loan we will spend less on monthly costs and have the boat paid off in a few years. 

It was important for us to get a boat with a multi-fuel stove, because in this climate it’s essential. We have the fire on 8-9 months a year. To keep our 62-foot home warm, Ecofan is very useful to circulate the air and get the warmth all the way into the bedroom. The stove’s a must on boats to fight condensation too. As we live off-grid and change where we moor every couple of weeks, we aren’t plugged into mainland electricity and running dehumidifiers is out of the question. Our two best friends are air circulation and dry heat, both of which we get from the stove + Ecofan combo. 

Tell us about your wood stove. How long have you had it and how often do you use it? 

Our stove is a 5kWt Aarrow multi-fuel burner that came with our boat. From September till May the fire is on for 24-hours a day if we can help it. It’s been a lot easier to keep it up last year as we are now working from the boat!

How did you learn about Ecofan? Which Ecofan model do you have? How’s it working out for you? 

We heard about Ecofan from other boaters. When we bought Alba, we inherited a stove fan (of a different brand), but we didn’t feel like it made much of a difference. This winter we bought the Ecofan Original and we love how efficient it’s been in distributing the heat. The bedroom is a few degrees warmer and feels like a very different room. And now that we are both working from the boat one of us is always in the bedroom (we swap rooms every other day for the change of scenery). Being able to have our own space is vital for the longevity of this lifestyle. And having a warm bedroom that we could use 365 days a year is why we still love living on our narrowboat.

It’s a weird time for the world. How have you been affected personally or how has your lifestyle changed recently? 

In March, we both transitioned to working online so the first thing we did was leave London. Previously we could only cruise in the city so we could commute to our offices. Once that was no longer necessary, we travelled to the outskirts of London where we spent the first lockdown. It was then I got furloughed and decided to take this opportunity and start documenting our adventure on Youtube. When the first lockdown ended we left London and started cruising different canals in England, spent the summer on the Thames and ended up on the Kennet and Avon canal where we are now. I was made redundant which gave me the chance to delve deep into learning how to create films and explore this new-found passion. I’m grateful I can balance freelance work and still do what I love! We can’t plan ahead for obvious reasons, but we have big dreams. Feeling lucky that 2020 gave us the chance to try something very different. We would have never seen all these beautiful places and been able to share them on YouTube if we were still working in London. Even though 2020 has been tough in many ways, we keep staying positive. After all, we choose to live simply and we have a lovely and warm home to take us to wonderful places in the UK!