Waltzing on the water

Strictly star Neil Jones reveals why he's loving life on a houseboat

- By Fran Winston

WHEN Strictly Come Dancing star Neil Jones opted for a houseboat while looking for a permanent home for himself and his fiancée, she was not best pleased.

Love Island contestant Chyna Mills, 26, would tell his Strictly castmates: “Oh, he’s got me living in squalor,” he admits.

“Then they’d come to see it and say: ‘What have you been going on about — this is better than my apartment!’

“I’ve had a few of them tell me: ‘If I could live here I would.’”

Neil, 43, became so enamoured with rivertop living that he and Chyna still spend half their nights on the boat despite recently renting a bricks-and-mortar home.

They were forced into a cottage by their daughter Havana, who is 22 months old. Neil says: “It was a lot easier when she was younger.

“When she was a baby, we used to just have her little cot next to us [in the boat]. We felt quite safe because she couldn’t open the door or anything like that. It was really like being in an apartment.