Waverley Storming Through

[Bob Golder]

The attached photo shows PS WAVERLEY crossing St Ives Bay in a storm :shock: .  She made port safely :news .  A video clip will follow soon.

[Eddy Matthews]

Having seen the full video you referred to Bob, all I can say is thank god I wasn't onboard her that day!

[Walter Snowdon]

While I was working on Waverley last year, we hit nearly similiar conditions crossing from Ilfracombe to Wales via the Holme Islands. It suddenly blew up to a force 7 directly off the Atlantic into the Bristol Channel . As we were crossing a   fiercely running spring tide at the time, she was rolling her paddle sponsons under, on a couple of occasions with water half way up the paddle boxes , but she weathered it beautifuly. I took a picture of her from  the side aft of the paddle box  showing her port sponson under 2 or 3 feet of water. A fantastic experience and the old girl just ploughed through it seeming to love every minute as much as I did.  I am back on board for 2 weeks in June. One week Bristol channel, then a 2 day Irish Sea trip up to Scotland and a few days in the Clyde Estuary. Cant wait! Remember, if anyone wants any specific detail photographing, please post a message.. Regards to all, Walter.

[derekwarner_decoy]

Walter - I envy your location & position to be a volunteer on PS Waverley and obviously you don't suffer from sea sickness

My most difficult sea situations ranged from being on board a 100,000 tonner in a smallish to largish cyclone off the north west shelf of Western Australia & the to a force 9 storm off Jervis Bay in NSW on board the HMAS Brisbane a 5000 tonne DDG [destroyer]

I think my ability to cope with & love rough seas was from my dear old dad who said "son - before you sail, have a cup ot tea & a few Vegimite sandwiches"   - thanks   Dad

[steamboatmodel]

Pardon a querie from Canada but what is a "Vegimite sandwhich"? Tea as a cure for seasickness I have heard of ( well doctored with gin or rum )
Regards,
Gerald

[thewharfonline]

I think thats one good thing about rivers....they don't gt that rough! well at least I haven't seent eh upper murray as being rough but lake Alexndrina and around Goolwa might be

[Waverley]

The video can be seen on the unofficial Waverley site - if you haven't seen it, you really should.

WAVERLEY has seen he fair share of bad weather and, as others have said,  she handles it very well. The paddles certainly help to reduce the degree of rolling, though.

In 1985, I was on her first passenger sailing to the Isle of Man, from Garlieston on the Solway Firth in the South of Scotland.   The weather forecaast was for the wind to veer to the west and drop - in practise it went to the Souith and rose which turned a three hour sail into a fuve hour one. Down the east coast of the Isle of Man we were going head on into seas which got higher and higher - at one stage I was standing between the funnels and I could not see over the next wave (This is NOT an exaggeration) and the only other time I have expeinced that was on the old CLAYMORE on passage to Barra in a Scottish winter. The weather was so bad the IOM Steam Packet cargo vessel's sailing was cancelled (and the IOMSPC sail in almost anything)

There was a photographer following down the coast - 2 of his picture appeared on the PSPS magazine (Paddle Wheels) covers and looked quite spectacular, but apparently the PSPS wouldn't print the best ones for fear of scaring potential passengers.

Anyway, we got to Douglas 2 hours late with no way home.  Garlieston pier was getting the full force of the weather and umapproachable - and every credit to the WAVERLEY SNC - every passenger was placed in bed & breakfast accomodation for what turned out to be two nights entirely at WAVERLEY's expense and our day trip turned into a long weekend - back to Garlieston on Monday morning.

Two oddities - after we arrived, the pub nearest the Douglas Ferry terminal was so busy (it was April, or very early May) received so much extra custom that he ran out of bitter - with no way of getting fresh stocks till Monday, his regulars were not impressed.

And I had to phone home to get a message passed on to my work - and someone told my manager I was stormbound in the Isle of WIGHT - I don't think that's possible.

Happy days.

Regards

David

[Eddy Matthews]

Here's the video of the Waverley that Bob Golder mentioned earlier - All I can say is thank god I wasn't one of the passengers that day!

[steamboatmodel]

What format is the Video in Window Media Player won't read it?
Regards,
Gerald

[Eddy Matthews]

It's a RealAudioMedia file Gerald - Just do a search for Real Audio in any search engine, the player is a free download.