16th Sept: Boat Show
The Boat Show week was beginning to look busy with a power cut at Stone point on the Tuesday and a double watch on the Friday plus a desire to finish relaying my back garden path which had drifted around during the 8th April flood! That meant visiting the Boat Show on the Monday which looked like being a cool but sunny day.
The show entrance is now near the newer cinema section of West Quay and you have to walk past a whole section of the Town Walls, cross the dual carriageway by bridge and then the dock road by a staffed crossing before you get to the section with the Marquees and the Marina. I’ve tried to mark the area they are using on the figure. Over the last few years the number of chandlers has decreased, this year I got the feeling that the number of exhibitors is down overall. Swallow Yachts were only showing the BC21, usually they have had 3 boats, and Matt seemed to be the only person manning their stand. In fact, while Matt disappearded for some lunch, I ended up the only one there!
I like the looks of the BC21 but, as Matt confirmed, she is really a BRe replacement… he would still build the latter but now the orders are for the BC21. However although there are various echoes of Seatern, for me the BC20 was a better choice with much more space and headroom in the cabin.
I got a bad feeling about the show this year. They have closed off the tree lined walk with the slope where people liked to sit on the grass to eat their packed lunches. The NCI trailer used to be along that walk, this year they were inside. There were reports that the catering was hugely expensive… I noticed ice cream cones at £5 and I’m told a vegetable wrap was £15.
Of the feature boats I looked inside the RAF 102 launch and went on a small landing craft, a LCVP (Landing Craft Vehicle Personnel). As I was looking around they said they were about to cast off so I paid my £20 on the spot for a 20 minute cruise down to the Western Docks! Had I only been able to pay at the “On Water Booking” desk I would never have gone. There were only 3 visitors and two crew on board and we were lucky in arriving off the Western Docks just as Wyeforce was swinging Waverley for a trip out towards the Solent. Here are photos from the LCVP:
Afterwards I went on the ex-Guernsey Arun Class Lifeboat 52-02, “Sir William Arnold”, which was apparently famous for the MV Bonita rescue in 1981. For old times sake I also had a look around the RV Callista ! Once I’d been to the Swallow Yacht “stand” I’d had enough. I bailed out of the show at the Dock Road crossing and made my way into the Old Town where I had a very pleasant lunch in the Tudor House Garden, much better and cheaper than the Boat Show.
