Retsub

That’s brilliant many thanks

About 5 years ago I shared the story of how 6 17 year olds managed to hire and nearly sink a 34 foot cruiser Lady Sandria 3. The story seemed to be well received and many others shared similar experiences. Somebody very kindly retrieved the story from your archives and four of the original crew by the miracle of Zoom during the, lockdown have recreated the story and added many other faded memories. It was hired at the end of .may 1973 after all. We are now ready to create a book from our weekly calls which may be very exaggerated but hopefully fun to read. Would love to share it with you hopefully we can complete our project in the next month or so. The one thing we haven’t yet found is a copy of the original advert for the boat in the 1973 Hoseasons brochure, if anyone can let me have a copy of the page for Lady Sandria 3 we would greatly appreciated.. it was hired from a boatyard just South of Breydon .Water many thanks retsub

One of the few pictures of Lady Sandria 3 prior to the sinking. note the motley looking crew

Because of the virus, commitments etc. the reunion was held via a zoom conference call.. Four participants, One in Orpington, one in Hertfordshire, one in Suffolk and one in Liverpool. Having not seen two of them since i got married in 1983 it was great to talk about old times. i then discovered that the Liverpool connection is somewhat of a hoarder and at the time had recorded the last voyage of Lady Sandria 3 on a book which i assume was a guide book issued by Hoseasons nearly 50 years ago.. As soon as i can work out how to size the pages etc, i will post them here. the journal as i refer to it, does include high level details of out voyage where we moored, best pub, worst pub etc and even if people dont want to hear about what we got up to, i am sure some of the Broads information will be of interest I did go to the shop with the intention of purchasing something to thank you for saving my old document. but everything seems geared towards boat owners. This really has brought back great memories and i would like to make a small donation as a thank you. perhaps someone can provide me with details how to this? and ask write I see a yellow donate button top right .. jon done

it certainly is many thanks, will go shopping shortly

Hi I wonder if you might be able to assist me. Several years ago I posted a write up of the Gallant crew of Lady Sandria 3. A group of 16 year olds and their adventures / disasters on the Broads around about 1972 Roll on 48 years and four of the crew are planning a reunion. Unfortunately the original post appears to have gone to the bloggers graveyard. I am guessing it was originally written between 2012 and 2015. Is there any possibility it could be retrieved? If not i fully understand. If its possible i will gladly make a donation to the forum or buy something from your shop in thanks. I would have been posted under the same user name Retsub. PS if our reunion extends to a boating holiday we promised better behaviour

Its titled outside the Pleasure Boat Inn. Apologies I was under the impression I had added titles. Photo 1 is Jo on the forward Deck of MY Eujoy photo 2 is Titled The Gennel 1934 photo 3 is blank photo 4 is Titled Happisburgh photo 5 is Happisburgh Photo 6 outside the Pleasure boat Inn Hicklng

Even more photos photo 5 is titled Happisburgh

Sorry meant to say were related to me, but this was taken around 20 years before I was born. i didn't even become aware of them until recently

thanks to everyone for their great comments. Although Stanley and Jo Fletcher werent related to me the photo was taken around 1935 I believe . The group outside the pub does have a few details under the original, as follows Pountney, Jiban ,Jack, Jo (Joyce Fletcher), and Eustace (Stanley Fletcher)

Thanks Vaughan Thanks for the info on Wroxham and The Torpedo boat destroyer. Wow!

Thanks Chris, I really do appreciate you taking the time to look at this for me. Will try to find more photos to try to get a better perspective. will try to get iome dates as well.

Thanks Smoggy that makes sense. The pictures have mostly been abbreviated to Hasbro , but I can see reference to Happisburgh elsewhere. Thanks Ian, as well

These photos say Horsey Dyke and Horsey Mere no dates but between 1925 and 1935

Hi Although i often read the posts on here I very rarely post, as after we sank our cruiser (see original post, I kept a low profile). Anyway to cut a long story short, our family has discovered an old photograph album showing some old photographs of the broads. i do have a couple of questions about them, but i wanted to be a bit cheeky if no one minds). I have long admired the font of knowledge about boating an the broads but i wonder if i can cheat a little and ask if anyone has any knowledge of the boat in photos 5 and 6. most of these photos were taken around 1925 - 1930 1 photo says Pleasure Boat Inn Hickling 2nd photo says Lingalonga (which i assume is a holiday bungalow) with Hasbro lighthouse in the background? any idea where this might be? 3 Photo says Wroxham, does anyone recognise it? 4 is at the Pleasure Boat Inn 5 and six is a Boat which was purchased by a great uncle of mine Stanley Eustace Fletcher. The photo says the boat was called Grey Ghost when they purchased it in 1925, Understand it was stripped down and repaired and came back as MY Eujoy (Eustace and his wife Joyce). We were told that Stanley Eustace Fletcher served as a midshipman in WW! and as a naval reservist in WW2. We understand he served on the small boats flotilla at Dunkirk. Eujoy was originally moored at Bourne End in Bucks. Any thoughts on what type of vessel Eujoy was, what her eventual fate was would be greatly appreciated. PS as well as these photos, i believe we may have more photos taken around Horsey Mere? if anyone is interested.

Thanks Admiral Avatar installed. Had to google it to see what it was! Very impressed. Grace, sounds like you had fun as well

Thanks to everyone for such a warm welcome. To be honest I wondered if I would be made to walk the plank after sharing my story, but interestingly a lot of people seem to have gone through similar apprentiships. Of course time is a great healer, if this had happened yesterday I would no doubt have a cutlass at my back. when you are new to a forum its sometimes difficult to know if you should refer to people by their names or by their forum name. So in this case I will respect rank and thank the Admiral for the avatar which I will gladly use once I work out how? I should point out though that Retsub is the name of my old pet Labrador sadly no longer with us in reverse... Buster

Guys thanks for the warm welcome and nice to hear I am not the only one to have disasters. Not knowing the characters on here I am a little concerned that WildFuzz may still have the incident open he/she sounds scary lol

Smellyloo Your Name reminds me of another story from our trip, but probably not suitable for this forum. Rascal i am honoured. It was probably your video's that I stumbled across that got me interested in the Broads again.

Hi I hired a number of boats during the early to mid seventies and recently became interested in The Broads again, mainly as result of watching videos on you tube. Maybe the time has come for a comeback, but I thought it only fair to tell the tale of my first trip to the Broads. let me start by saying this is not a story to be proud of, especially in a community such as this where its I obvious that good manners. Correct river etiquette and a community spirit prevail. I hope by way of this confession, I will be allowed to contribute to your friendly community Sometime around May 1971 a group of 6 sixteen year boys, myself included, somehow managed to hire a boat for a week via Hoseasons. We collected our boat from Burgh Castle Marina on a Saturday and after a short training lesson, we were let loose on the Broads to spread havoc. Now we may have caused a number of the problems that I will tell you about now, but hopefully, the hirers learnt their lessons and nowadays would not permit hiring to a group of teenagers. The boat in question was called Lady Sandria 3. A six berth boat with front and back cabins and a central sliding canopy. Being just south of Breydon we decided to head south for our first evening. We eventually passed a pub with moorings and decided to turn the boat around and moor up at the pub. Unfortunately this ended with the boat aground front end in a bank of reeds. Two of the crew were thrown overboard to push the boat back afloat. Although we succeeded, the two members were left aground unable to get back aboard. Two very muddy and very unhappy lads staggered into the pub sometime later. the next day we somehow managed to traverse Breydon Waterand found our way to the Northern Broads. We were obviously very inexperienced and naive about etiquette etc and although we managed to avoid damaging anything, I do remember a few angry fists being raised at us, particularly from the sailing community. Quite how it happened I can't remember (I suspect just being naive). We somehow found ourselves passing successfully under Wroxham Bridge. It wasn't until we moored up that one of the crew pointed out the plaque on the dash stating that the boat would not pass under Wroxham or Potter Heigham bridges. I can only assume we must have been very lucky with the tides because when we attempted the return journey we became stuck under the bridge. We somehow managed to push her through mainly by manually pushing against the underneath of the bridge. By the time we cleared the bridge a decent crowd had gathered and we were told that the police had been informed . We beat a hasty retreat and spent the next few hour terrified we were criminals on the run. On one of the broads we attempted our first stern on mooring, which we somehow achieved. However a helpful soul at the mooring suggested I threw him the mooring rope. Unfortunately I dropped the end in the water and it was consumed by the propellor. We we then headed south and moored up sideways on, on the river just outside Oulton Broad. We walked into the town found ourselves a watering hole and proceeded to drink 3 or 4 pints. A considerable amount at lunchtime for 16 year olds. When we returned to Lady Sandria we found her sitting much lower in the water than all the other boats. She was in fact being kept upright by the mooring ropes and appeared to be sinking. The inspection hatch for the engine compartment was afloat and we were clueless what to do. Four of the crew were assigned to bailing out duties and myself and a friend, ran into the local Hoseasons office in Oulton Broad. From memory it was quite a jog and we arrived totally out of breath. We gasped out our story to the office manager dressed in a 3 piece suit. He drove us to a boatyard where we met with a mechanic and the four of us headed out on a small dinghy with an outboard. All the way out to the stricken vessel we told the two guys of the valiant efforts of our friends to keep Lady Sandria afloat. Unfortunately when we caught sight of her, they were all tired and wet and had decided to relax on the top deck.. Not good. A Pump was set up and was manned by three of us. The Hoseasons manager was working the pump, I was holding the hose and my friend was holding the end of the hose over the side of the boat. The mechanic had adorned a snorkel and was head down in the engine bay trying to investigate the problem. It was at this time that a truly funny sequence of events occurred . You really had to be there to see how funny this was. My friend holding the end of the hose had decided to place his finger in the end of the hose and squirt some bugs floating in the river. At this moment the mechanic surfaced slowly removed the face mask and uttered the unforgettable line" what do you think you are a xxxxxxxx fireman". One by one we all roared with laughter. if I remember correctly the rope I had dropped onto the propellor had damaged the prop shaft and water was seeping in when the engine wasn't running..we spent a day or so in dry dock before returning the boat to its home dockyard the next day. just to put icing on the cake as we attempted a stern mooring, we hit the bank to hard, and the two bolts holding the sliding roof in place to shear off, causing the roof to slide off. Needless to say we lost our security deposit. this was nearly 45 years ago and it's obvious that we should never have been allowed to hire the boat in the first place. Hopefully we didn't cause too much distress and it's probably a little late, but belated apologies to anyone who may have been affected by us. i did return to the broads 2 or 3 times after and am pleased to report much better behaviour. So so my sorry tale ends and I hope one day to once again enjoy the beauty of the Broads.