Triple Mooring

August 30, 2017

Was moored at the Viaduct moorings on Sunday when one of Richo's orange gems comes along and moors in front of me. Next thing there's a majestic gem comes and moors alongside the first gem, then suddenly along comes another orange gem and moors alongside as well. It got a little interesting because the first pair were only tied together at the front causing the outer pair to drift apart for a while until they got more lines sorted.

I then notice a woman come out of the first gem with a dustpan and brush and get busy sweeping the deck on the port rear corner. A couple of dustpans full of rubbish went into the water and I just thought she was doing a bit of tidying up. Then I caught a bit of the conversation between two of the helms where the helm of the first boat was saying, "they told us we would have no problems with any of the bridges in these boats" At which point my gaze travelled upwards from where the woman was busy tidying and I then noticed the rather second hand corner of the roof on the back of the first gem, along with the remains of the handrail pointing at a rather jaunty angle. Ooops!

About 30mins later along comes a man from Richardsons and takes a few photo's then disappears and returns with a roll of silver gaffer tape and gets busy on applying a rather fetching corner patch to the roof and corner. He then moves on to apply more of the same to the opposite front corner. :default_ohmy: How much clearance do those gems need? I came through about 40mins before and there was 6ft10in clearance. I thought Richo's insisted on the use of the pilot?

Next morning we are sitting there enjoying the sunshine when the same three boats come back down river from Coltishall and proceed once again to triple moor at the Porter and Haylett water point causing chaos as you can imagine due to the close proximity of the railway bridge.

Broads01 · August 30, 2017

Richardsons absolutely do insist on use of the pilot, as do all operators now I believe. Whilst clearance may have been generous it doesn't take much in novice hands to cause damage. Some people think they don't have to comply with rules and see no need to respect other people's property.