Waverley paddle steamer launches busiest season for decade amid fuel cost fears
£2-4 surcharge added to tickets after 65 per cent diesel cost increase
Historic paddle steamer Waverley has embarked on its busiest season for more than a decade on the 80th anniversary of its launch.
The 141 sailings which got underway on Friday will include the first ever trip round Skye, while the vessel will visit several ports for the first time for 30 years, including Uig on the island.
However, its operators have introduced a £2-4 fuel surcharge on tickets to help offset a 65 per cent increase in the cost of diesel since last year, which they described as a “major concern”.
The daily fuel bill has increased by £3,000 and by ore than £400,000 over the season.
More than £1.5 million has been spent over the winter on upgrading the Glasgow-based ship, such as a new water mist fire suppression system.
A public appeal raised more than £135,000 to replace the masts and dining saloon windows of the world’s only ocean-going paddle steamer.
Waverley Excursions general manager Paul Semple said the season had started a week earlier than last year with the first excursion on Friday from the ship’s base beside Glasgow Science Centre on the Clyde to Tighnabruaich and the Kyles of Bute.
The steamer will visit 73 ports from Oban and the Inner Hebrides to Northern Ireland, north west England, Wales, the Bristol Channel Devon and Cornwall, the English south coast, and London and the Thames estuary.
Mevagissey and Padstow in Cornwall, and Newhaven in Sussex, are among other places that Waverley will call at for the first time since the 1990s.
Mr Semple said: “In a week’s time, Waverley is scheduled to offer her first ever sailing round Skye - in fact we can find no record of any excursion vessel offering this trip previously.
“On May 18, she is due to sail to Iona, her first visit in over a decade.
“The [main] Clyde summer season is slightly extended this year, with sailings from June 26 until August 30 before she heads for the south coast.
“During the Thames sailings on October 2, we will mark the 80th anniversary since Waverley’s launch, which is a magnificent milestone to reach.”
The steamer was built at the A & J Inglis shipyard in Glasgow where the Riverside Museum now stands, just down river from Glasgow Science Centre.
Mr Semple said the significant rise in fuel costs was a major worry.
He said: “With such an increase, we can’t just absorb that and are applying a fuel surcharge of either £2 or £4 to tickets.
“This surcharge will help towards the additional cost of fuel, but we are cautious of passing the full additional cost of fuel on to customers and supporters as we do not wish to deter people from sailing on Waverley.”
In 2023, an £180,000 appeal was launched to pay for Waverley’s annual winter maintenance after soaring fuel prices left insufficient reserves.
Mr Semple said fitting the fire suppression system had been a complex task “given the nature of retrofitting modern electrical components and pipework to a vessel on the brink of being 80 years since launch.”
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