Calmac vocabulary

[Kelpie]

What's the secret sauce that allows the northern isles to have a decent ferry service?

 

[KAM]

Slight thread drift but...
"The Good Lord made the whole of this land
And all that it contains.
Except of course the Western Isles
And they belong to MacBraynes!"
Sorry, couldn't resist it.

They certainly seem to be making a sea grab. Perhaps they need more manouverable boats. Managed to get shouted at a few times this summer. Happened again in Rothesay.

 

[awol]

They certainly seem to be making a sea grab. Perhaps they need more manouverable boats. Managed to get shouted at a few times this summer. Happened again in Rothesay.
View attachment 124539

My admiralty chart must be out of date but it has a marked anchorage.

 

[KAM]

Same as mine. Calmac seem to be making their own rules but not informing anyone except by loud shouting if you infringe their territory.

 

[awol]

What's the secret sauce that allows the northern isles to have a decent ferry service?

A quick glance at an Orkney input to Holyrood is less enthusiastic.
https://archive2021.parliament.scot/S5_Rural/RECC_ORKNEY_ISLANDS_COUNCIL_FI.pdf

 

[penfold]

What's the secret sauce that allows the northern isles to have a decent ferry service?

They don't really; it's better of late than CalMac but it is burdened with the same lack of imagination and flexibility of thinking as CalMac, stuck firmly in the rut of ploughing a groove betwixt the islands and Aberdeen with large and expensive vessels that guzzle a lot of juice due to their necessarily high service speed. The amount of subsidy is equally ruinous, the Noggies would have binned it off decades ago for the shortest sea crossing to the nearest bit of Caithness(along with upgrading the road south as necessary) years ago combined with upping the frequency of the airlink, perhaps augmented by a Hurtigruten style RoPax service once or twice a week for tourists and people who don't like flying or bus travel.