escaped Maid

Well, that was an exciting day. I got up early to make my way West to Balloch to see the Maid of the Loch winched out of the water. I decided to take the bike on the train which was great. Nice and fast to get to the train station and a very nice ride along the Leven from Dumbarton to Balloch. In Alexandria I met Rowan's dad and together we made our way to Loch Lomond. The steam ship is currently without a boiler and permanently berthed. The plan was to pull the ship across to the original cradle which was to be winched up the slip way using the original steam winch. It took ages and we were waiting and watching in the cold with quite a number of other spectators. The steam winch did its trick and pulled the ship out. It was great hearing the gears turn. We were just about to go and find a cafe to warm up when we heard this awful crunching noise and the Maid of the Loch slipped back into the Loch. I am not entirely sure what happened but I guess once 550 tons start moving its hard to stop. Luckily nobody was injured. We will have to see if the ship was damaged. The picture was taken shortly after it escaped. I briefly thought about taking a video of it slipping but obviously don't know how to operate it in a hurry. 

I managed to get the 3 o'clock train home to Edinburgh. Right, now really back to normality.

More pictures of today's adventure on flickr.