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NORTH EAST TRIP
EASTER 2005 (continued)
Text and all 2005 pictures © matt@hhvferry.com except where stated

Despite our fairly dismal initial inspection, we were not deterred from making the TUXEDO PRINCESS the centrepiece of a night out. After checking into the hotel and relaxing for a couple of hours, it was time for a night on the Toon. A taxi ride to the quayside was required and we mentioned in passing to our lady driver that we were probably going to head for "the Boat" later in the evening:
"Aww The Boat! It's a DIRTY place! But I do like the Sex Club!".
Good grief! Had things fallen so far from my memory of the TUXEDO ROYALE as a cheesy but harmless student night out? Perhaps not: she continued, "it's got sticky floors ya see. But the saxophone player - bloody brilliant". Ahhh... SAX Club. All these years away must have detuned my ear for the local accent.

We were dropped off on a still-busy quayside but it was noticeable that the accents had now changed. Where in the afternoon it had been a cosmopolitan, touristy place, clearly the locals had now come out to play and the place was buzzing. We enjoyed a pretty good meal in an Italian restaurant before crossing to the Gateshead side. The PRINCESS didn't open her doors until about 9.30/10pm, so we entered the first bar we found on the other side, Buffalo Bill's. On a Friday evening, Bill's is not the place for a quiet drink and the place was absolutely heaving with a mix of locals and a surprising smattering of tourists, including a party of German businessmen who were absolutely loving it.

If you have ever seen the movie Coyote Ugly, you might get the impression of what Buffalo Bill's was like and although first impressions are "oh my God, this wasn't what I banked on!"- it was fairly easy to just join in with the fun as the immodestly dressed bar girls leaped up on the bar counter and performed for the lads. Unlike in the film however there was no wasteful pouring of beer either over themselves or unfortunately into the masses. To ensure strict equality of course, the barmen later did the same for the ladies but by then, and slightly later than planned, we were bounding over to the 'Caley P'.

Top: The Tuxedo Princess at her Gateshead berth.

Above: An original Caledonian Princess postcard, showing some of her original interiors, going clockwise from top right:
One side of the Second Class Lounge, amidships on Promenade Deck;
Part of the Second Class cafeteria with one of the pair of David Gentleman murals visible;
The First Class smokeroom;
The First Class restaurant which was located on the Upper Deck (actually the deck beneath the Promenade Deck).

We entered into the forward lobby on Promenade Deck. As with the TUXEDO ROYALE, this ship's passenger spaces were recognisable only in that the shell of each room had been retained and most of the staircases, alleyways and toilets etc were in the same place. As built, the ship was a two-class vessel and followed an essentially horizontal divide between first and second class. The forward lobby was part of first class but on this particular Friday night, both the smokeroom (forward of the lobby) and the lounge (above on Boat Deck) once assigned to this class were closed off - thus we were deprived both the Sax Club and the Piano Bar. On the closed stairway leading up off the lobby could be seen a framed version of the original poster produced when the ship was built advertising both the ship and her route, rather larger but otherwise the same as that which can be found in Stranraer's Car Ferry Terminal.

Heading aft we entered the original Second Class main lounge which expectedly had lost the original high-backed rows of fixed seating with the luggage racks suspended from the deckhead. This is now the Green Room, fulfilling the role, very much as the name suggests, of a bar where customers can get into the mood prior to heading on to one of the main dance areas. The first of these is just aft, in the shape of 'Angel Street' located in the former Second Class smokeroom. This has a DJ podium off to starboard and central dance floor in addition to the bar counter on the aft bulkhead. This room specialises in 1970s and 1980s music, with the DJ wearing one of those comedy afro wigs and what could well have been a chest wig. We couldn't hold that against him for too long though as he kindly consented to playing the Tuxedo's anthem, "Dancing on the Ceiling/" (otherwise known as "Dancing on the Sealink" for real aficionados...)

Above Angel Street is the chill-out room, the Monte Carlo Bar, which is housed in the original Boat Deck lounge. John Hendy's 1981 biopic of the ship noted that this area originally featured, "floors covered in mottled grey linoleum and was furnished with chocolate covered settees and nasturtium coloured chairs with rafia sides". Alas much has changed, but this is now a relatively pleasant and quiet area where one can get away from the noise of the rest of the ship. This bar leads out directly onto the encircling promenade which is in really excellent condition with much attention obviously lavished on the original teak decking. Right forward, it is possible to descend from this promenade down to the ship's forecastle and admire her forward superstructure, albeit now somewhat compromised by the clutter of various new walkways and canopies. On the uppermost deck, the ship rather unexpectedly has a large selection of the plastic moulded Sealink deck seats which were installed fleet-wide in the late-70s/early 1980s and are a familiar feature on almost all former Sealink ships still sailing from that era.

At about 11pm, there was a deep rumbling in the bowels of the ship and whilst one wished this was the sound of the ship's turbines coming to life prior to departure for Larne, the reality was of course that the main dance area, the Chameleon Club, had opened for business, the revolving dance floor was in action and the music was blaring out. After a slow start, the Chameleon Club gradually filled up, and by midnight it was quite well filled. Once again, the old turntable had been reconditioned, souped up and transformed allowing clubbers to enjoy dancing whilst going round and round. Sitting briefly to one side allowed me to admire a myriad of uncoordinated attempts to step on and off without tripping, falling or otherwise showing oneself up as even remotely affected by drink. Forward of this space was a function room at mezzanine deck level on the starboard side. To port, but sadly locked away in what is now a storeroom but was once the Second class cafeteria, is believed to be a surviving part of one of the original 25 foot long David Gentleman murals installed in this area when the ship was built.

I had expected the Chameleon Club to be the most popular room on board, being not only the largest but also the best-known of the venues the ship has to offer. However, its mix of modern and dance music seemed not to be as much to the taste to the clientele as the retro cheese-fest of Angel Street upstairs. Whilst the Chameleon Club was certainly busy, Angel Street was really packed and this perhaps reflects not only what is actually a rather broad age range in customers (I would say the average was around the 30-year old mark, with a large percentage being well past that mark), but also what they expect and want from a night out on 'the Boat'. And that is by no means anything approaching "hard core"; cheesy music and a good laugh are perhaps more the order of the day and the ship certainly seemed to be scoring highly in that regard.

Jumping into a cab at about a quarter past two, we met with some of the anti-Boat local feelings. "They should take it out to sea and sink it" was our driver's blunt opinion. I really couldn't agree. Of course the CALEDONIAN PRINCESS herself, with her stylish interiors and original purpose has long gone. But in many ways the ship is not much more changed than many a UK ferry which is still operating in Greece or other distant waters. If something had to become a floating nightclub, then this ship is as good a choice as any. The alternative would have been the scrappers and had that been the case myself and anyone else under the age of 30 wouldn't have ever had the opportunity to really remember her. To be denied the chance to walk on that absolutely immaculate boat deck promenade, beneath lifeboats which still said 'CALEDONIAN PRINCESS STRANRAER', to peer into the bridge (now used as a store room), to see that powerful funnel, to stroll the corridors and work out what used to be where in her original guise. This is all much the same that we would do on ships like the EXPRESS SANTORINI, which is about as similar to the CHARTRES as the TUXEDO PRINCESS is to the CALEDONIAN PRINCESS.

Unlike the deathly "preserved" WINGFIELD CASTLE, the TUXEDO PRINCESS today still has a purpose, still makes a good living and is still very much alive. Much as many enthusiasts might bristle at the very idea, she remains just as much a working ship as any which still leaves the quayside. What's more, more people will have had more fun on the ship as a nightclub than will ever have in her career as a ferry when, however stylish, she will have been endured just as any ferry is by seemingly the majority of passengers. Over time she has become an enduring Tyneside icon, albeit one with a love/hate relationship with the locals. Despite the recent hype, I found her to be just a good, fun, relaxed and actually quite tame night out.

Below: Rows of standard Sealink-issue moulded fibreglass deck seating lie out of use on the topmost outside deck. (Cameraphone image courtesy Richard Seville)

Below: The immaculate teak promenade deck. (Cameraphone image courtesy Richard Seville)

Below: In warmer weather, hot food is available from this deck barbeque on the port-side outside promenade. (Cameraphone image courtesy Richard Seville)

Below: The Boat Deck Monte Carlo Bar. (Cameraphone image courtesy Richard Seville)

Below: At the forward end, a section of car deck has not been converted and is in use for storage, retaining its green paint from the Sealink days. (Cameraphone image courtesy Richard Seville)

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