Day Nine
0100-0400 No sea or swell overcast and calm
Now approaching Firth of Clyde as Ailsa Craig is sighted. The weather remains overcast and calm.
0430 Pladda Light is abeam to port. Pladda Lighthouse is an active 18th century light, at the southern end of the island of Pladda, off the Isle of Arran. The tower is 95 feet high and there are 128 steps to the top. Light keepers were withdrawn in 1990 when the lighthouse was automated and it is now remotely monitored from the Northern Lighthouse Boards Headquarters in Edinburgh.
0730-0800 tug shortening tow.
1020 Cumbrae Light, set on a low raised beach at the southern end of the island of Little Cumbrae, seen abeam to starboard. There is much tidying and preparation to do. Stowaways depart ship for shore.
Preparing to enter port, mooring and heaving lines being made ready and decks washed down. Vessel accompanied by Christopher Mason in his yacht.
1200 Noon 55° 50'N; 04° 56'W
1353 Cloch Lighthouse, a shore-based feature with distinctive crow-stepped gables, is now abeam to starboard. We are nearing the entrance to the Clyde.
1425 Pilot Robertson now on board tug, ready for the entrance to the river. The harbour tugs Boojum Bay and Puncher from Greenock are in attendance.
1505 Tug Boojum Bay made fast and swung aft
1520 Entering James Watt Dock to welcome from family, associates and spectators.
1550 All fast in dock and tugs dismissed
1600 After 1380 nautical miles at an average speed of 7.17knots, tug Wallasey commences unrigging towing gear: and departs immediately for Swansea.
The return of Galatea to the River Clyde, close to where she was launched at Port Glasgow and named Glenlee in December 1896, from Seville, Spain has taken 8 days 7 hours and 50 minutes-or ninety seven years!