I fell in love with an old derelict

Oct 29 2007 by Peter Elson, Liverpool Daily Post

The expression tug-of-love has a new meaning for drama teacher Cathy Roberts, who has sailed her new home half-way around Britain to Liverpool. Peter Elson reports

CATHY has come home. A drama teacher by profession, few theatrical events could match her own idiosyncratic arrival in Liver-pool. While love at first sight is not unknown, to fall so hard for a semi-derelict tug-boat puts you in a class of your own.

Not only that, but a tug-boat stranded far from home on the other side of the country, deepest Yorkshire.

But, as they say, love will find a way. Albeit, in this case, a rather long-winded way to unite the star-crossed lovers at their future permanent berth in Albert Dock, Liverpool, where Cathy Roberts, 43, will live aboard.

Sadly, no amount of dieting (or metalwork surgery for that matter) would slim-down the loved one sufficiently to squeeze through the Leeds and Liverpool Canal.

Instead, Cathy had to stack her victuals, splice her mainbrace and start the engine for a round- Britain voyage aboard the former River Weaver Navigation maintenance tug, France-Hayhurst.

All this was done after completing the tug’s refurbishment into seaworthy condition that met with the stringent Maritime & Coastguard Agency regulations.

After a voyage of 11 days (plus stops) and around 1,500 miles, chugging along at six knots through the North Sea, Caledonian Canal and Irish Sea in the face of truly, deeply, filthy weather, the 65ft-long tug finally made it back to the Mersey.

Cathy’s mother, Geraldine Roberts, and her sister, Carole, were on the Liverpool quayside to watch her momentous arrival at Canning Dock.

“I’m very proud of what she’s done, she’s got a very adventurous streak,” says Geraldine.

Carole adds: “Mind you, she’s always been a bit quirky – but lovely with it.”

Geraldine says: “I think this is the first circumnavigation of Britain by any female member of the family, although my father, Capt Francis Darby, worked here for Coast Lines.”

During her working life, France-Hayhurst’s ownership passed from the River Weaver Navigation trustees to Manchester Ship Canal, and then British Waterways, as an inspection launch and tug.

Curiously, the tug switched to and fro between the contrary roles of mundanely towing dredger hopper barges and carrying canal top brass to inspect their empire, quaffing glasses of Pimms under a foredeck awning.

BUILT in 1937-8, by Yarwood’s of Northwich, she was named after Weaver Navigation trust chairman Col William France-Hayhurst. After retirement, the tug was bought by a private owner who died. While abandoned at Knostrop, near Leeds, on the River Aire, arsonists set the vessel alight and she sank.

Raised by new owners for conversion into a diving school support ship, this plan was shelved in favour of trans-formation into a house-boat, but, while only partly completed, France-Hayhurst was put on the market again.

“That’s when I found her in September, 2005. I’d been looking for a boat for a while and I fell in love,” says Cathy, who discovered the tug for sale on internet auction site Ebay.

Love can hurt, though, and the price tag for this affair was £47,000, plus a further £25,000 to finish the conversion into a floating mobile home that can also venture out into the river and sea.

The tug's original build cost was £4,565. However, her value is now nudging £100,000.

Cathy is adamant France-Hayhurst was worth remortgaging and selling up her land-bound house to make her dream come true.

“I’ve been trying to get the tug back here for a year and just whenever you thought everything was finished, other set-backs occurred, practical and bureaucratic.

“Luckily, I had a fantastic carpenter working for me. I knew it would be worth it, as this is a unique boat.”

During her British Waterways years, France-Hayhurst’s original Crossley diesel engine was replaced with a trusty Lister six-cylinder 138hp engine which powered her back to the Mersey.