Hurricane Hutch’s Top 10 Ships of the Clyde

Funny, sad and enlightening: ‘Hurricane Hutch’s Top 10 Ships of the Clyde’ is as much social history as it is a book about ships and shipping. Captain Robin Hutchison’s unique personal perspective on an era fast fading from memory. Robin became one of the youngest captains to serve on the Firth of Clyde. This book is a wry look at life on the Clyde – an insiders perspective on the river, its people and its ships. Always fascinated with ships Robin first ran away to sea aged 9 during the Second World War. His parents eventually sent him to Nautical College and he then spent 10 years deep sea, sailing to the Far East, Australia and New Zealand, Africa, the Mediterranean and South America, before finally returning to the Clyde in the late 50’s. He rose to become one of Cal Mac’s most senior and respected ‘skippers’. His last command was as relief Master of the luxury cruise ship Hebridean Princess – a ship he first captained when it was the Cal Mac ship Columba. In picking his personal ‘Top 10’ Robin also charts the changes he saw over nearly 40 years. His time on the Clyde saw the iconic Clyde paddle and turbine steamers such as Jeannie Deans, Caledonia, Waverley and Queen Mary, and their complex interlinking network of day cruises, gradually give way to the ‘point to point’ domination of the more functional car ferries such as the Caledonian Isles and Jupiter. In one infamous period he captained 19 separate vessels in a single 3 week rota, so there is not a ship, nor a pier, he didn’t know.