trips by pleasure boat to scroby sands

My Mum and Dad took me on a trip on the Norwich Belle around 1962 when I was about 8, when we were on Holiday in Yarmouth.  The sea that day was so incredibly rough, that I (and just about everybody on the boat) thought we were going to go down.  It started the moment we went over the harbour bar, and we were just sliding in the troughs.  As young as I was I can remember the boat lurching almost horizontal to the water then sliding straight up in the opposite direction.  The captain told my dad that he had been doing that trip for around 20 years and this was the roughest he'd ever seen it.  We had to turn back, there were people sliding all over the decks, glasses and crates being smashed downstairs, and naturally people being ill in the traditional way.  When we were arrived back I remember seeing around 5 ambulances along the quay side.  I have been on many cruises on large cruise ships since and have been in some horrendous weather, particularly in the Bay of Biscay, but nothing has come close to this!  That day there was us, the Eastern Princess, and I think the Golden Galleon, neither of which were faring any better than us.  How on earth these boats were ever allowed out in the North Sea is beyond me!  I recall my dad roping me to something to stop me flying overboard.

I too remember the sea trips in this little boat, although at the time being only 5/6? Out looked like a big battleship to me! Mum, dad myself and my sister used to go to yarmouth every year, first two weeks in sept to cheekily extend our six week holiday to eight! Going on the Norwich belle was just one of the highlights of such brilliant holidays, I remember approaching the quayside looking for her distinctive bunting hoping it was her and not "golden galleon" (for some reason I felt loyal to the belle?!" I also remember that dad also very much looked forward to going on her , though I suspect that this may have something to do with the onboard bar! I was born in 1975 so can only have been six at the most the last time I went on her but yet still remember those trips. Dad Sadly passed away suddenly in 1995 and I never got the chance to say thank you so much for those holidays as they must have been such a struggle to afford. Mum also passed away suddenly this year (2014) but I always made sure we had time for a chat about holidays and all the fond memories, so hopefully she knew we loved those times.