I crossed the English Channel (and southern North Sea) many dozens of timesbut still have memories of one trip. I had a meeting in Calais to attend, with one of the port officials to discuss telephones. The ferry left on time but we were warned it could be an extended crossing time (nominally 75 minutes).

I was in the first class lounge directly under the bridge of the P&O Pride of Calais and had declined a complimentary glass of champagne. The lounge was virtually empty and the stewards all recognised me so they left a radio tuned to Dover's harbour control instead of the usual muzak. As we left the berth the weather was reported as a force 8, a little lumpy but nothing out of the ordinary.

As we reached the harbour entrance it was reported as a force nine and the ship was given an option to abort the crossing and return to the berth. We went onward. A minute later we're out of the harbour and the wind is now classed as force ten, Dover harbour closes automatically when it reached a ten! We're now committed to cross the channel.

It was very lumpy and the crew were kept busy cleaning up frequent mess. I did take a walk down into cattle class once but the smell was not pleasant so I went back to the lounge and read my paper.

I arrived an hour and a half late for my meeting but it went ahead regardless, in French as he spoke no English, taking only about twenty five minutes to conclude, I made it back to the port departure lounge to discover, strangely, no ferries were running. I went up to the bar and found some of my managers who had also gone to Calais for the day. I bullied one of them into paying for me to stay in a hotel that night as I had a further meeting the following afternoon. What he didn;t know was that I had an overnight bag hidden in a locked room for just such an eventuality. I was back in the bar ten minutes later with bag and just needed a lift into town.

Shiraz