Royal Yacht Britannia, Edinburgh

I’m standing at the stern of the ship on the ‘verandah deck’, a large space with a 2 inch thick teak floor, formerly used for games of quoits and deck hockey and painting. Above my head a Union Jack flutters gently in the easterly wind, bringing with it the scent of fuel from the nearby docks. It’s freezing cold and the sky is gunmetal grey. 

A sun lounge opens on to the deck, and inside are bamboo chairs, walls panelled in teak and a well-stocked drinks cabinet. You can easily imagine someone sitting here fifty years ago, watching bronzed sunbathers stretched out on the deck through the open sash windows, or sipping a glass of champagne as the yacht cruised through the azure waters of the Pacific or the Caribbean. 

Those glamorous days are long gone though. Now the five-decked ship with its royal insignia and deep blue hull is attached to a struggling shopping mall in the north of Edinburgh. Within a 500 metre radius there are two unsightly blue and yellow tower blocks and a flour mill, as well as a number of down-at-heel streets. Royal Yacht Britannia looks utterly out of place. 

Queen Elizabeth travelled the world on Britannia for over 40 years. Befitting a ship of such size, it had an enormous crew of 220 yachtsmen and 20 officers. It truly belongs to another era. Indeed, some aspects of life on board seem barely believable now. For instance, the petty officers (and, I suppose, other yachtsmen) slept in hammocks until 1970, the same year the crew’s rum ration was eliminated. The Queen was accompanied by 45 attendants when the boat was used for official state visits, and took 5 tonnes of luggage on board with her. Yes, 5 tonnes. Pompously, menus for dinner were printed in French, and it took 3 hours to set the very long dinner table.

I learn these intriguing titbits from the audioguide which is included in the steep £14 ticket price. The man performing the description sounds as though he could be a member of the royal family himself. Prince Philip, he remarks, wanted a ‘mah-sculine cabin, although he somehow ended up with a tiny single bed. You could go your whole life without meeting someone who speaks in this fashion.    

As I walk round, passing thickly carpeted staircases and rooms decorated with mementoes of past voyages like a whale rib bone and a Swedish broadsword forged in 1738, I can’t help thinking that working on board must have been intolerable. The verandah deck, for instance, was scrubbed daily with sea water by junior yachtsmen. These unfortunates were obliged to work in silence, ‘so that the royal family was not disturbed’. Indeed, were a sailor to find himself in the presence of one of these exalted individuals, he was to ‘stand absolutely still and look straight ahead until they had passed’. 

Britannia certainly offers an intriguing insight into the past, and has considerable snob value. Then again, do you really want to spend 14 quid to view innumerable pictures of Prince Charles?