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Back in the mid to late 1990's and early 2000's Chris Coburn and myself with a well organized crew undertook some remarkable cruises aboard NB "Progress" reaching parts of the waterway system seldom boated or accessed. This involved coastal and sea passages for "Progress" which had been built and adapted for this type of cruising. We arrived in many unusual destinations, got into the odd sticky situation but managed as the intent was to raise the awareness of little used, endangered or not easy to reach navigations. In 1998 we undertook a cruise to Caernarfon exiting the canal system via the Mersey and then coast hopping to the Menai Strait through which we accessed Caernarfon, the cruise was an entire success and we promoted the plight then of the Lichfield & Hatherton canals. On our return run we did the Conway, the full Mersey and even the Sankey. Then we headed to Birkenhead. Here our mooring proved a little unusual! The only place to tie up was to HMS Onyx, a "Oberon" class submarine. It wasn't easy, plus to dis embark we had to get over the submarine and then up onto HMS Plymouth and onto the dock. All this was rather fun and we had a great stay there. The ships were part of the "Historic Warship Trust" and had the German U Boat U534 on the dockside for company. "Plymouth" was the scene of the Falklands war surrender and Onyx the only diesel powered sub to fight in the Falklands. For any visitor it was a great day out. Sadly to cut the story short the adjacent buildings were to be converted into apartment and the HWT were asked to find another berth. The trust went into liquidation. The ships became assets of the Mersey Docks and Harbour board. Peel Holdings took over the Mersey Docks and Harbour board. An attempt to form a trust and get HMS Plymouth preserved in Millbay docks failed, despite the ship being host to the Argentine surrender in the Falklands war!! HMS Onyx was taken to Barrow in Furness where she was set up as a museum ship, this too foundered and hope was that she would go to Greenock where most of her class had been built, This failed too. The U boat has been cut into four parts and is mounted dockside in Birkenhead, very sad as the overall impression of the shape of the boat is lost. As for the other two, HMS Plymouth was sold to a Turkish ship breaker in October and is now cut up. HMS Onyx suffered the same fate in Rosneath last month, From those photos only Chris Coburn;s "Progress" now survives. Should we treat our National heritage like this?