About

ButeBlog is very simple.

It has one purpose, to allow information about Bute to be posted on a casual and intermittent basis, and then commented on or discussed, should anyone wish to.

Simple.

Pioneer

The Pioneer signature remembers MV Pioneer, one of the most popular car ferries to serve on the Clyde, along with the three Streakers (MVs Juno, Jupiter and Saturn), and the first of the group to be retired from service in 2003.

MV Juno appears to have joined MV Pioneer in retiral. Having completed relief duties for MV Bute (due to harbour works at Rothesay) on an extended Passenger Certificate, she left Rothesay with three blasts of her horn at 15:15 on April 21, 2007 (the same day the certificate expired), bound for Gourock, then Rosneath. On April 26, it was reported that her four-legged mainmast had been removed, probably signalling the end of her 33 year service.

As of works at Rothesay in 2008, the side-loading operations of the Streakers came to an end with the removal of the side-loading ramps on the pier, and the installation of an end-loading linkspan.