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Everyone, it seems, has a Steam Packet story to tell.

We were having a wonderful week on the edge of the Lake District. The sun was out and it was warm and spring like.

Our caravan break was a mixture of walks with the dogs and enjoying the Cheltenham Festival on the television.

We also visited Carnforth railway station where there is a special tribute to the wartime classic Brief Encounter which was partly filmed there in early 1945.

Absolutely well worth a visit by the way. It is really a well-run little gem - and you can watch the film for free, although you can leave a donation, in a special little ‘cinema’ at the station.

Anyhow, all was going smoothly until Thursday morning when we came in from a walk and were settling downto scrutinising the Cheltenham race card for the third day of the festival.

A surprise text message came through - our first and only one of a week in which we had been happily and mercifully free of so-called ‘devices’.

It was from the Steam Packet announcing that our afternoon sailing from Heysham the next day (Friday) faced possible cancellation. We would have liked to think it was from the captain himself, as that would have increased the drama.

We jumped into action, packed our bags and rang the ‘Packet’ in the hope we would get on that afternoon’s sailing. There was no space.

But we were able to book the overnight 02.15 Friday sailing. We were a bit worried about how bad the storm would be in the early hours and whether we were doing the right thing.

We arrived at Heysham at 01.00 and indeed the wind had picked up.

Everyone from the Packet was very good and getting us all on. It was clear there were people there like us whose breaks had been cut short.

Clutching our pillows from the car we hastily went up to the passenger deck only to be told there were no cabins available.

I was not ready for this grim news and proceeded to pace up and down the passenger areas looking for sanctuary where we might be able to get some shut eye.

The boat was already moving and edging out of Lancashire when out of the blue our ‘saviour’ emerged.

A lovely member of the Steam Packet staff asked if we were the people who had asked about a cabin earlier.

He announced that a cabin had become available.

It was a Godsend!

We paid him the £67 which was round about what I had won backing Special Tiara, the winner of the Queen Mother Champion Chase at that world famous horse racing event in Gloucestershire.

I think our saviour was Irish and we spoke briefly about Cheltenham with him and his female colleague before gratefully retiring to the comfort of our cabin.

Weighing everything up we were glad we managed to get home on that 02.15 sailing because the Friday sailings were indeed cancelled because of the weather.

We would no doubt have been facing accommodation problems and a trip to Birkenhead at the weekend.

And there was a silver lining! It meant we were back home on Friday afternoon and able to watch the full glory of the final day’s superb racing at Cheltenham.

And we backed the winner of the Gold Cup, Sizing John.

Oh and my husband had some good news after cockling his left foot during the English break.

He went along to A&E at Nobles on Saturday morning where an x-ray revealed nothing more serious than heavy bruising.

Patricia Foulkes, Spaldrick, Port Erin

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I have only two questions about the commemorative real time re-enactment of the Battle of the Somme in Station Road, Port Erin.

1. How can it take six months to replace a little over 100 metres of road and pavement?

2. How can a drastic reduction in car parking spaces for the shopping centre be described as ‘regeneration of the village’?

Lorna MacKellar, Meadowfield, Port Erin

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I booked a return flight with City Wing from Belfast to the Isle of Man out on June 1 and return on June 6. I booked this in January and it cost £158.

On March 12 I got an email from City Wing to say they had gone into liquidation and my flight was cancelled.

Eastern Airlines have taken over the route but will not honour my booking. They say they have taken over the route but not City Wing. What I have to do is make a claim for my money and book and pay for a new booking with Eastern Airlines.

I looked at their website and for the same dates for one person return to Belfast the cost is £408. In my view a total rip off. My wife and can go to New York and back for less!

John Scott, Bushmills, Co Antrim

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Once again those in charge of the MER have excelled themselves.

The new station lay-out in Ramsey is now in place and in use. It was quietly laid out over the winter and opened without fuss on March 9.

No wonder there was no fanfare. It’s awful.

Trams abandon their passengers on a gravel platform, not very wheelchair/pushchair friendly, with no shelter, nowhere to buy a ticket or get information, and not even a bench or loos. The area is not even safe. If several people lean on the plastic fencing it gives way, and there’s a drop on the other side.

Shunting in Laxey station was deemed too risky with passengers about, yet a much more difficult and badly-designed shunt, in a more enclosed site, on a steeper hill seems to be acceptable for Ramsey.

And talking about the steeper incline – have they learned nothing from the Snaefell runaway disaster?

Buffer stops for Ramsey trams are a chained-down sleeper and a large (empty) flower planter. They probably could stop a runaway tram but not before it had gone through the fence and half-way across Parsonage Road.

There is a perfectly good, purpose-built station in Ramsey, standing empty apart from bewildered passengers. Rather than pander to the whims of architects who are now out of business, and developers who still lack planning permission, why don’t the MER powers-that-be have the courage to leave things alone. ‘If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ should be the motto of such a valuable heritage railway.

And don’t waffle on about the Ramsey arrangement being a temporary terminus. So’s Derby Castle and look how long that’s been in use.

The director of public transport appears to have learned nothing in his years in tenure, but he could at least avoid repeating the same disastrous mistakes.

Sara Goodwins, Dreemskerry Hill, Maughold