The £26m Royal Daffodil, built in Birkenhead, sailed on 22 September. Its first public cruise is Saturday by ballot, with passenger service later this autumn.
The first new Mersey ferry in more than 60 years was named and sailed on Tuesday, and it was built on the Wirral side of the river. What it did not do was carry a single commuter from Seacombe.
The £26m Royal Daffodil made its maiden voyage on Tuesday 22 September, after a naming ceremony at the Gerry Marsden Ferry Terminal (Merseytravel). Liverpool City Region Mayor Steve Rotheram was joined by the Minister for Aviation, Maritime and Logistics, Keir Mather MP, and the host Claire Sweeney.
The ceremony ran to the old form. Sea Cadets welcomed the guests, the vessel was blessed, a ceremonial bottle was broken against the hull, and tugs saluted her on the river as she went out. Pleasant Street Primary School Choir and Liverpool Show Choir sang.
Among the guests were representatives of the Birkenhead shipyard that built her. Merseytravel’s account names it as “Wirral’s Cammell Laird shipyard, now named Balaena Birkenhead”.
When you can actually get on it
This is the part the ceremony coverage skips, so here it is plainly.
- Saturday 26 September: the first public cruise. Places went by free ballot, not sale. 68 winners each received four places, so about 272 people will be aboard (Merseytravel, 12 August).
- Later this autumn: the planned introduction into passenger service. Merseytravel has published no date beyond that.
- Until then: the existing fleet runs every sailing, including the Seacombe commuter service.
So if you cross the river to work each morning, Tuesday changed nothing about your journey yet.
Built here, over three years
The boat is a Birkenhead product, and the timeline is on Mersey Ferries’ own pages.
Mayor Rotheram signed the £26m contract with Cammell Laird in December 2023. The keel was laid at the Birkenhead yard in early 2025, and Rotheram named the vessel Royal Daffodil at that ceremony. She first went onto the Mersey for sea trials in April 2026 (Mersey Ferries).
The exterior keeps the fleet’s historic red, white and black livery. Underneath, it is a different machine. The Royal Daffodil runs on diesel-electric propulsion with highly manoeuvrable drives, which Merseytravel’s own marine operations manager describes as requiring crews to learn entirely new ways of operating (Merseytravel, 7 August).
What passengers will notice is more ordinary and probably more useful:
- an onboard lift between decks, plus two staircases
- USB charging points at seats
- baby changing facilities
- dedicated cycle parking on the main deck
- adjustable panoramic windows in the main-deck lounge
- an open upper viewing deck with timber bench seating
Catering will be run by Crosby Fresh, the local business that operates the Discovery Café at Seacombe Ferry Terminal.
The Wirral side of the story
Cllr Paula Basnett, leader of Wirral Council, was among those quoted at the ceremony. “Built here in Birkenhead, the new vessel is a showcase for Wirral’s long-standing maritime and shipbuilding traditions,” she said.
The celebration, though, lands at a terminal Wirral no longer has. Woodside Ferry Terminal has had no sailings since October 2022, when it closed for an £8.6m upgrade funded through Wirral Council’s Levelling Up allocation. Mersey Ferries announced in March 2024 that it was “set to reopen from summer 2025”, after work to install a new landing stage and linkspan bridge (Mersey Ferries).
That was more than a year ago. Woodside still appears on the commuter timetable as a row with no times against it, and it is not listed among the terminals on Mersey Ferries’ Find Us page. We could not find a revised reopening date published anywhere.
Seacombe went the other way. It reopened in October 2022 after a modernisation backed by £7m from the Combined Authority, and it is now the only Wirral terminal with sailings.
What it means for you
- You cannot book a place on Saturday’s cruise. It was a free ballot that closed before the ceremony, and the 68 winners have already been drawn.
- Your commute is unchanged for now. The direct cross-river service still runs from Seacombe every 20 minutes, 07:20 to 09:40 and 17:00 to 18:40, Monday to Friday, on the existing fleet. The crossing takes 10 minutes.
- One evening is already cancelled. There is no evening commuter ferry on Thursday 1 October (Mersey Ferries).
- Fares, if you are thinking of switching from the tunnel: £3.10 single and £4.20 return for an adult, £1.60 and £2.10 for a child aged 5 to 18, £11.50 for a six-journey Flexi, £68 for a month and £171 for a quarter.
- Parking is free at Seacombe in the rear car park if you hold a Flexi, monthly or quarterly commuter ticket.
- If you drive instead, the resident tunnel toll is £1.60 with a T-FLOW account against £2.40 cash. Our roadworks and travel page has the current closures and the full toll table.
What we could not confirm
Merseytravel has not published a date for the Royal Daffodil entering passenger service, beyond “later this autumn”, and has not said which route it will work first. Nor has it said whether the existing vessels stay in the fleet alongside it. We will update this page when a date is published.
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