Prince of Wales pub excursion

Can anyone help identify when and where this photograph was taken?  Ellen English found the picture amongst her late husband’s family photos, but apart from knowing that it was an excursion of gentlemen from the Prince of Wales public house there is no other infomation.  It would appear that the group are on a boat/ship, there’s a lifeboat davit behind them and in the foreground there’s a back-to-back seat with what appears to be a life preserving float underneath, these are all typically found on ferries and large pleasure boats.  Do you recognise anyone in the photo or know where they were going? Looking at the clothes that they are wearing it could have been in the late forties or early fifties but that is just a guess.