The series suffered the tragic loss of its leading actor when Maurice Colbourne, who played Tom Howard, died of a heart attack in 1989, during a pause in filming of season 5, aged just 49. Episodes of the fifth season were hurriedly rewritten to explain the character's absence before finally killing him off at the beginning of the sixth and final season. The sixth season was made to wrap up all the storylines from the previous season and bring closure to the series.
Stephen Yardley and Jan Harvey started a relationship while working on the series and got married. They were also involved in promoting the DVD release many years later by recording commentaries and giving interviews.
The original working title for the series was "The Boatbuilders".
Kate O'Mara described the series as "wonderful escapist television". She enjoyed making it because she knew Tony Anholt and Jan Harvey, who had both worked on Triangle (1981), and she described Stephen Yardley as "divine".
The theme tune for the series was reworked (with lyrics by Don Black) into a ballad "Always There", performed by Marti Webb over the closing titles of each episode during the second series in 1986. The song later made it to the top twenty in the charts.