Friday 12 July 2013

My Ship Photos II

In my last post I mentioned that I hadn't seen Mein Schiff 1 yet - now I have. She's one of the prettiest cruise ships calling this season, along with Celebrity ships and Aida ships. I saw her briefly on the 10th, and on the next day Aidabella called, making it a first for me to see her as well. The reason why I haven't seen her yet is simple - I haven't got around to it, because she doesn't visit as regularly as her slightly larger fleetmate Aidamar. It's very easy to remember that Monday is Aidamar day.

Mein Schiff 1 (german for My Ship) in all her glory

Finlandia passing by

Finlandia: Oh, are you taking pictures?

Finlandia: Take a picture of me, I'm pretty too!

Finlandia: Grrr get out of the way, I'm prettier than you!
Finlandia: Why were you taking pics of her anyway?

Mein Schiff 1: *sob*

The next day, we had so many ships that it was very hard to take pictures of them all. It was not only a day with lots of cruise ship calls, but also the first ships had already arrived for the upcoming Tallinn Maritime days.

Carnival Legend and Silver Whisper

Carnival Legend

The best I got of Artania

Aidabella

Silver Whisper

Aidabella peeking

Some features on Carnival Legend

Her name is Libava, although we liked to call her Latvian Pride, for obvious reasons

Friday 5 July 2013

My ship photos

In this year, I've been out taking photos of ships around Tallinn a lot. I've also been on some ships (Viking XPRS a few times and Silja Europa once), and that has got me to Helsinki, where I could take pictures of ships we can't see in Tallinn. The first time I went to the beach for the sake of ships was the Estonian Independence day, the 24th of February. In April, the infamous sale of Isabella happened, and she spent a few weeks in Tallinn for maintenance. Later, on the 30th to be exact, the cruise ship season in Tallinn begun with Astor visiting. I didn't go to see her, but I did see MSC Musica the next day. On the 13th of May, my special favourite Aidamar called for the first time. Later on I bought a new camera with great zooming abilities especially to take better photos of ships. By now I've seen all the regulars several times, and quite a nice amount of cruise ships, some of them many times. But I still haven't seen Mein Schiff 1..

Anyway, here's some of my photos.


My special favourite of the regulars, Silja Europa, on the Independence day, all white
Parade of the regulars, seen every day around 6:15 PM
Star model at Tallink HQ
Finlandia and snow in early April
Changing from Isabella to Isabelle. Progress: Isabellæ
Boarding Viking XPRS in late April
Funnel of Viking XPRS
The wide sundeck in the stern
Isabellæ's big nose
Helsinki captures 1 - Silja Serenade
Helsinki captures 2 - Little Suomenlinna boat
Helsinki Captures 3 -  Mariella the Mighty
Helsinki Captures 4 - Serenade's almost identical sister Silja Symphony
Linda Line's Merilin leaving and making waves
Baltic Queen leaving for Stockholm
and Victoria I leaving for Stockholm
The long goodbye between port mates Finlandia and Viking XPRS
Star - 6 crossings a day, two hours on the sea, one hour in port, 7 days a week, almost like a tram
Star's mate Superstar, with a schedule similar to Star's, they meet halfway each time, one coming, other going.
One tiny regular - Juku, the ship to Aegna, who sounds just like a tractor.
Princess Anastasia from St. Petersburg visits once in four days.
She and her sister Mariella are one of the few ships old enough for a bow visor.
Gorgeous as always, Silja Europa arrives to Tallinn to show off  her shiny new letters

 And here's some cruise ships too

MSC Musica, the first cruise ship I saw here
Vision of the seas on 13. May after Aidamar got out of the way
Costa Luminosa a week later, and the mouth of Aidamar as she gets out of the way
Celebrity Constellation - had to sneak out of school to see her (managed to do it legally somehow), and it was totally worth it!
Emerald Princess the same day
and a rear view of Le Boreal
Queen Elizabeth and some local vessels looking at her
Seabourn Sojourn on 20. May
Columbus 2, same day
.. and Azamara Quest
Another Azamara Quest - and if you look carefully, you'll see Viking XPRS too.
A quick picture of the departing Arcadia taken before school from a nearby beach, 1. July
Same day, same time, different ship - Marina
Early morning of 3. July, MSC Poesia moving in.
When MSC Poesia arrived, Norwegian Star wasn't in sight yet, but she was  already blocking the view when first people  finally got off MSC Poesia. From far away, the pink spark on her bow looks a bit like a mouth.
Ryndam, who parked between Superstar and Silja Europa

Should I mention that when we were there to watch them arrive in the morning, none of them came anytime near the scheduled time? All arrived at around the same time, either very early or very late.

Big fat Aidamar watching little Black Watch go