Baltic Holidays - Day 6 - Day at Sea 2

Another day at sea so not too much to shoot except the sea and any weather that might be happening over it but to be honest.
I find the sea rarely disappoints for impressive views.

Some stormy weather off in the distance.

Time for sunset!

A very wide Panorama. 

I enjoyed a lot of the above photos were fun to snap. the sky was filled with colours. Trying to capture them whilst considering composition and framing, camera settings and such. I'm quite happy with them as a result however I started to identify a problem at this point, It is most noticable in the following shot.

Notice the blotches on the cloud?
Sadly this was not dust on the lens but a defect with my brand new Nikon D600. I'll make a post about this later but it became a nuisance which i wasn't to identify until much later.

Finally! My favourite bit!

I set up my camera at the window of our cabin and captured the following timelapse.

Baltic Holidays - Day 5

... and now we're in Helsinki, Finland.

The weather was not good so not too many shots in Helsinki itself we just looked around really. Most notable place we visited was the Rock Church or Temppeliaukio Church.

I only took a couple of shots inside but it was a very nice building. Also a very busy building.

We then wondered around a bit just to see the area. It rained most of the time but it stopped when we discovered these guys.

Dino-babies!

Apparently they're Angel-Demon babies as sculped by AES-F group.
I'd like to have seen more but weather and time did not allow.

The next set were shot as we left port.

Little boat in our giant ships wake...

Baltic Holidays - Day 4 - Germany/Schwerin

Guten Tag!

Today we're in Germany, docked in a town called Warnemunde.
Most folks get the train to Berlin, (long train journey), do some shopping and come back again at great risk of missing the ship, we however will be visiting a place called Schwerin and having a poke in and around it's castle.

This involved a two stage train trip and a walk through the very pleasant town of Schwerin.
Here's a few shots from that walk.

We had to walk around a lake which I can't believe I haven't got a shot of as it really sets the scene for how picturesque a town this is.

The next set of shots are from the castle and it's grounds. (We didn't go inside until it started raining)

The two heads above were carved into the bases of the lamp-posts that ran along the sides of the bridge that was crossed to approach the castle.

A bit more of one of the lamp-posts above with the castle entrance behind it.
Something about the faces captured my attention I'm not sure what but I found them very photogenic.

The castle entrance in more detail. (In truth I can't remember if this was the front or the back entrance of the castle but it's definately a main approach.)

I hope that captures a feeling for some of what the exterior is like.
What I haven't really communicated is how the castle sits n the middle of a lake, accessed by a bridge. It's surrounded by colourful gardens and even a cave riddled, rocky out-crop.

The following shots are interiors. I'm 50/50 on how interesting these will be...

It's a beautiful castle well worth a visit.

Shortly after we scampered off into town and had lunch + ice cream sundaes before catching the train back to  Warnemunde. We looked around a bit and rode on the ferris wheel, there were several markets selling various touristy things and beer, of course... Germany remember.

Here are some snaps I got before we boarded the ship.

A sand sculpture near the visitor centre. There's a few of these.

Some weather off of the Warnemunde docks.

Before we left this Cruise Ship departed. (The Emerald Princess)
It wasn't until I reviewed the shot in post that I realized there was something going on below deck.

I'm not going to say anything, i'll leave you to come to your own conclusions...

... and then it was gone, shortly followed by ourselves.