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.

Baltic Holidays - Day 3 - Denmark

Day three of the Baltic Cruise aboard the Carnival Legend and we've arrived at a new country.

T'is Copenhagen Denmark.
Pictured above is THE little mermaid of legend. The shot is very touristy, there was a hundred or so people crowding it so I just grabbed the clearest shot I could snag just so I could say I saw it.

A somewhat less clear shot... Less said the better really!

The next few shots are from the Journey made from the Cruise ship to our target destination. Tivoli Gardens!

The window of a stone mason(I guess) shop.

And then... a little late and a little tired from a longer than anticipated walk, we've arrived at the theme park of theme parks, the park that inspired Disney himself. Tivoli Gardens.

It's quite a lot like a Disney theme park but, sort of, in miniature or compacted, the coaster rides are fun and there are some crazy vertigo inducing rides too. There are a couple of spots where there is some old, stale looking 60's/80's-"modern"-block-building  looking boring amongst well kept gardens and themed rides but it was a pleasant day out for the family.
I only snagged a few shots as, much like Disney, you have to move fast to get your moneys worth out of the park but also the ship was only docked for a few hours and the park itself only opened at 11. As usual, the family photos are not included here, just the couple I took of random stuff.

I understand that representing Copenhagen's Tivoli Gardens almost entirely with shots of the China-Town themed section of the park might be confusing... but I'm alright with that.

On exiting the park the plan was to grab a bus and/or taxi back to the ship, however due to roadworks outside the park, not speaking the local language and an absence of taxis we were unable to do any of those things, we were able to find a chap riding a cycle-rickshaw.

So it was that we ended up being ferried past all the sights and sounds of Copenhagen, we otherwise would've missed, as we darted between other tourists all whilst listening to our "drivers" radio that played such hit tunes as The Final Countdown by Europe.
There's nothing quite like riding past a few hundred people in a moderately-faster-than-walking-speed, open-air vehicle whilst cheesy 80's music is played loudly!


Anyway once back on board we tried to relax a bit.

A shot of the Harbour we were docked at.

The next few shots are something I always do when possible.
When cruise ships, or I imagine any large ship, is harboured and needs to pull away from a dock they have to displace an awful lot of water. A crazy amount I'm sure. I suspect they have huge pumps specifically for the purpose of moving water from one side of the ship to the side the dock is on.

Anyway, when the lighting is right and the water is being moved in the massive volume such as it is I like to take some high contrast shots and play with the saturation/white-balance a bit.
As a result you can get some great textures.

As we pulled away we were stalked by sea birds.

I don't do much bird photography but gave it a whirl.

Bye bye Copenhagen.

That's me, reflected in the cabin window, with Copenhagen and it's weather behind me.

The sun shines down through the incoming rain clouds.

Baltic Holiday - Day 2

Day two on the ship was a day at sea and elegant night.

Not many shots to post as we spent most of the day exploring the ship, which includes me not thinking to lug the camera round with me... Any once I thought to carry it around with me again I got the following:

The obligatory "Look at our drinks!" shot that every set of holiday photos must include...

The next three shots were just an experiment.

I've been itching for some star photos for weeks and never expected to be able to grab any on-board the ship or during the trip but thankfully, due to the previous trip to Norway where I, by chance, grabbed a shot that I regretted not exploring further,  I brought my tripod along anyway and tried a few exposures out...

Naturally I set up the camera for a timelapse to see what results I could get for future nights.
Here is the resulting animation.

Baltic Holiday Day 1

Today my family and I went on holiday to the Baltic sea on the Carnival Cruise Ship, Legend.
The next 12'ish days there will be posts of some of the snaps I've taken whilst on this holiday, do not be surprised if they are not a consistent theme.

The destinations on the itinerary are Finland, Denmark, Russia, Estonia, Germany and Amsterdam but we start with Dover as this is the port we leave from.

The following shots are from the balcony of our cabin. Looking out over Dover and it's white cliffs.
I've never been to Dover in my memory before.

... the last sight of the white cliffs as we make our way to the Baltic.

And finally the first sunset of the holiday, Dover has long gone behind us and now the last light is blinking out.