Picture Postcard, from...where, Southampton??

This is the nearest I'm going to get to a Caribbean Cruise (or any other cruise, for that matter!)

Ventura is docked here in Southampton's Ocean Terminal, as I overlook Town Quay Marina. Queen Mary 2 is through the masts, head-on to us, so look in LARGE to find her.

Another cruise liner, The Independence of the Seas was berthed to the right of where I am here and it soon slowly passed by, off out, with all its passengers excitedly stood on deck, looking forward to wherever they were going, though it made me chuckle as it is probably as warm here as it is to their destiny! I had then moved on to my long telezoom, picking out details, plus the Isle of Wight ferry was also overtaken, and over-loomed by the Independence...

So, a glorious day, a £9.90 return train ticket to Southampton is a lot cheaper than a cruise and I always get lots of good wideangle shots, especially around the Port areas. This was the first time I had taken the new(ish) Nikkor 10-24mm (used for this shot, at 10mm) to Southampton and the blue skies really suited the polariser used.

I specifically chose to edit as a high-contrast image, too eek out that in-your-face postcard glossiness. I did shoot this at the long end of the zoom also (eqv to 36mm in 35mm terms, so still wideangle) but in the end I chose this for its quirkiness and unusualness and to encompass that great big blue sky.

Many thanks to all who favourited, commented, viewed etc my Bournemouth Pier at Dusk blip of yesterday; right now it is in the no. 3 slot of the Spotlights. I am very grateful to all!

So, I hope you all had a thoroughly excellent 'hottest day of the year' and hope that it continues tomorrow. I also hope you enjoy my 'Carribean' shot on the south coast in the meantime.