Beautiful images of the Norwegian passenger ship FINNMARKEN arriving Cape Town in new cruising white colours in the morning of 13 February 2010.
It seems Hurtigruten (www.hurtigruten.com) has adopted the old tradition of repainting their passenger ships in tropical white when sent cruising, just like Bergen Line used to do with the METEOR of 1955 and also with their classic VENUS of 1931 in the final seasons, when the traditional black hull and funnels gave way to all white hulls and yellow funnels...
Photos taken and kindly shared by Ian Shiffman of Cape Town. See more of his photographs at the Table Bay Underway Shipping site here. Ian has one of the largest passenger ships photos collection in the world.
Texto /Text copyright L.M.Correia. For other posts and images, check our archive at the right column of the main page. Click on the photos to see them enlarged. Thanks for your visit and comments. Luís Miguel Correia
Hurtigruten doesn't paint ships white when they do cruise service away from the normal Hurtigruten schedule. When NORDNORGE and NORDKAPP did Antarctic cruises, they retained the normal colour scheme with black hull and white superstructure, and so did MIDNATSOL (or was it TROLLFJORD? I do not remember) when it did cruises in the Mediterranean. FRAM, which is on permanent cruise service, also has black hull and white superstructure. FINNMARKEN is not going cruising, she is going to Australia where she will spend 18 months (with an option for another 18 months) as an accomodation ship for a mining company.
ReplyDeleteFinnmarken is hired to an australian oil company for use as a lodging/hotel ship for a period of 3 years with an option for further 3 years extension. She is for the contract period to be oparated by an australian affiliate of Hurtigruten and is painted white as a it is convenient to have a white hull in tropical waters. Otherwise all Hurtigruten vessels have black hulls, even when used in cruising activities (like Fram and Nordsjernen). Regards, J.M.Holmen, Bergen, Norway.
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