Qing Ping Shan

During the month of December, we have struggled with lighting: either it is too late when we finally find the time, or the weather as been un-cooperative.
You can get an idea partly from the bright red of the port side light near the bridge: it shines quite nicely in the low light conditions we face this time of year.

There's no one on deck despite the rather balmy 15C temperature.
And it looks like Coast Guard #6 is headed south at the same time.



Name: Qing Ping Shan
Heading: North/Black Sea
Type: Carrier
Flag: Hong Kong
Date: 27 Dec 2017
Weather: warm winter evening

Bright Ocean II

Winter. the best we can do at this time of day is a dark, hazy image.
The ships ... they come and go regardless of the weather.
We .. catch what we can ... light permitting ...




Name: Bright Ocean II
Heading: South / Marmara
Type:  Carrier
Flag: Panama
Date: 20 Dec 2017
Weather: clear & cold

Amazon

This one is going to have to go somewhat un-identified:
There are many, many Amazons out there but none of them in the AIS database seem to match this one.
Pretty clearly <cargo>
Equally clearly headed north to the Black Sea.



Name: Amazon
Heading: North/Black Sea
Type: Carrier
Flag: ???
Date: 13 Dec 2017
Weather: fall evening

DS Sofie Bulker

Name: DS Sofie Bulker
Heading: North/Black Sea
Type: Carrier
Flag: Marshall Islands
Date: 09 Dec 2017
Weather: fall evening with a strong south wind

Concord

Name: Concord
Heading: North/Black Sea
Type: Tanker
Flag: Marshall Islands
Date: 08 Dec 2017
Weather: fall evening

Gillingham

Once again, a late afternoon lighting of the sun.
Feeling lucky to even be able to see the light - winter is just around the corner and we had a small flurry of snow today.
Learn something new today: Majuro is the capital of the Marshall Islands.



Name: Gillingham
Heading: South / Marmara
Type:  Carrier
Flag: Marshall Islands
Date: 06 Dec 2017
Weather: clear & cold

Hansa Cloppenburg

Nice colors just as the light is fading at the end of daylight hours.

Name: Hansa Cloppenburg
Heading: North/Black Sea
Type: Container
Flag: Liberia
Date: 29 Nov 2017
Weather: fall evening

VictoriaDeip

Excellent lighting!

Name: VictoriaDiep
Heading: North/Black Sea
Type: Cargo
Flag: Netherlands
Date: 24 Nov 2017
Weather: fall evening

Michigan Trader

Fall evenings, the lighting gets worse and worse and worse.
That said, this isn't so bad - it's going to get worse the closer we get to the end of December.
The photo is now 1 day old, so she has moved considerably north of the photo position

Name: Michigan Trader
Heading: North/Black Sea
Type: Cargo
Flag: Antigua
Date: 14 Nov 2017
Weather: fall evening

Maratha

Name: Maratha
Heading: South / Marmara
Type:  Tanker
Flag: Greece
Date:10 Nov 2017
Weather: clear

Balla

 

Once again that time of year has come that it starts to get too dark to capture much.
That said, this evening, we caught Balla heading south,



Name: Balla
Heading: South / Marmara
Type:  Cargo
Flag: Hong Kong
Date:08 Nov 2017
Weather: clear, mild haze

Leo I

Leo I has moved south quite a bit since yesterday - now somewhere out in the Aegean Sea.
The AIS link shows that she has had a paint job since she was entered into the records, but we can be pretty sure it's the same ship: registry and size match our photo data.
Lome - that's a port in Togo.


Name: Leo I Heading: South / Marmara Type: cargo Flag: Togo Date: 01 Nov 2017 Weather: crisp fall evening

Saga Tide

 

Nothing particularly remarkable here.
Except maybe the Hong Kong registration.
Not much from those parts that float past us here.



Name: Saga Tide
Heading: South / Marmara
Type:  Cargo
Flag: Hong Kong
Date: 26 Oct 2017
Weather: clearing after rain

34 A 1679

Another classic fishing boat.
Love the way they draw the (can we call it a?) tender up onto the back end for transport.
Looks like she's headed to the Istanbul fish market to unload her catch.



Name: 34 A 1679
Heading: South / Marmara
Type:  fishing
Flag: Turkey
Date: 01 Nov 2017
Weather: crisp fall evening

Ohio

Ohio was the name of another tanker that went down in the history of WWII - actually, kept from going down - by lashing her to 2 escort destroyers to bring her precious load of fuel into Malta.




Name: Ohio
Heading: South / Marmara
Type:  Cargo
Flag: Bahamas
Date: 01 Nov 2017
Weather: crystal clear fall evening

Tzarevetz

Name: Tzarevetz
Heading: North/Black Sea
Type: Carrier
Flag: Malta
Date: 31 Oct 2017
Weather: fall evening

Dobrynya Nikitich

The fall lighting is amazing: evening reds and yellow and oranges,
The weather has chilled considerably, but maintained a decent no-rain for 2 days now
Look carefully at the tree - lower left - and you should see a large bird watching the waters below.


Name: Dobrynya Nikitich
Heading: North/Black Sea
Type:  Cargo
Flag: Moldova
Date: 31 Oct 2017
Weather: crisp fall evening

A582

There is virtually no observable action on deck, no flag at the rear.
Appears to be a submarine rescue ship of the Turkish Navy

If the link below doesnt resolve, that's because Wikipedia is still blocked over here (adding a 0 in front of wiki... solves the problem for us, but we dont know what it does on your end)



Name: A 582
Heading: North/Black Sea
Type: Navy
Flag: Turkey
Date: 27 Oct 2017
Weather: clearing after rain

Sea Melody

Sea Melody I is heading south (as is all traffic at the hour of the photo)
Weather is changing - cold and rainy currently



Name: Sea Melody
Heading: South / Marmara
Type:  Cargo
Flag: Marshall Islands
Date: 26 Oct 2017
Weather: clearing after rain

YM Increment

We frequently wonder how the sites (to the right) such as vesselfinder.com manage to stay online. (Put us aside: small operation, virtually no overhead, low cost)

That said, we are finding that one of our old mainstays - vesselfinder.com isn't producing or working as it should. More and more we are relying on marinetraffic to come up with our limited data. Sorry to say.

YM vessels come by from time to time: we've already noted YM Hazar.



Name: YM Increment
Heading: North/Black Sea
Type:  Cargo
Flag: Liberia
Date: 20 Oct 2017
Weather: clearing after rain

CMA CGA URAL

We have seen several others of the CMA flag, but this thing is massive: check out the load above decks! Can hardly count the number of containers. See MSC ilona, Celine and more ...


Name: CMA CGA Ural
Heading: South/Marmara
Type: Container
Flag:   Malta
Date:15 Oct 2017
Weather: very pleasant evening

Navin Vulture

In some ways, the name fits - in that vultures feed off... whatever.
It may be the evening fall lighting, but she certainly looks in need of a paint job, and the rust adds to the <vulture> moniker.


Name: Navin Vulture
Heading: North/Black Sea
Type:  Cargo
Flag:  Marshall Islands
Date: 13 Oct 2017
Weather: clearing after rain

MSC Celine

Notice the smokey fire on the Asian side back behind the ship in the first shot above.


Name: MSC Celine
Heading: North/Black Sea
Type:  Container
Flag:   Panama
Date: 1 Oct 2017
Weather: clearing after rain

Kerem

Kerem would appear to be a rather Turkish name, so one question might be : why the Maltese registration?

Name: Kerem
Heading: North/Black Sea
Type:  Cargo
Flag:   Malta
Date: 11 Oct 2017
Weather: pleasant evening

A579

There were actually 3 of these things that came by back-to-back but it took us a little while to focus, go and get the camera and take a few shots.
Initially, we said ..." Turkish . Look at the flag. " Proudly displayed.
She appears to be  Turkish Navy TCG Cezayirli Gazi Hasanpaşa

Name: A579
Heading: North/Black Sea
Type:  navy
Flag:   Turkish
Date: 02 Oct 2017
Weather: clearing after rain

Estesun

It is pretty clear that summer has gone by.
The lighting conditions (as you can see) at our best (after work) hours are no longer optimal.
The evening call to prayer (sunset) creeps forward a few minutes each day = is now at about 7PM.

That said, you should notice that there are various lights on board Estesun - and you can expect more over the next few months.

Name: Estesun
Heading: North/Black Sea
Type:  cargo
Flag:   Panama
Date:26 Sept 2017
Weather: possible rain evening