Where in the world ?

[ExArkie]

6 hours ago, sfred said:

 

Correct! 

 

That makes 499 ports.  Where will be number 500?

If I may be so presumptuous to stake a claim at number 500, I found one port on the list that we had been to and had actually been on a ship (non-Cunard) at the time. 

Docked at a rather industrial location, buses provided to get us into the occupied parts of town. Probably enough details in the background (assuming adequate resolution) to direct our super-sleuths to a likely location, but hints can be provided if necessary.

 

[sfred]

Thanks @ExArkie!   This port is Noumea, New Caledonia, at the Port Autonome de Nouméa container terminal.  The blue and green cargo cranes, and the maritime museum buildings on the other side of the pier, were good clues.   Also the numerous Swire shipping containers, which narrowed the geographic likely possibilities to Asia/Oceania.

Edited July 14, 2021 by sfred

[bluemarble]

We have indeed now reached the milestone of 500 ports/destinations identified on this thread! Congratulations, everyone and thanks for all your contributions to keep this thread going.

 

I'd like to take this opportunity to post some statistics I've been compiling to recognize those who have contributed the most to this thread. It won't come as any surprise who has posted the most, but I must say I was amazed when I saw the actual counts. Here are the top 12 contributors along with how many times they've posted on this thread. That somewhat arbitrary cutoff includes everyone with 50 or more posts.

 

Contributor             Posts

bluemarble               948

sfred                          412

Host Hattie               310

Colin_Cameron        264

carlmm                      262

exlondoner                244

Solent Richard          210

Palmeat                     175

Lanky Lad                  103

Essiesmom                 95

sogne                           90

Ray66                           87

[sfred]

My congratulations to everyone also!  I would never have previously thought that Cunard had been to so many places around the world.  All the photos and port games have certainly helped the wife and I develop a bucket list of future explorations.

 

Thanks @bluemarble for your interesting statistics on posts.  I won't tell the wife about my count. She thinks I waste too much time here on CruiseCritic already!   😄

 

I've also been updating my analytics and graphs.  Here are the charts for our 500 ports.  An update from the previous graphs are that I added a longitude field to the latitude, enabling a graph of NE/NW/SE/SW latitude and longitude combinations.  The top 10 countries are the same as before, although their ranking has changed a bit.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Host Hattie]

Congratulations on getting to 500 ports and thanks for all the statistics 

[ExArkie]

10 hours ago, sfred said:

Thanks @ExArkie!   This port is Noumea, New Caledonia, at the Port Autonome de Nouméa container terminal.  The blue and green cargo cranes, and the maritime museum buildings on the other side of the pier, were good clues.   Also the numerous Swire shipping containers, which narrowed the geographic likely possibilities to Asia/Oceania.

That is, of course, correct. 

[Solent Richard]

Good afternoon one and all. Time for a bit of nostalgia maybe.

 

To my eternal shame I am having to resort to a 'personal' photograph taken at one particular port still on the list.  Try as I might,  I cannot find any other taken in the actual port. But it's on the list as yet unidentified and there maybe one or two clues in my photograph: taken in March 2003.

 

As the story goes, we'd had one hell of a good day out drinking and returned to our cruise ship by taxi with two crew members: us being the last passengers and they the last crew members to return. I guess you know the feeling: Captain on bridge wing glaring down through binoculars.

Anyway, here is said photograph complete with trophy(s) as we hit the aft bar for another excellent sailaway party...

 

 

 

 

 

Edited July 14, 2021 by Solent Richard

[bluemarble]

1 hour ago, Solent Richard said:

Good afternoon one and all. Time for a bit of nostalgia maybe.

 

To my eternal shame I am having to resort to a 'personal' photograph taken at one particular port still on the list.  Try as I might,  I cannot find any other taken in the actual port. But it's on the list as yet unidentified and there maybe one or two clues in my photograph: taken in March 2003.

 

As the story goes, we'd had one hell of a good day out drinking and returned to our cruise ship by taxi with two crew members: us being the last passengers and they the last crew members to return. I guess you know the feeling: Captain on bridge wing glaring down through binoculars.

Anyway, here is said photograph complete with trophy(s) as we hit the aft bar for another excellent sailaway party...

 

 

I think there's enough to go on here for me to attempt this one.

 

1) Right off the bat the shape of your trophy is suggestive of a port in Egypt.

2) There are only two Egyptian ports remaining on our unseen ports list (Sharm el Sheikh and Sokhna).

3) The wrapping on your trophy indicates it's from "Luxor Gift Shop" which helps confirm this is Egypt.

4) An internet search turns up a Luxor Gift Shop located in Sharm el Sheikh.

5) I'm finding other photos of the Sharm el Sheikh port showing a similar rock face with a similarly-shaped green beacon on it as seen in the background.

 

Based on that evidence I will guess this is Sharm el Sheikh, Egypt.

[Solent Richard]

14 hours ago, bluemarble said:

 

I think there's enough to go on here for me to attempt this one.

 

1) Right off the bat the shape of your trophy is suggestive of a port in Egypt.

2) There are only two Egyptian ports remaining on our unseen ports list (Sharm el Sheikh and Sokhna).

3) The wrapping on your trophy indicates it's from "Luxor Gift Shop" which helps confirm this is Egypt.

4) An internet search turns up a Luxor Gift Shop located in Sharm el Sheikh.

5) I'm finding other photos of the Sharm el Sheikh port showing a similar rock face with a similarly-shaped green beacon on it as seen in the background.

 

Based on that evidence I will guess this is Sharm el Sheikh, Egypt.

Congratulations @bluemarble spot on with Sharm el Sheikh, Egypt.

 

We called there with P&O as part of the Aurora's 2003 World Cruise. I was actually reminded of it two days ago when she passed our balcony sailing out of Southampton...

 

[sfred]

To continue the momentum started by @Solent Ɍichardin our progress towards 600, here is a port on our unseen list.  I've been to this port by plane on a business trip, and Cunard has been there recently.  There's a further hint in a previous "challenge", if needed.  The photo is public domain from wikimedia commons.

 

[bluemarble]

14 hours ago, sfred said:

To continue the momentum started by @Solent Ɍichardin our progress towards 600, here is a port on our unseen list.  I've been to this port by plane on a business trip, and Cunard has been there recently.  There's a further hint in a previous "challenge", if needed.  The photo is public domain from wikimedia commons.

 

 

This one is Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea.

 

You mentioned having been to Port Moresby on business during the "challenge" you accepted to extend the alphabetical order of ports being identified here from Mapaca and Maceió to Madang.

 

More conclusively, a search for images of Port Moresby turns up this image on Wikimedia Commons described as "Overlooking Port Moresby "Town" from Touaguba Hill."

[bluemarble]

I'll continue the trend of posting public domain images of places from our unseen ports list that I've visited but don't have a photo of my own to contribute. This photo dates from the 1960's. That distinctive church close to the shoreline was built only a few years before this photo was taken and is still there today. The profile of the hills in the background may also help with the identification of this one.

 

Edited July 16, 2021 by bluemarble

[Tonopah]

1 hour ago, bluemarble said:

I'll continue the trend of posting public domain images of places from our unseen ports list that I've visited but don't have a photo of my own to contribute. This photo dates from the 1960's. That distinctive church close to the shoreline was built only a few years before this photo was taken and is still there today. The profile of the hills in the background may also help with the identification of this one.

 

Hammerfest, Norway. I’m 99% sure because of the church.

 

Edited July 16, 2021 by Tonopah

[bluemarble]

22 minutes ago, Tonopah said:

Hammerfest, Norway. I’m 99% sure because of the church.

 

You got it. That is indeed Hammerfest, Norway.

[sfred]

6 hours ago, bluemarble said:

 

This one is Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea.

 

You mentioned having been to Port Moresby on business during the "challenge" you accepted to extend the alphabetical order of ports being identified here from Mapaca and Maceió to Madang.

 

More conclusively, a search for images of Port Moresby turns up this image on Wikimedia Commons described as "Overlooking Port Moresby "Town" from Touaguba Hill."

 

100% correct all around, @bluemarble!

[Essiesmom]

On 7/11/2021 at 4:29 PM, sfred said:

 

Good morning everyone!  This very elusive port is Vava'u Tonga.   The photo was taken from the Mt. Talau national park.  There's a photo in google maps of a small wooden observation deck where @Essiesmommay have stood. 

 

This one took a long time to identify!  A very good challenge indeed.

Yes indeed, this is Neiafu, Vava'u, Tonga taken from Mt. Talau.  No idea if we were on a tower.  If I could refer to my journal from that 1989 trip...  EM

[Essiesmom]

Another one on the list, taken on arrival in 2002.  Probably not a difficult one to identify:

 

[sfred]

7 hours ago, Essiesmom said:

Another one on the list, taken on arrival in 2002.  Probably not a difficult one to identify:

 

 

Hi @Essiesmom. Hope you had a nice time on Crystal Serenity.

 

I can't say for certain, but I'm going to guess this port as Naha, Okinawa, Japan at Naha pier number 7.  The grey and yellow cargo container crane loading the ship on the other side of the pier is a close match to google photos of Naha pier number 9.  There also looks to be a school band welcoming your ship, which is very common in Japan ports.  Finally, the vehicle traffic looks like it is driving on the left. 

Edited July 17, 2021 by sfred

[Essiesmom]

Yes, that is Naha.  Zoom in on the yellow arch and it says Star Princess.  Her maiden visit on her inaugural cruise.  EM

[bluemarble]

How about this one? Another public domain image of a place on our unseen ports list I've visited but I don't have my own photo to contribute.

 

[North West Newbie]

1 hour ago, bluemarble said:

How about this one? Another public domain image of a place on our unseen ports list I've visited but I don't have my own photo to contribute.

 

 

This is Old Port in Portland, Maine.

[bluemarble]

18 minutes ago, North West Newbie said:

This is Old Port in Portland, Maine.

 

That's correct. According to my tally, this is your 50th post on this thread, earning a spot on our honor roll of the most frequent posters, so congratulations for that as well.

[sfred]

Here' a port on our unseen list that I have been to several times by plane.  A consulting company I used to work for delivered outsourced business process services at our offices in this city, and I would take clients there to show them the facilities.  To help narrow the possibilities, a hint is that it is very cold there in the wintertime.  Photo is public domain from wikimedia commons.

 

[ExArkie]

7 hours ago, sfred said:

Here' a port on our unseen list that I have been to several times by plane.  A consulting company I used to work for delivered outsourced business process services at our offices in this city, and I would take clients there to show them the facilities.  To help narrow the possibilities, a hint is that it is very cold there in the wintertime.  Photo is public domain from wikimedia commons.

 

Probably not a grand testament to my travels in that I recognized (or at least thought I did) the industrial waterfront easier than the lighthouse. It looks to me to be Dalian (Liaoning Province), China.

 

[bluemarble]

I've found a few more Cunard ports to add to our unseen ports list. But before I post those to start a new page on this thread, I'll finish off this page by mentioning a couple discoveries relating to ports we have already seen on this thread.

 

First of all, I think we can now confirm Ancona, Italy (photo contributed by @Palmeat) has been a Cunard port. Ancona appears on itineraries for the old Cunard ships Saragossa and Palymra.

 

Secondly, I think we can also consider Gladstone, Queensland (images contributed by @sfred) to be a true Cunard port of call, not just a layup port used by QE last year. I found a Sagafjord itinerary listing a call to Gladstone during a voyage from Papeete to Sydney.