03 January 2012

Victoria I in Helsinki, 3 January 2012

Victoria I

IMO 9281281
Built 2004, Aker Finnyards Rauma, Finland
Tonnage 40 975 GT
Length 193,80 m
Width 29,00 m
Draugth 6,50 m
Ice class 1A Super
2 500 passengers
2 252 berths
400 cars
1 000 lanemeters
4 Wärtsilä diesels, combined 26 240 kW
2 propellers
2 bow thrusters
Speed 22 knots

 As I have noted before, Helsinki has in effect two cruise seasons: the self-explanatory summer cruise season and a more unusual winter cruise season around new year, when Russian travel agencies charter ships for Baltic Sea cruising out of St. Petersburg (Russians also form the majority of passengers on regular cruiseferry services around this time of the year - even on those that don't actually call in Russian ports). Since the time of the year can require ships with icebreaking capability, the ships used are usually normal ferries.

This year, three ships are making four to five nights long cruises out of St. Petersburg: St. Peter Line's Princess Maria and Princess Anastasia, as well as Tallink's Victoria I. Since the first two commonly visit Helsinki anyway I did not bother photographing them, but the Victoria I is a rarer visitor and hence I went out to get some night-time (actually around 6 PM) photographs of her.

Victoria I at Kanavaterminaali in Helsinki, photographed from various locations around the South Harbour. Click on the images to see in larger size.

It was a bit too dark for really good photographs, but these will have to do. ;)
Victoria I and the two cathedrals of Helsinki: the Helsinki Cathedral on the left and Uspenski Cathedral on the right, behind the Victoria I's radar mast.
A different point of view showing the the various quays at Katajanokka.
The car deck was in use, as you can see, and apparently tour buses started directly from inside the ship.
Lastly, as a hopefully final update on the too small diplayed images problem I wrote about here, I have now gone through all the affected entries and all images in this blog should display normally. If there are any problems, please let me know.

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