Saturday, August 22, 2009

CRUISING CUBES

They are the ugliest things I have ever set my eyes on and the owners call them by such an elegant name, cruise liners. They are cubes stuck together in stepped rows, like kids' chunky Lego. Relatively speaking, Lego would be more attractive, as each of those cubes are likely to be in a bright primary colour. The modern cruise ship is no more than sterile blocks with portholes, stuck on a barge base. Some of them tower on the horizon in the most fearsome manner, forcing you to view their displeasing line. Seeing this massive torso against a boat or ship of more manageable visual proportions, puts these enormous motels on water into perspective.



If you peer into this picture you might just see a boat, not very small by every day standards, but barely visible on this horizon. Look to the left of the picture; there is a white high rise land-based construction, and even that appears to be deferring to the monstrous floating top heavy barge, which is euphemistically called a cruise liner.



There is a white colossus looming up behind this delightful harbour. The water craft here greatly contrast with the cruise ship, and pleasingly, soften its outline.

4 comments:

adamantixx said...

i agree, far more akin to an inner city tower block than the graceful and beautiful vessels that used to cruise the oceans.

ZACL said...

Absolutely.

I wonder how it would accord with Poundbury, HRH's super conurbation design in Gloucestershire, that is said to attract high levels of all sorts of crime.

I digress, Poundbury isn't surrounded by water.........yet.

Vincent said...

I don't mind seeing them from the outside. I would hate to be in one though.

ZACL said...

I have never been stuck in a floating set of high rise cubes either. I have met people of all nationalities who choose to be, usually when they come in to port and put their feet on dry land for a few short hours.