Gdynia has a big harbor that works 24/7 … we should know because we heard from the window of Pani Helena’s flat all the trucks and cranes and ship’s horns and deisel locomotives operating night & day.
The harbor has lots of docks for big container ships, with massive cranes cayside for heavy loads (notice Asia at lower left in pic). Imagine that this port area of Gdansk-Gdynia has seen ships for a couple thousand years, and what those ancient mariners would think today seeing ships the size of towns, and cranes reaching down like the hand of Poseidon.
Perhaps I’m getting carried away, since I’ve not lived near nor seen such huge works. To Asia’s dad, the docks must all be old hat, as he’d spent a lifetime at sea for months at a time. This engineering stuff still fascinates me, though. Probably because I’m still a little kid at heart, wanting to drive a dump truck or work one of those cranes.
On the way to the public wharf there stands a bridge that gives you a bit of an overlook of seaside Gdynia. On this bridge one day many many decades ago, Asia’s future grandfather walked up and across the arches to impress her future grandmother.
Docked at the wharf are an old four-masted ship and a naval frigate.
Down at the end stands two monuments. One celebrates sailing and maritime life.
The other is dedicated to Joseph Conrad, the Polish seaman who became a writer (he wrote in English, his third language. Asia and I talked about his lengthy–boring–prose, got that way because he’s a non-native speaker and used long-winded constructions.)
Of course, we had to take pictures of each other looking through the deep-sea diver’s cut-out. Now we have a collection of these silly photos from a variety of places.
