I thought that such a distinctive ship deserved a close in shot. As I mentioned earlier, we are looking at the Overseas Passenger Terminal which normally hosts cruise ships. It sits on the western side of Circular Quay, the body of water that we're looking at here. (Actually it's Sydney Cove, but the foreshore around it is still called Circular Quay.) To the OPT's left, we see the Museum of Contemporary Art, formerly the Maritime Services Board building. Behind, we see the area of Sydney known as The Rocks which are described in other shots.

On the eastern (nearer) side to us we can see "The Toaster" (the Bennelong Apartments, discussed in earlier shots), the southernmost theatres of the Opera House, and the start of the Royal Botanic Gardens.

I thought of cropping in more on the ship to make it the sole centre of attention, but decided that I preferred it sitting in context.

As I've mentioned previously, the Cuauhtémoc is a Mexican 3 masted sail training ship, which is part of the Mexican Navy. It was named after the last Aztec emperor, who was executed in 1525. It was built using a modified 1930's design created by the German firm Blohm & Voss. I knew them better as an aircraft manufacturer of World War II, although the company had in fact been established as a shipbuilder in Hamburg in 1877. Its most (in)famous product was probably the German battleship Bismarck. Although it was based on B&V's design, the ship was built by a Spanish shipyard named Astilleros Celaya S.A in Bilbao, a city which is on the north coast, and in the Basque region of, Spain. She was the last of 4 sister ships (the other three having been built for Colombia, Ecuador, and Venezuela), and was launched in January of 1982, being commissioned in July of that year.

She has a steel hull, a length of 67m (about 220'), displaces 1,800 tons, and has a compliment of 186 officers and crew with 90 trainees.

I suppose that if you really want to learn the sea, a sailing ship is the best way to do it as long as you don't get killed in the process.

But then, I don't really want to learn the sea. Not in a hands on and washed overboard manner, anyway. Cuauhtémoc and her sisters often do duty as representatives of their countries... and you have to admit that they are indeed striking ambassadors.