What a place to Get Wrecked

Here is another post from the Urban Ghosts site. While the Solomons are world renowned for their shipwrecks, I was totally unaware of this one. By cruise ship standards, the "World Discover" is relatively small at 87m long & 15m wide, but its wreck is still a sight to behold.  Listing 46 degrees to starboard, the rusting vessel languishes near the shore of Roderick Bay, in the Solomon Islands, where it has become both a tourist attraction and an object of local looting.

World Discoverer

 The ship was built in Germany in 1974 and initially named the BEWA Discoverer after being sold to Denmark’s BEWA Cruises.  Sold several times over the years, and registered in a number of countries including Singapore and Liberia, she was ultimately renamed World Discoverer and sported a double hull to allow for cruise voyages to Antarctica, the Falkland Islands, Chile, Ushuaia, Argentina. During the period between March and May, the ship cruised the South Pacific Islands, and between June and August, around the Alaskan region and near the Russian border around the Bering sea. Very few vessels have been constructed for exclusive cruising expeditions near or around icebergs, but the double hulled construction allowed impact with glaciers while sustaining very little damage to the ship or crew. The World Discoverer also has a 8,000 mile cruising range allowing the ship to be the first ship to ever transit the Northwest Passage.
A small fleet of dinghies landed passengers on various shorelines for observation of local wildlife in the area. Each day comprised typically two to three expeditions to the shoreline. A team of experienced expedition leaders answered any tourist questions concerning the region, ice floes, their movements, and the ship's destinations.
After more than two decades of service, World Discoverer struck an uncharted reef in Sandfly Passage on April 30, 2000.  A ferry answered the stricken ship’s distress call and carried her passengers to safety.  Meanwhile Captain Oliver Kruess and his crew heroically grounded World Discoverer in Roderick Bay to avoid sinking.
The wreck has remained in Roderick Bay ever since, but is not thought to post an immediate environmental hazard.  An underwater survey declared World Discoverer a “constructive loss” but efforts to salvage the vessel were hampered by the civil war in the Solomon Islands.  Now rusting and ransacked, it makes for an interesting attraction for passing cruise ships.

And what is truly amazing is that you can actuallly see it on Google Maps!

Unfortunately for me, the ship hadn't floundered when I was in that area of the Solomons in 2000. In fact Sandfly Passage was beautifully calm when we visited.

Sandfly passage

Japanese destroyer Karishama

There were some WWII wrecks in the vicinity, as nearby Guadalcanal and Tulagi were the scenes of major naval battles between Japan and the United States. The Japanese overran the area in their push into the South Pacific in 1942. The United States, and the allies, recaptured the islands in a series of land and sea battles which left most of the Japanese ships sunk or partly sunk when they were purposely run aground.
The destroyer Kikuzuki (left) also known as the Karishama in Tokio Bay is only a short distance from LST342 (below) a tank landing ship in Purvis Bay both were towed up to the shore by the US Navy to be salvaged. Now the World Discover adds another wreck to the Florida area.

US landing craft transport near Mbola Island

Still the Greatest

I'm watching the production of Great Expectations on ABC1, and believe it is a "great" depiction of the book, with beautiful scenery - the marshes are wonderfully atomspheric, the decay of Satis House, and Ray Winstone is suitably menacing as Magwitch.
But the best rendition of Great Expectations has to be the 1945 film, with John Mills as Pip, Jean Simmons as Estella, and Martita Hunt as the eccentric Miss Havisham. I can still vividly recall her fly-away hair and gossamer gowns, and the wedding breakfast table with the mice!

Miss Havisham & Estella

The Rank film was the winner of the 1947 Academy Award for best cinematography, and was nominated for the best picture award (it was beaten by Gentleman's Agreement with Gregory Peck), and has since been voted the 5th greatest British film of the 20th century.
Fortunately the original film is now available on DVD.

Stranger things have happened

Best to click on the picture to obtain a clear image.