Britannia Royal Naval College

High on a hill above Dartmouth, Britannia Royal Naval College has been training Royal Naval officers on this site since 1905. In fact, naval officers' training in Dartmouth goes back to 1863, when the old wooden wall HMS Britannia was first moored in the River Dart. The job has always been the same and is now encapsulated, as you might expect, in a mission statement:

“To deliver courageous leaders with the spirit to fight and win”

The Queen met Prince Phillip here during a visit made by the very young Princes Elizabeth. He was then a dashing young Naval Cadet: Phillip of Greece.

The whole place was steeped in history and obviously still provides excellent training for the cadets that are lucky enough to be able to attend courses here. The view, out to sea past Dartmouth, from the parade ground, was magnificent.

Stoke Gabriel

Today is my birthday. I don’t particularly like getting older but I did get some excellent presents this year – mainly to do with photography. The filters that I received I used to hold back the sky (a graduated filter) on the above shot. While I was setting up the tripod etc., typically, Ann got talking to the people that owned the yacht that is to the left of the picture. Yes, the figure in red is Ann climbing onto the yacht having already been invited on board during the brief period that it took me to set up my camera. I quite like the perspective of the pontoon where all of the dinghies are moored.

Dartmouth

The weather forecast was not good so we decided to move on to Dartmouth where we knew we should be able to get a marina mooring. If it is going to rain then it is better to have electricity and be able to get off the boat without a very wet ride in the tender.
There is always plenty to do in Dartmouth and once the rain stopped then the light was wonderful and I was able to take some great photographs of the view from the boat. We actually moored in Kingswear which is on the other side of the river to Dartmouth. This has advantages because it means that you can look at Dartmouth in the sun in the morning and then enjoy the sun shining on Kingswear in the afternoon.