Got to pop in quickly whilst already in the area - was great to visit (and thanks to all those who offered advice in a previous thread, Kure will have to be a future visit). A few photos below, and some impressions:
- having visited both World War 2 battleships and ships of the line / frigates like Victory and Warrior, didn't have the appreciation of how much there was still a broadside consideration with pre-dreadnoughts until I saw, in person, all the heavy secondary guns bristling out of the sides.
- feels very spacious below decks, not sure how much of that is the result of modern changes into a museum ship. I assume that would have been stores and hammocks or bedding in some of the (currently) open spaces. There's also a massive auditorium forward - I'm not sure what that space would have been originally?
- the virtual reality headset demo was surprisingly good. You can look around the bridge? of the Mikasa during the opening and closing stages of the Tsushima battle (not sure how accurate ship placement is), with incoming shell splashes and outgoing fire, signal flags being lowered.
- on that note, walking around higher up on the ship felt incredibly exposed, in terms of what it must have felt like with incoming fire
- some nice range finder displays
- there are an incredible number of model ships in the main below deck display area.
- interesting to see thick armor in places like the conning tower, almost as thick (14 vs 17.3?) as in an Iowa class, but obviously lower quality.
Very much recommended if you're in the area, and you can get a good feed on the way to the train station afterwards.
- having visited both World War 2 battleships and ships of the line / frigates like Victory and Warrior, didn't have the appreciation of how much there was still a broadside consideration with pre-dreadnoughts until I saw, in person, all the heavy secondary guns bristling out of the sides.
- feels very spacious below decks, not sure how much of that is the result of modern changes into a museum ship. I assume that would have been stores and hammocks or bedding in some of the (currently) open spaces. There's also a massive auditorium forward - I'm not sure what that space would have been originally?
- the virtual reality headset demo was surprisingly good. You can look around the bridge? of the Mikasa during the opening and closing stages of the Tsushima battle (not sure how accurate ship placement is), with incoming shell splashes and outgoing fire, signal flags being lowered.
- on that note, walking around higher up on the ship felt incredibly exposed, in terms of what it must have felt like with incoming fire
- some nice range finder displays
- there are an incredible number of model ships in the main below deck display area.
- interesting to see thick armor in places like the conning tower, almost as thick (14 vs 17.3?) as in an Iowa class, but obviously lower quality.
Very much recommended if you're in the area, and you can get a good feed on the way to the train station afterwards.
statistics: Posted by NewJerseyMike — 4:29 AM - 1 day ago — Replies 3 — Views 160