A Day Out With the Wife

 Not much to say about gaming progress - I am working in the mdf river sections, so should have some pics of them soon.

To fill the gap, I decided to post about this trip we had into Auckland CBD a couple of weekends back 

The old Victorian/Edwardian central post office, now converted to a railway station!

A view up Queen Street

The Auckland Sky Tower - still the highest building in the southern hemisphere, I think?!

After this quick stroll, we went to look at the exhibition my wife had bought tickets for. Without jumping ahead, here is a clue 

If you have not guessed already, this will probably seal the deal

It was, of course, an exhibition on the RMS Titanic (one thing I found out during the visit was that RMS = Royal Mail Ship!)

A nice model of the ship 

Part of the route between exhibition "points" dressed up to look like a corridor in the Titanic

A mock-up of a first class cabin 

White Star Line crockery (not from the Titanic, but it is authentic - just from one of the sister ships)

A Swedish (I think) advert for potential emigrants

The Auckland town hall building

And a couple of views of Auckland's famous (thanks U2!) One Tree Hill - minus the tree that was taken down years ago after a chain saw attack by a Māori activist who objected to the tree being a non-native import!

A nice day out - the exhibition was interesting and well done - everyone was issued with a personal "device" where you selected a station number as you walked through the exhibition at your own pace, listening to the commentary about the different aspects of the story. One thing that did strike me (but was no surprise) was this statistic near the end of exhibition:

Survival Breakdown by Class

• First Class: 202 survived / 123 died (approx. 62% survived)

• Second Class: 118 survived / 167 died (approx. 41% survived)

• Third Class: 178 survived / 528 died (approx. 25% survived

Only about 24% of the Titanic's crew survived the disaster, making their overall survival rate nearly identical to that of the third-class passengers.

Out of approximately 885 to 892 crew members on board, only around 212 to 215 survived, while roughly 670 to 680 perished.

Survival Breakdown by Crew Department

The survival rate varied drastically depending on the crew member's specific role on the ship:

• Victualling Crew (Stewards, Cooks, Housekeepers): ~22% survived (roughly 106 out of 494)

• Engineering Crew (Stokers, Firemen, Greasers): ~22% survived (roughly 72 out of 325)

• Deck Crew (Officers, Sailors): ~65% survived (roughly 43 out of 66)

And on that sombre note, I will finish off for tonight!