Superb story and photos Atto 
The photo showing the silhouette of the Black Pearl is fantastic.
Out of interest how deep was the lake? ... and did you get wet? 
Elaine 
Thank you thank you
The lake is pretty deep, which is why I was unable to retrieve the cargo that fell overboard from the Pearl and the Interceptor, including the Admiral's Hat! (My British Royal Admiral is now hatless, and I only had one of them
)
And yes, I did get VERY wet, as it was raining the entire time, and at one point I tried to lean over the dock in a feeble attempt to catch the admiral's hat and dunked most of my entire arm in the water (whilsth wearing a jacket) just to fetch it, but without success.
Amazingly the ships don't delve that deeply into the water more than an inch or two (the water line is fairly close to the bottom of the ship, so in some shots it almost appears as if the ships are on a shallow bed, but they're not; they're far out into the middle of the lake, moored, off camera, by a thin long line tied to the dock so they don't blow completely away.
Also, I made sure they had styrofoam inserts in the case that they capsized so they wouldn't be lost to the lakebed forever (and yes, the black pearl actually did capsize twice before I finally removed the cannons and extra weight so the water wouldn't splash into the cannon port holes). Ssadly, I lost my crate of chickens and a rooster that came with the ship, along with the cargo pallat that the crane uses to haul goods onto the ship with
My favourite shot though was when the Pearl came up on the Interceptor and the ship turned to face them. The wind was on my side when I got that lucky shot
