Did I Photograph A Ghost Ship?

In September 2015 I was in a cafe on the beach at Ventnor on the Isle of Wight. I was enjoying a large bowl of seafood and half-listening to Demi Lovato being cool for the summer on the music channel in the background. It was a horrible day; there was a cold wind carrying a stinging rain, and it was nice to be inside The Beach Shack warming up after a long walk along the coast from Bembridge, where I was staying on a boat.

The cafe boasted large windows looking out onto the sea, and I remember being mildly surprised by how misty it was outside, given the wind. Then I spotted three tall masts emerging from the fog. How cool, I thought, it looks like an old-timey pirate ship. I'd never seen one like that actually in use before, and I wondered if there was a special event going on. I offhandedly snapped a picture, went back to my mussels (or was it crab?), and thought no more about it. I didn't notice when the ship sailed away, but by the time I'd finished my lunch it was gone.

I probably would have thought no more about this, except a few weeks ago, Dai and I were talking about historical ships (we have a large model of the HMS Victory - the kit to build it was my first Mother's Day present), and I mentioned this nice ship I'd seen on a foggy day off the coast of the Isle of Wight.

I kept talking for a while until I realised that Dai had gone quiet and was just staring at me. "Do you still have the photo?" he asked urgently.

"Well, probably," I said, and spent a fruitless half hour searching, but couldn't find it. 

Dai then told me about the HMS Eurydice, which sank in a storm off the coast of the Isle of Wight in 1878, and 364 lives were lost to the sea. Since then, many visitors to the island have reported seeing the Eurydice on this part of the coast, and their sightings have been blamed on "light reflecting on mist". (From Haunted History of HMS Eurydice - BBC Hampshire.)

Obviously I was extremely excited by the possibility that I had seen and photographed a ghost ship, but as I couldn't find the photo my dreams of a mention in the Fortean Times would have to remain dreams.

Except that last week, trawling through old photos on Facebook to try to decide whether I should cut my hair short again after the wedding (help?!), I finally found the photo.

At first I was a bit deflated. It doesn't look very ghostly. Then I did an image search for HMS Eurydice and... well, see for yourselves! I'm not entirely convinced... but it's not a bad likeness, is it?! What do you think?

An Ecosia image search for HMS Eurydice

(Dai suggests this may be something to do with a Sailing Trust rather than a paranormal encounter. Disappointingly, he's probably right.)