2024 – Queen Mary 2 Grand World– Part 1 – The Atlantic 1.1

Thursday, January 4, 2024 was our first day at sea.  I got busy and called everyone, reaching most of them.  One of them, who is travelling with a caregiver, fell, a week or two before they boarded and she’s in a wheelchair now.  She cannot navigate the lip on the bathroom door without help and the shower is impossible.  She might have to go home if the ship cannot find her an ADA room.  I’ll ask but this doesn’t look good.  Their travel agent had been on that one for over a week before sailing.  We are hoping for maybe a commode and access to the Spa for showers.

I got to my office hour at eleven.  It’s tucked away in an odd part of the ship, between the games tables and the meeting rooms.  There’s not a lot of foot traffic.  Three people found me, though.  My group co-ordinator came by and cleared up a few things, but sadly, there wasn’t an ADA room available on the ship at any price. They are looking at ways to accommodate my passenger.  I went back to my cabin, worked on my cocktail party speech and had it printed along with a new manifest. 

Around 3:30pm, I went to tea in the Royal Court.  It was very nice, with white tablecloths, lots of elegant servers, a pianist and all.  I ate two finger sandwiches, two pastries, and three scones with cream and strawberry jam.  I started off at a table to myself but, when asked, took on another person.  He turned out to be a very nice Italian but not my cup of tea.  He was single and lonesome, but all he was looking for was a dance partner and they gave me the speaking parts in the ballet recitals, in high school. 

A half-hour before Cocktail Party time, I betook myself to Sir Samuel’s, its designated bar.  It was decently attended, considering it conflicted with early dinner. Two couples came to dinner with me after and they were delightful.   The entertainment was the all dancing, some singing production show “Apassionata” and it was super.  There were five couples swirling around in hot pink and black, two of them better singers and three of them better dancers.  It was all wonderful.

The late shows on board don’t let out until eleven, so I slept in until nine the next day, cleared my email and did some client work. 

They changed the main floral arrangement.  This one is not too shabby either.

One of my people came to the Desk.  She said they had come to the cocktail party a little late but no one was there.  Luckily another one was there, to vouch for me, and suggest she might have come an hour late because of the ship having put the clocks forward an hour at noon.  It’s a funny way to do it, taking the hour out of the day rather than the night.  I guess the old farts had been complaining or the ship finds it easier to entertain us for an hour less.  But it IS confusing.

I am going to move the Happy Hours forward a half hour to 5:30PM, as many have early dinner.  The other passenger was there to get his Australian ETA done.  How he managed to board without it is beyond me.  The Holland America World Cruise department told me they would be denying boarding to anyone who didn’t have one.  I had pointed out that was silly because it was turned around in a day after application.  All it took was the applicant’s good self, his phone, passport and credit card.  He had all that. He just didn’t have a WiFi package, so I let him use mine.  We had the usual fun finding the appropriate background and the chip in the passport, but we got through all that.  Then it stopped us when it couldn’t verify our coordinates because we were on a ship in the middle of the Atlantic in gale force winds.  He was able to save his work and, hopefully, can finish in a Café in Southampton.  If not, I’ll go out with him at the next port.

Then I went sussing out dining venues for the group.  I found The Verandah Steakhouse for $50 per person, and one that alternates between Asian (Bamboo) and Indian (Coriander) for $25.  Now for dates.  Cunard does not supply a day-by-day list, with port arrival and departure times, like the other cruise lines.  I use it to record my DV events and add my own dinner dates, etc.  I was lost without it, so I requested one from the ship and started making one, using an Excel spreadsheet. 

I went to tea in the King’s Court, which is a royal name for the buffet.  I figured I would eat less if the pastries and scones weren’t being continually offered.  I had a piece of salami, a piece of cheese and two scones, better.  I met a Brit who explained that Devonshire folk load the cream on first and then the jam, while people from Cornwall put the jam on first and top it with the cream.  Wasn’t that enlightening?  I’m learning a lot.  On the way out I met my family of four, who have become buffet addicts because they are vegetarian and the buffet does that best.  I worked until happy hour, went to my designated bar, and no one came.  I bought a teddy bear, with a QM2 lifejacket on, to keep me company.  It will end up in Ginger’s Toy Tea, like the rest of them. 

Then I presented myself at the Britannia Dining room, willing to share.  They didn’t have a share table with open space but could put me at a table for two, between two other tables for two.  It turned up we were all girls and we had a marvelous time.  Janelle was retiring to England, and traveling with her retired service dog, a 14-year-old Black Lab/Border Collie mix.  Marilee was along for the ride.  Julie and Lucie were a British mother/daughter team.  We had lots of fun girl talk, until Janell, had to leave as it was time to walk Loki. There are quite a few dogs on board.  It’s a Cunard tradition.  Julie and Lucie and I went for a drink in the Chart Room, which was featuring Jazz, and met Stephanie, a French professor who had married a Brit.  All of these people are just using the ship as a very nice way to get across the pond.  The entertainment in the Royal Court (read: main theatre)  was William Caulfield, a pretty good Irish comedian.  The late show is at 10:15pm and lets out at eleven.  So good night.

January 6, no one came to office hour again.  I don’t hang around there too long past my time, because it’s freezing and the chair is so low I can barely reach my computer, so back to my room I went.  I found out later why it was so cold.  It was bloody snowing outside to the amazement of those who had never seen any.  Somebody even made a snowman:

I took that picture after tea, which I had in King’s Court again and managed to cut back to two pieces of cheese, a mango parfait and only one scone.  It held me until dinner.  I had more delightful female dinner partners, Fritz, who’s moving to the Cotswolds, where her family comes from, and her friend Holland, an interior designer.  We talked so long I missed half the show on the main stage.  She was a pianist, Katie Clarke.

It was still snowing the next day, out here in the middle of the North Atlantic, passing Newfoundland.  We went by the place where the Titanic sank.  Not sure how comforting it is that they still take the same route.  We are having quite stormy weather, with 40 foot swells, but the Queen Mary 2, ocean liner that she is, is handling it beautifully.  No one came to the desk but I was busy with client work, finishing the calendar to use for organizing purposes and creating the first newsletter. 

For dinner, I was matched up with Gladys and Elizabeth, her younger friend, a nurse by profession, who had come along as companion, and Pauline and Graham, a British couple, both electrical engineers.  Not quite sure how we got here but, amidst the talk of stabilizers and azipods,  Graham was able to enlighten me on how they got rid of the pigeons in Trafalgar Square.  They fed them contraceptives until the population just, well, died off.  They were doing Big Band music in the Queen’s Court, so Liz and Gladys and I went there in the pause before the show.  Ballroom is very big on Cunard and some of the dancers are really good.  One oriental lady, in particular, was very serious.  When first seen she was dancing with the Italian I had met at tea, and a little later, just twirling herself around the floor, very energetic, very correct – a little different, mind you. Fun to watch.

The Royal Court entertainment was interesting, too, Ukebox, another four guys from Liverpool and you can guess what instruments they were playing.  They aren’t the next Beatles, but they played a lot of good songs and it was a fun time.  I met one of my couples after the show and they wanted help buying canes.  The pitching and rolling ship had pointed out their limitations to them.  I volunteered to be their personal shopper in Southampton.