Tuesday - April 19, 2005

QE2: Post-parting Depression

I admit that I went into a bit of a funk the first night we were on the Queen Mary 2. As lovely a ship that she is, I was really missing al the places and faces that had become so familiar to us over the past few months.

April 16th was one of the very rare days when both the QE2 and the QM2 were in the same port. As we waved goodbye to my family in Southampton, I was also waving goodbye to a ship and crew I had come to love. The QE2 may be aging and she may be a bit tired looking, but she is still a grand old dame and she inspires a lot of loyalty in those who spend any amount of time treading her decks. It is hard to describe the emotions I was feeling as we sailed by the QE2 as she waited with her tugs to to sail off behind us. The QM2 gave three long toots of her whistle (a girly whistle, as one passenger called it) to salute her and the QE2 answered with her deep, goosebump-raising tones. I could see a number of crew members out on the bow waving to us, and wondered if Nor, our cabin steward, or Marius and Jose, our waiters, were among them. I could see the new passengers all crowded onto her observation and sun decks, just as we had been so many times on leaving a port. I wondered who would have our cabin and who would be enjoying the new mattress that I had managed to wangle just a month or so ago. And I wondered when we would be standing on those decks again and where we would be going.

As we sailed out of Southampton, I went back to our cabin and stood out on our balcony to get a look at the fiery sunset. And there on the horizon was the QE2, sailing off to the Balearic Islands with the smoke from her funnel outlined against the red sky. She was a gorgeous sight and I could feel my eyes welling up as I watched until she disappeared from view.

Both Mike and I spent our first night on board the QM2 in a bit of a funk. We went to dinner, but now we were seated at a back table in a huge 2-story dining room instead of at our prime seats in the intimate Princess Grill. Our waiters were very efficient, but they didn't have time to give the personal attention we had been used to. We ordered a bottle of wine, but it didn't come until after our main course was finished, It was not a good start. We went to the entertainment after dinner, and suffered through a show featuring a not very funny comedian. The flower arrangements on the ship were very nice, but they didn't show the imagination and pizzaz of those done by the QE2 florist. We couldn't help but make comparisons all evening, and as beautiful and glamourous a ship as the Queen Mary undoubtedly is, she was losing badly. We went back to our cabin, which is smaller than our other room, and crawled into bed. And, ah, finally the QM2 came out ahead - the mattress was divine!