Friday 1^st May 2015 – Day at Sea.

We took our passports down to the Britannia restaurant to clear British passport control and were pleased that the weather was very British as well – wet and windy!

We sailed through the Bay of Biscay and it was as flat as a millpond.

We went to listen to lecture by the Safety Officer which was very good (although Nesta thinks he’s nowhere near as good looking as Aureliano!)

In the afternoon we finally played bridge! (Ian thinks he did very well in delaying it for this long!) We were a bit confused, as only one other pair played the same way as us! (For Graeme’s benefit this means that every other pair played Standard American, strong no trump with five card majors with a possible phony club bid - as opposed to our Basic Acol!)

Ian got even more confused by the bidding - but even allowing for this, we finished fourth.

Fortunately we finished in time for Nesta to attend the “hat decorating” session! (Oh yes!!) The idea was to encourage passengers to have a hat good enough for the “Ascot Ball” but as we had already packed our formal gear we sat this out!

 

Saturday 2^nd May – Day at Sea.

The last day of our voyage – and it’s raining!

As we are getting back on in a fortnight for the 175 year Liverpool celebration, we packed our formal kit (and the wine) in a suitcase and phoned one of our friends on board who has offered to put it under his bed!

We spent the day packing but decided to give the evening entertainment one last chance to impress us. Unfortunately Roy Walker was not funny and “The Flyrights” were absolutely appalling - so we left early and went into the restaurant for a last meal. It was a nice meal and we said goodbye to Robert and Leo, giving them both a “little something” in thanks. Leo is going home tomorrow but Robert will still be on when we return – so we’ll ask to be moved to his section when we get back on.

After our meal all we had to do was finish our packing and put the cases out for collection. We contacted Graeme to let him know we should be off by 11am.

 

Sunday 3^rd May – Southampton.

Well – here we are!

113 days later and we’re back in Southampton. We have been told to sit in the Britannia Restaurant and await our slot to leave the ship will be at 10-15am.

At 9-45am a message came over the loudspeaker that the gangway was closed, due to a security issue, and disembarkation had therefore been delayed….We gave it until 10-35am before deciding to join the queue and get off under our own steam. Nobody checked whether we should have been in the queue or not and we got off in time to meet Graeme!

Overall we have had a fantastic trip. We have seen some amazing places and the QM2 is a tremendous ship. We do feel that Cunard are not as good as they think they are (living on their name) but we are glad we came!

Thank you all for reading (and commenting) on our blog and, if you can bear it, we’ll start it again in a fortnight when we get back onto this wonderful ship!

Bye!!