Tag: Southampton

Queen Anne 31.8.24

1 September 2024 / admin

DFDS Cross Channel Ferry

Today we are at sea – all day with docking in Southampton due in the early hours of Sunday morning. If anything looking out of the windows at time are progress not only seems glacial – more like non-existent. I assume we are moving forwards but we really are moving very gingerly – the average will be under 10 knots for this journey.

To ensure we are au fait with the dining options we go to the Artisans Foodhall for breakfast – it is of course simply a renamed buffet and here I sense a real design problem. The counters are set high and plates are all passed over it with all food being served by the chefs. Fine – except that the plates are pretty warm and we have seen a lot of people this week on board using walkers and wheelchairs who simply cannot reach that high (and can probably not so easily manage a hot plate). I assume the high level design emanates post-covid – but to me it feels like a step backwards. However I do get both black and white pudding – which is rare anywhere else – so well done Cunard.

White Cliffs Dover

Regrettably the fine weather has vanished and it is grey and overcast outside; if it were not for the excessive number of windmills on the various horizons it is similar to being mid-Pacific – although as the day progresses we get views of coast lines and indeed intermittent 4G signals enabling a partial football score – until the signal is lost!

We have not previously visited the Observation Deck so head up there – it is open air and as we soon find it is the only location onboard where smoking is permitted – well there has to be somewhere! We do some reading but head elsewhere in favour of fresh air after a while. I think we have seen most of the ship on our various peregrinations around the boat. We did plan a burger on the Pavilion Deck – which is the main pool area – but it is both busy and noisy so decide on a light lunch up in the Grills restaurant.

Appealing activities were limited this morning but we have a busy afternoon. Jackie does her packing and then heads off to Bingo. I make use of the balcony – the seats are comfortable and I can listen to some podcasts and also observe the white cliffs of Dover as we are proceeding (still pretty slowly) along past Dover and Folkestone – with cross channel ferries crossing in front of us at one stage.

I then attend to some of my packing and then I attempt to find out progress in Brentford of the Southampton team – once we go 1-0 down I am fed up and almost glad that we lose the signal. I then join Jackie for some music in the Queen’s Room before attending most of the evening performance in the Royal Court theatre – but it is not as enthralling as “Brief Encounter” so depart for dinner.

Come Sunday morning we are docked and an early breakfast beckons before we can disembark, find our suitcases and car and return home.

Queen Anne 28.8.24

29 August 2024 / admin

Queen Anne Southampton

Embarcation for our cruise is Southampton ocean terminal and whilst we are half an hour early many others are well in front of us. We join short queue but soon a man is taking notes and then photos of the car, key handed over and we walk across to drop our main cases and head into the Ocean Terminal.

Check in is busy and passport dates are closely checked but we remain well within validity at the moment. They decide to retake our security photos with glasses on but the longest delay is the check at the ship, although I cause a delay as my watch has tripped the security gate as I forgot to take it off.

We are asked to also visit our muster station and have our passes scanned as a double check that we are on board and also know the location of our muster station. As the muster station is on stairway C, at the aft so having walked back we get scanned. Next we want the Queen’s Grill where we will be eating our meals so we take the lift up to level 10 which is the location of the Grill restaurants. Only to find that there is no entry from this direction – it is closed off – so we have to go down a floor, through the buffet restaurant (re-imagined as an “Artisans’ Foodhall”) to the mid-ships lift.

We head up in the lift to the Grill restaurants which will open at 1300 and after a drink we are positioned at a table behind a pillar and close to a serving station so the good lady wife is not at all happy and asks if we can be relocated, we shall see.

Lunch devoured we find our suite on deck seven which is towards the aft of the ship. Jackie’s case arrives and she unpacks and mine then appears quite a bit later. As ever I suspect we have both over packed.

Queen Anne remains stationary and we head up to deck 11 and the Grills terrace where we can sit in the sun for an hour or so, although it is cloudier than early and even spits with rain at one point.

Showing that the ship is new it is announced that the usual emergency sirens will be heard and we have to go to our muster station. Given our earlier visit this is a surprise! However shortly before the alarms are sounded the instruction to visit the muster station is counter-manded; obviously scripts are not up to date!

Queen Anne

Warning sirens sounded we commence sailing and head steadily down Southampton Water past Fawley and Netley and then we start heading eastwards towards the English Channel, turning as we get close to the Isle of Wight following the marker buoys.

Arriving back at the Grill restaurant for our dinner it is pleasing to hear that an alternative table has been found from which we can view the passing landscape on the port side, Gosport, Portsmouth, Spitbank Fort, distant Wittering and Pagham are all out there somewhere.

We each have excellent steaks for dinner.

Post dinner we visit the theatre but are not greatly taken by the entertainer so slip out and return to our suite for a drink and bed. We lose an hour tonight as we move to Rotterdam time ahead of our arrival there tomorrow afternoon.

Sleep is a little disturbed, hot, then cold, then hot again, odd noises and some strange notions. First night is often short of sleep.

Back Home

14 October 2016 / admin

Friday 2 and Saturday 3 September 2016

Friday is spent entirely at sea as we head back down the North Sea and through the English Channel to berth at Southampton, right back where we started from.

A day at sea allows the shipboard team the opportunity to arrange extra events. We have a look around the specialist restaurants and will probably take advantage of them if we ever come on the Celebrity again as they break up the dining. Jackie usually partakes in a bingo session on a sea day, although I do not always accompany her I do this time. Just as well as she enjoys a small win on this trip, mainly because one number flashes up but was not announced by the caller – although I spotted it! Lucky!

The evening entertainment has been pretty good throughout the trip – a Freddie Mercury impersonator one night and an excellent girl singer who has worked on UK X Factor and won (I think) the Dutch version. I am told we will be doing a Celebrity cruise again in the future, it is more relaxed than Cunard and the entertainment is better – of course the ships are much larger which gives greater capacity but the ratio of staff to passengers is not so good – but the service seems pretty good to me.

On Saturday morning we cannot be sure when we are disembarking as it is done in stages and we are given estimates of when it is likely that we can go and collect our luggage. The more expensive staterooms tend to disembark first. We have time for a breakfast but they are ahead of schedule and we are about half way through breakfast when we are told we can go. Finding luggage is always fun in the adjacent “warehouse” and unlike when we arrived we have to walk back to the car – when we arrived the luggage was collected at the car and that was the last we saw of it until we were in our cabins! Luckily the wheels on the cases work and we are not in a great hurry.

Steve and Veronica have definitely enjoyed the trip and are looking at what might be worth booking for the future.

Route segment	Distance in Nautical miles
Southampton to Bergen	805
Bergen to Flam	100
Flam to Geiranger (approx)	256
Geiranger to Alesund (approx)	65
Alesund to Stavanger	250
Stavanger to Southampton	635
Total (approx)	2111

And with that summary another holiday comes to an end.

Sailing Outwards

26 September 2016 / admin

Friday 26 and Saturday 27 August 2016

Another holiday starts here. After a period when Jackie implied that she was not keen on cruising – largely due to the unpleasantness in the Bay of Biscay – here we are off on another cruise and we are joined by Steve and Veronica. This time we are not with Cunard but we are travelling with Celebrity in one of their largest cruisers – the Eclipse.

The background to the Eclipse can be found here. Compared to Cunard ships she is larger and with many more passengers and less staff to passengers but the entire atmosphere is far more relaxed. We embark at Southampton and as usual once the bags are handed over life is easy.

We sail away on the Friday afternoon in bright sunshine and the sea is dead smooth. We take what seems an unusual route to the west of Cowes before turning to port, obviously staying right in the deepest channel and then heading along the south coast. The Spinnaker Tower at Gunwharf Quay can be seen in the distance and we head east as our destination is Norway.

There are some photographs of our initial departure to be found here.

Saturday is entirely at sea as we are heading north, although to be honest we do not get to see any land on either side as we sail at a steady rate, probably a little below the top speed on 24 knots (28 mph). We do see numbers of oil platforms as we get further north.

Our cabin is outside with a nice balcony on which to sit and very close to the nearest lifts. The balcony seems untroubled by wind and we are able to sit out there at times for a read quite comfortably. Noise and vibration is non-existent and we have a very good night’s sleep. It was the tour consultant’s suggestion and it definitely seems to be good.

Dining times are not fixed for us. We can wander down to the restaurant and if they do not have a table for us they give us a little box which lights up and buzzes when our turn comes up on the system. It all seems to work and they have a pretty good idea of how long before a table is free. And there is bar not far away for a drink.

And the sea remains pretty smooth and we continue heading north! According to my check it is about 800 nautical miles (which itself is 1852 metres – about 15% more than a UK land mile) from Southampton to Bergen which is our first port of call on Sunday.