D&N

That does make it more complex, in that I imagine you need two sets of advice. I would have thought the US Government would have a similar facility to the UK but not something I've ever needed to research. Good luck.

I would go to: https://www.gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice , assuming you are British in that your profile says location UK. Select each relevant country and the information should be there. For a belt and braces approach I'd then go to each individual countries website and check that it didn't contradict the UK gov info.

Surprised PA isn't on that list! It is after all a Blanc de Blancs. 🤣 Seriously though; did any of the non French offerings taste anything like the Chablis, Puligny-Montrachet or Meursault? Glad you enjoyed it.

We are highly unlikely to book QG at any time in future. We've considered what an upgrade from A1 to P2 would mean and location of grills restaurants on QM2. Neither would suit our particular needs/likes better than A1, so we're better spending any extra cash on wine etc. However I would still be interested to read genuine experiences and comments from a regular traveller, albeit someone who is probably slightly biased towards the product 😀.

Back in the 1960s it tended to be more general fancy dress. There wasn't the flood of cheap outfits in shops there is now. My mother used to make us outfits, including a penguin of much better quality than ours, it was made for my older sister but I then used it when I grew into it. I had a kangaroo outfit with a length of curtain rail covered in fabric for the tail and a pouch for the baby joey. I had a bear based on a faux fur jacket worn back to front. For all these she made really well fitted heads with properly positioned eye and mouth holes. One of my sisters had a witches outfit that was also in a church panto I think. And a variety of others. So really just a nod back to that.

It's my bedtime so I'm not about to look anything up. Do you have a source for the QM2 number? I don't even know why the numbers have been quoted? It doesn't ring any bells with me. I'm sure someone with time on their hands will be along any minute!

Sorry. Binned when we cleared our loft before leaving Scotland.

The only time in our adult lives that we have dressed up for a Halloween Party (fancy dress or costume party), was an event at a sister in laws. A variety of cheap poly-cotton sheets were bought at ASDA (part of Walmart) and stapled together. A close study of the footwear can identify the male and female species. I originally thought we might recycle the outfits as nuns the following year but the subsequent party wasn't held (or they didn't invite us!). Potentially these could have been worn for the Masquerade Ball and the Black & White Gala! 🤣

I'm considering white tie with an ordinary dinner suit. My wife plans to wear another white gown accessorised with black for our next black & white night. I wondered how white tie and pocket square might look, so intend to buy those items and try it. If we don't think it's suitable I'll go back to black. I haven't researched whether that might break any sartorial rules but I'm more interested in whether we think it looks better than black tie when we are seen/photographed together. If you like the look I wouldn't bother too much about other peoples opinions.

There is of course no need to follow any theme other than the Gala Night dress code. However themes such as Black & White, Red & Gold or Ice White are fairly clear to most folk. A few people mistake the intentions of Masquerade and Roaring 20s as being fancy dress/halloween party themes. I'm sure the intentions are to recreate the elegance of aristocratic Venetian and 1920s events rather than to dress up as Batman & Robin 🦸‍♂️ or 1920s gangsters (can't find an emoji).

Here it is flipped. There are thousands of QM2 exterior photos online, Marine Traffic has close to 1,750. If you compare photos of both sides you'll see that the lifeboats line up with the same features on each side of the ship, which confirms that they are generally identical. 8013, 8014, 8109 & 8110 are probably the clearest of the obstructed. There are a couple around 8045 & 8046 that have a zodiac instead of a lifeboat, and you can see over the zodiac easily. We originally booked 8014 & 8045 for trips that were cancelled so I looked into the views quite thoroughly although they weren't available for our eventual trip and we had funds to go for an A1.

Imagine 8110 flipped. The two sides are almost mirror images. I don't have tools to do it just now. The clear space will be to right towards stern.

Where folk actually wear a dress intended for the theme, they are generally like some of the below knee versions shown on this website: https://zapaka.com/collections/1920s-dresses Nora's had some beading but hadn't been intended for that. It came from https://chescadirect.co.uk/ sale. We did buy something else from Zapaka a few years ago and I think delivery took quite a few weeks from the far east. We have a couple from SHEIN. Since they're not really gowns she can get plenty of use from them here.

You can buy a connecting flight from Victoria BC to Heathrow. Some of the options were a change at Vancouver. The point was it would mean disembarking QE a day earlier, if it could be arranged, and therefore arriving in LHR a day earlier as well. However it's immaterial as the OP in post #11 decided to book something else.

There was of course one theme night when we intentionally dressed for the wrong theme. Our trip had two Roaring Twenties Gala nights. The first had originally been listed as a Masquerade night. We dressed as planned for the Masquerade theme, although we only donned our masks for some of our own and some of the professional photos. I don't think anyone really noticed and we certainly didn't feel out of place.

"a sharp looking sweat suit". What is that? 🤣🤣🤣 Not the Riviera we live on!

Thank you. Mercruiser posted 5 tests with download ranging from 4.17 to 32.6. Yours is within that range. What is much shorter are your "ping" times, which suggests your signal is getting to/from the server quicker and may be why you're getting good results. I don't think Starlink is operating yet on QM2. The provider "Equinix" is the same in your test as in the earlier ones. I suspect off the Spanish coast and in the Med you have been getting a better satellite link. It might even be to do with atmospheric conditions somewhere on the 20,000 mile trip to the satellite. The main thing is you're happy and can do what you need with it.

Hello @DaisyUK, If you get the chance can you try running "Speedtest by Ookla" to get a report of the internet speeds you are experiencing? It can be found at speedtest.net on a browser, or you can download the app from App Store or Play Store. Mercruiser took several readings a few weeks ago just before Starlink was installed, on this thread here:

I found a 2021 wine gift price list and used the following search term, which revealed a number of similar pdf files with 2021 prices: my.cunard.com content dam cunard my-cruise gifts pdfs

They train in our bay quite frequently.

I would think most ladies Smart Attire clothing would be just as appropriate on gala nights.

Could the answer be that those who want more formal nights, dress formally on some additional nights when formal is not required? Instead of "lugging" stuff around for fewer nights, wear it on gala nights and a few others of your own choosing. If lots of folk did that then word may get back to the "company" that there are folk who want gala nights, in the same way they are being told that some are eating in the buffet because they don't like formal. Both these photos were taken on "Smart Attire" nights. If you read the definition in the daily program you would find that we complied with requirements. Next time I will probably wear a black or white tux every night on a 14 or 15 night round trip crossing. Rationalising in that way may also reduce the amount I need to lug around.

Firstly, in my earlier post I hadn't checked that the OP was from NZ. My experience is with UK and French registered financial products. I'm not actually sure that being a French resident our UK accounts are fully covered by UK regulations although I have had refunds on fraudulent activity. We certainly don't qualify for Nationwide's travel insurance. On the 'Wise' debit card. My experience has been that I didn't need to have an inflated balance on the card. In practice I did have about double on the card when boarding QM2 because we were making a separate visit to New York a few weeks after our crossings. However the charge to: Cuk Qmary Ii Usd, was listed as being taken the day after we boarded. The card record shows: "The total of this payment has been updated. The original amount was 1 USD. The difference has been taken from your balance." Every time we spent anything the authorisation was updated but never at any time exceeded our actual spend. When we checked in to Sofitel New York we had already paid for the stay in full, and for all our planned sightseeing trips. There was just over $1,000 left on the card and they applied an authorisation for $600, probably on basis of $100/night. I didn't want to have lots of USD left on the card when we returned to France and I told them re-authorise to my credit card. When I did that the $600 was immediately released and available to spend. In summary, we didn't need to have more than our planned spend on QM2 and pre-authorisations clear immediately on the Wise card.

And if you come across 'Habit To' Band, perhaps you could comment on how much of their stuff is danceable? I looked them up on YouTube. They have some original stuff that's quite heavy. I can pick out a beat from much of it that we could dance to. They'd probably be mortified at the thought of folk doing foxtrot or quick step to it! 😀 But they do covers as well and have demo videos to get cruise and hotel work.

Another recommendation here for both Nationwide Credit Cards and Wise (previously Transferwise). As French holiday home owners and more recently residents we've used our Nationwide cards for regular spend here for about 20 years. All our revenue is in £s and most of our spend in €s. On a daily basis the GBP:EUR rate we get from that can't be beaten. If the rate is unacceptable we switch to local cards in €. We started using Wise in December 2014, initially with a small FX transfer to try them and since for all our FX transactions, including funds for buying property. We pick a day/time that the rate is beneficial. That ensures we have a fall back if the £ isn't doing well enough, and of course we need it for utility bills etc that must go through a French account. Originally Nationwide cards were fee free in the VISA Europe area and we would have paid a small commission for spend in USD. I got a Wise card to cater for that and had loaded it at a beneficial rate in advance of our trip to US in 2020, which of course was cancelled. In the last few years the fee for USD spend has been removed. The balance on the Wise card paid all the QM2 bills including drinks packages, good wines, photos, handbag & bear. They notified in real time when Cunard updated the authorisation amount. We ran down the balance on the Wise card in a subsequent visit to New York, paying the last few bills on the Nationwide card. In New York, the hotel put a large authorisation on the Wise card. The main bill had already been paid and this was in case we had any extra stuff. That meant there was a load of cash on the card we couldn't spend. Switched the authorisation to the Nationwide card and problem solved. We were then able to spend it all on meals etc. Our room in the Sofitel on W 44th was large and very comfortable but we had no intention of using it for anything other than sleeping and showering etc, nor using any of the hotel's other facilities. I guess that last bit reinforces one of the benefits of credit over debit.