WantedOnVoyage

Easiest dress code I have ever experienced on a voyage was First Class in Costa Line's EUGENIO C., Rio to Genoa: it was formal dress every single night at sea (10 days across I recall) and for gentlemen, it was almost a "uniform" and what man doesn't like that? For the ladies, it was a challenge and I swear most managed to wear something different and distinctive every single night.  The mountains of luggage that came off in Barcelona and Genoa showed how that was accomplished.

32 minutes ago, exlondoner said:

Except the term dress shirt is unclear, meaning something different depending on where you are. 

Well if anyone... in the English speaking world thinks a "polo" shirt is a "dress shirt" by any definition.. they would be wrong.  It is not. Never has been. Everyone has the right to fudge, to obscure but to not to twist the English (be it British or American) language into a pretzel of his or her own making. 

And just as selfishly I hope to see them still aboard QV in... 12 days time!

Sure is.... my favourite meal of the whole voyage since it's... well the first one.  Thirteen days until ours... not that I am counting or anticipating. 

It is curious that  "pomposity" is a quality oft ascribed to those wishing to dress "over" the minimum (and it is, too) dress code while it is no less pompous to insist, as some do, that "it's my holiday" and I can dress as I darn please.  It may be your holiday but you are sharing with it, in close confines, with others.... a ship is a community. Always has been. I am not sure, too, how one dressed for work has anything to do with the unique environment of a Cunarder... the only ships in the world that even aspire something to anything above "chinos" and "polos".  If the dress code is so onerous, why there are 99.7 percent of the rest of cruise ships to sail on. 

I would avoid QM2 Q1s for the nonstop noise of the canned "music" played around the pool and open deck during the day just below your "private" balcony.  If you can hear this up on the Grills Deck if the wind is right (and you can), it must be very noticeable on the suite balconies. I would find it unbearable. I cannot imagine why this is even necessary with the myriad ways of listening, privately, to one's own music if needed.  But to spend a Q1 per diem forced to listen to this... no way. 

5 minutes ago, Austcruiser84 said:

I believe QA’s forward hull is slightly more robust than your average cruise ship. Therefore slightly more liner in design than cruise ship. 

 You do? Where did you read that?  I do not believe her hull is any different from any of the other Pinnacle-class ships.  That's a major, significant structural alteration of plates and framing too and for what reason would this be done? She is a cruise ship in design, purpose and profile not a liner by any definition of the word.  And nothing wrong with that, either. But a liner is a lady as Kipling wrote and QA is no liner and I'll leave it others to determine if she's a lady. 

Amen.... honestly, you'd think they were digging a ditch at dinner or after dinner. The only time that was acceptable was in CANBERRA's notorious Stadium "Theatre" which was originally, as the name suggests, a semi enclosed sports deck that they roofed over to be the first "theatre at sea" and had...well... no effective air conditioning.  The performers were soaked in 20 mins and every chair back was draped with a dinner jacket.  Why it was another CANBERRA tradition. 

But come on people.... learn some manners. Jackets belong on your back, not the chair's. And if you're working up a sweat eating dinner, you might think about that, too. 

We have cruised extensively in the "R"s including the original R7 (Renaissance/Oceania) and I love them. My wife doesn't... the BAC-111 size "bathrooms" of 90 percent of the cabins not high on her list and yes, as a sensitive sailor, she can discern they are not anything like any of the big Cunarders or even CARONIA in anything like a sea. And off the coast of Libya on the R7, she was really feeling the swell.  So were many others. I suspect it's an easier transition to go from Oceania/Azamara "R"s up to Cunard Grills than the other way around. Was for us and... we have not gone back.

To be clear... a dark suit has always been acceptable and suitable for Cunard on formal nights.  Sure has since I started sailing with them... in 1977. More common in Tourist Class but not uncommon in First Class, either.

To me, the big downgrade of the dress code is "Smart Attire" and regardless of what the code now states, I personally cannot even imagine going to dinner in a fine restaurant... ashore or afloat... wearing a "polo shirt". If you don't think Cunard is fine dining... you are wasting your time and money and their efforts.   The "polo shirt" is, as the very name implies, an item of sports attire and most do not look like Steve McQueen in "The Thomas Crown Affair" wearing one, either. So... don't. Or at least wear a jacket over it. 

And to end on a pompous note.... a dress code is not for "men" but for.... "gentlemen" (and ladies) and therein lies the distinction.  What one might is not always what one should. 

Well I went to university for a term in The Bronx, and up there we'd put it rather differently than you delicate Brooklyn boys...

The drinks menu is what I recall from our September QV Med/Aegean cruise... there's precisely one gin martini and one vodka one under $12. I did find the bar staff sufficiently fed up with these duelling drinks packages that one could, at the onset, say "I want this and I have a $12 limit" and they got on with it.  Not the sort of thing I like having to do as a premium passenger but shipboard staff can play the game better than the shoreside penny counters I find.

It is amusing though how the shipboard staff just roll their eyes if you mention shoreside "management"... Cunard ships are so much better run and organised than the supposed people managing any of it... from Southampton or California. Or indeed, "working from home" in wherever.  They've been that way since my first dealings with Cunard, dating to 1977. So it's worthy of the "Cunard Heritage Trail". 

Well it appears you got it... QUEEN POSTUREPEDIC!  At least it will discourage those armchair nappers in the Commodore and Chart Room in the afternoon... the ones with the same book for the whole three weeks and never make it past page 21. Ditto no steamer chairs. It seems a mite austere and severe to me, but I always aced cabin inspection on my ship... even sharing a cabin with three 16 year old cadets. 

Yes... very hard to get a fair impression of interiors in at this stage... finished just enough to be deceptive without being well... really finished.  And empty spaces without people even more so.I bet the housekeeping staff is not pleased with all those black hard surfaces in the suites... what a dusting nightmare!  

Me, I am more concerned that I have yet to see one piece of furniture that is not covered with what appears easy care vinyl or imitation leather.  There is not a single piece of comfy looking fabric upholstered furnture either portrayed in the renderings or in reality. And all of the chairs are upright, small profile armchairs that might be suitable for dining but hardly condusive to lounging with a good book and a coffee. The other Cunarders are filled with this type of traditional furnishing imparting a cosy quality that seems wholly lacking in QA as presented. So those who want different... well it appears they got it!

Thanks... personally, I'd just rather pay the cheaper UK market Grill fares that don't include "free drinks package" that is now anything but and those who wish can just buy the existing drinks packages of our choice. RIght now, this promotion is a pat on the head while they are reaching into your pocket.

8 hours ago, Germancruiser said:

Thanks for posting those great pictures. To my delight I saw that the prommenade deck of QA is indeed NOT blocked by the liveboats- well at least it looks like it when looking at the picture on post 28. Can´t wait to see for sure if that is the case.

But they are.... you are looking at the big shore tenders amidships which are suspended over the deck only as high as the rail as there is added clearance needed for their rudders and propellers. So yes, if you are a five-year-old, you might be able to peer through the rail under the tenders and get a sea view. But all of the the regular lifeboats are indeed, as on all the PINNACLE-class, flat on the deck, completely blocking the view for... everyone. 

The stats tell the story... they usually do. Things don't seem, they just are:

QA  P1/P2 302 sq. ft.

QV/QE  P1/P2 335 sq.ft.

QM2 P1/P2 381 sq. ft

QA Q6  484 sq. ft

QV/QE Q6 484 sq. ft.

QM2 506 sq. ft.

generalinquiries@cunard.com 

from a message from Cunard customer service 19 March:

Our management team will be looking at possible changes in the future for this matter. Thank you for contacting Cunard and have a good day.

Oh, they threw in a $50 obc as "an expression of good will." so there's that.

We sail in QUEEN VICTORIA from Southampton... why 20 days from today... so who knows how Cunard defines "in the future"... 19 days or three years or... never. And we hope we have one of our team of very creative wine and bar stewards we been favoured with in the past. 

I would suggest any Grill passengers e-mail them in any event about this.  The more the merrier as they say.

None of these changes had anything whatsoever with the decor of the rooms... most were done as operational or revenue enhancers.

Have you ever even been aboard QE2?

I have... five times throughout most of her career and I can tell you that in 1977 and 1979 most of her principal public rooms and cabins were exactly as they were when built and used as intended. Coumbia Restaurant, Midships Bar, Library, Card Room, Queen's Room, Entrance Foyer, passageways, cabins etc were all original.  We sailed in her in 1993 and had an original cabin and much else was still original that late in her career.  

The First Class Library stayed the same until she was re-engined... same location and doubled in size, taking the former card room.

QE2 was certainly changed a lot inside but no British liner before or since was more critically acclaimed... "Ships Have Been Boring Long Enough"... when she came out in 1969 she was indeed unlike any Cunard and all the better for it. I remember someone in school bringing in the first brochure and we 12 year olds though she was "groovy"!  And she was, too. 

I am not suggesting duplicating QE2's interiors in a new ship but the spirit of originality, boldness and native design genius she represented.  I don't see any of that in QUEEN ANNE.  Do you?  She's just a typical Tihany Group design inside. 

That is.... not correct. I sailed in QE2 in 1977 and almost all of her interiors were original. And exceptional.  So what you state is wrong. 

Oh something that was 100 per cent British design for starters rather like QUEEN ELIZABETH 2 c. 1969, all Dennis Lennon and Britsh Design Council.  Now she was special and distinctive.... contemporary to the point she's considered a true classic today.  The Grill Room, Queen's Room, Library were instant icons of liner decor and the quality was... exceptional. She had Axminister carpet that was so thick it was sinful just to walk on. 

P&O's AURORA, when original, was exceptionally attractive inside and quite distinctive with a sense of "Britishness".  

Sorry, QUEEN ANNE looks precisely like all the Holland America Line Pinnacles inside... harsh, cold, hard surfaced and with relentlessly uncomfortable looking chairs.  Indeed, the computer renderings probably capture the feeling being clinical in themselves.  

1 hour ago, tacticalbanjo said:

it's bang on trend.

Just what we value Cunard for, no?  Munchin size chairs with easy care thin upholstery, metal framed and obviously designed for people with 28" inseams.  But the sage green redeems all.

The "Drawing Room" is downright curious, possibly taking its "what are we supposed to do in here" cue from the QM2's "winter garden" that, in the end, was used for the  "art auctions".  

Oh dear, still not swept off my feet by any of this.... what can I be thinking? Or indeed, what are they thinking?  Hope those of you booked can tell us what you think and prove the computer generated images dead wrong. 

My wife is gluten-free (Coeliac) and her experience with her diet in Princess Grill has been exemplary.  But yes, for the last three years, the bakery items are alas "ready made" and they no longer make these items aboard with gluten-free flour.  Oddly, though, they will go to the most extraordinary efforts to make gluten free Beef Wellingtons etc. and most breaded dishes, too. Just not the actual bread or biscuits.  

But Cunard are just outstanding... so much better than Oceania... with her diet and one of the main reasons we stay loyal to Cunard.  I don't think you'd be disappointed. 

But SAGAFJORD... sigh. I still remember sailing on the last voyage in home waters of VISTAJORD in 1983 when she was still a proper NAL liner. And we loved her as CARONIA. Those were grand ships and sadly Cunard never replaced them in quality or character since.