Pushpit

Just look at the deck plans. Most staterooms are portrait in respect of the main door, some are clearly landscape. So on QA, look at 4060 and 4062. Or for inside staterooms, compare 1116 and 1114. On QA there aren't many so we can probably guess which one they were in.

The legislation isn't giving us direct guidance on this. Here's my take on it: "significant change" - to whom exactly does that apply? Cunard? the passenger? or possibly both? Well it can't be Cunard since they made the change, they can't mark their own homework on this. Plus as part of one of the UK and USA's largest companies arguably very little is significant since the sums of money at stake here aren't even rounding numbers in their annual accounts. So "significant" must mean "significant to the customer". Therefore to my mind if a customer says it is significant AND has some rational reasons to back this up, then significant it is. The clearest way of putting this is to say "I would not have booked this sailing had I seen the revised timetable". If it got to the court or arbitration process then this could be tested as to plausibility and I wouldn't want to be Cunard's lawyer. At the other extreme would be someone who could identify a particular reason for being in (say) Messina - booking excursions, lunch, meeting friends, making internet searches. One could even use some Cruise Critic queries as evidence that Messina was an important part of the sailing. So in my view it is down to each passenger to calibrate this for themselves. Some passengers would indeed just party on, regardless, and for them the word "significant" would not apply.

It's pretty leisurely when she does get going. Each sector is 200 to 300 statute miles long, it's probably around half the total distance of the original. It's basically swapping Corsica and Sicily for a gentle plod around Sardinia.

Just to explain the last paragraph a bit: on the literary festival crossings that I have done, there have also been a substantial number of publishers, agents, academics, print companies, marketing company representatives on board, as well as the authors. Perhaps 100 such guests? I guess this is how Cunard gets the show to work. Those in the industry are therefore to some extent working on board, and thus take over several of the rooms in the Connexions area. Usually just 4 and 5, the big room at the back of Illuminations, but they are also given exclusive use of the computer room for at least some days, that's on the starboard side of Connexions. The computers are still available in the library. They also have their own cocktail party and similar social events, so this may close off say the Champagne Bar for a couple of hours at 17:00 hrs, then it's back at 19:00 hrs. They also use the smaller meeting rooms down on Deck 1. For the paid passengers I personally don't think it's a big imposition since most of these rooms aren't greatly used in conventional crossings. but views will vary on that. For those who are interested in the authors and writing there are quite a few things that happen. So yes there are interviews in the theatre or illuminations where Amanda Reid will ask questions of the authors and allow questions from the audience. Sometimes you get 2 authors debating a question such as "is Magic Realism a cop out?" (my wording, the actual title is more subtle!). There may be a writing class in Queens Room where an academic will pose some exercise questions for the audience for which to try their hand.

Cunard has an outsourced agent for Iberia, Mexico and those European markets that Cunard don't have a marketing presence (e.g. Croatia), and is known as Cunard Cruceros. Their website has a reputation for the precision and details that are woefully missing from Cunard itself. This is what it says at the moment:

I am just putting the prices here, just to see what happens over the next few days. If cancellations start to be processed, these prices will dip. UK Point of Sale Direct, 2 passengers sharing. (For single passengers there is also Oceanview on sale at £1349).

Yes, that's always been the issue with travel agents versus tour operators, and it's a peril TAs face and probably hate. It wouldn't surprise me that this is the dialogue that you are not witnessing at the moment. But it goes with the job, and a good tour operator will reach an accommodation with their travel agents since ultimately TAs can start pushing business to other companies. A typical outcome in this scenario is for Carnival to tell the TA "give Isitme a full refund, sell that or another cabin to someone else for a hefty reduction / big OBC, and we will maintain your commission".

In the European regulations (which still apply in the UK) "significant change" is not precisely defined, but there is wording which says that even if the supplier (Cunard) is forced by external factors to change an essential item in the contract then the consumer should be contacted to allow the consumer to withdraw from the contract. That includes when a "significant proportion" of the contracted services cannot be met. So on a land based package tour, changing a package from resort A to resort B is always a significant change. But changing from hotel X to hotel Y may be regarded as not significant is hotel Y is considered a higher standard and has all the facilities of X and more. So that is how tour companies handle hotel problems - they either find a better hotel which no-one will complain about, or they decide to offer a refund anyway since the cost of hotel Y is too high. In Scots law the wording is "material change" but it has the same meaning in this context. The above is factual. As to my personal opinion, leaving out one location and cutting the sailing aspects by more than a quarter is a significant change. It gets overwhelming if the visit to Messina was a significant reason for you to book this particular sailing. I actually think Cunard will refund, the TA here hasn't got the matter on to the right desk yet.

From other events of this sort, that seems to the the SOP: offer OBC / make tour arrangements but not advertise the cancellation option. In reality, depending on where the passenger lives, there may be a legal right to cancellation and full refund for anything judged to be a "significant change". That applies to Europe including the UK. So those who enquire are told it is possible, and may also be offered a credit note uplift on a future booking within the next (say) 12 months.

On my QV PG menu from January (the OP was asking about QM2) the cheese trolley is shown as the penultimate item, with the coffee and petit fours at the end. So the dessert first. But if you want the cheese trolley before dessert, or even before the entrées for that matter, then I'm sure that your wish would be accommodated.

I was also on this sailing, and I enjoyed it, mainly thanks to the beautiful weather in Hamburg and the big send off from the people of that city on the Monday evening, which was unforgettable. It was like the whole city turned up to wave us off. Tuesday was a bit strange - a hot sunny period through the German Bight then a foggy afternoon off Holland and Belgium. It was good to hear QM2's foghorn every few minutes. As for recommendations: if you really like QM2 as a ship then it has to be a Crossing, that was what she was built for. Some Crossings then link in with a trip to the Caribbean or Canada. But the longer timeframe would allow the restaurant staff to get familiar with communicating with you. If you were on fixed sittings in Britannia you would get the same table and same staff every night. I doubt that many of them can do BSL but as someone who has deaf patients I know from my own experience that over time it gets a lot easier. So the longer the sailing the better, I guess.

I've not seen the 15 minute rule applied, but talking to a bar staff member they do use it in the Golden Lion and sometimes Commodore out of concern for people who may be tanking booze. Like many Cunard "rules", usually the passengers are treated as sensible adults, thankfully, it's a rule that's there so that it doesn't need to be applied. That said, getting in two rounds of drinks within 15 minutes may be wishful thinking - the wait staff are often working flat out and work a circle pattern in their service, and so it wouldn't be unusual for there to be a 15 minute gap plus on that circuit particularly at busy times. You can't rely on the caps being left on drinks, sometimes they get removed over the bar before getting to the wait staff. It's particularly annoying in Britannia restaurant if they take away the cap from the large sparkling water bottles at the start of the meal, since the cap keeps the water carbonated over the course of dinner. It only happens a minority of times. That said the cost of the Harrogate large bottles is pretty good value, even without the discounts and if you mainly drink water rather than alcohol then it's unlikely a premium soft drink package is going to be cost effective. The 1 litre bottles are cheaper than the 330 ml coke bottles.

Glass. Small bottles (330 ml) are in the premium packages, but not the 1 litre bottles. Moreover the packages don't cover the stateroom or room service, just the restaurants, bars and related venues. In the soda package then soda water from the bar fountain is included.

Yes, for delivery in the stateroom. Now there is a bit of confusion here, since the room service menu has, for a long time, offered 6 bottle of Harrogate water (still, sparking or both) for US$23, which is a whole dollar off the $4 per bottle price. Then earlier this week I saw this in my QM2 stateroom, which I've not seen before, and gives a more meaty discount. PG and QG get a water bottle refill service, so this is for Britannia and Britannia Club passengers.

Plusgrade upgrade ranges are quoted per person per sailing, and not per day. Solo passengers therefore need to double the quote to get to the charged amount (as is made clear in the email from Plusgrade).

I've got a pretty good memory and unfortunately I cannot recall seeing anything like that. There wasn't one mentioned in today's Daily Programme.

I would suggest you read up around this board, since you will find lots of information, and particularly reports from people who have done Crossings. I submitted one here from a trip in December 2023 for example, but there are many other trip reports. Lots of view points and information can be found here. Let me get rid of a few concerns. Being blue collar really isn't an issue - Americans aren't that good at this class system lark, and it isn't taken at all seriously onboard. You will find all sorts on board, and not so many members of the House of Lords there. You will find lots of interesting people from all walks of life though. In so far as I find out what people do (mostly I've no idea) they have every professional and non professional background you can imagine. And loads of retired people. The good thing about Cunard is that there is no mass jollification going on. You can participate as much or as little as you like, and as a couple wandering around the vessel you will be free to do things, or not do things. With things like lectures and libraries, quite a few activities are suitable for non-party-animals. And the Britannia restaurant is nowhere near a buffet, it is a classy facility, with good food, top service, and amazing decor, which will give you two a lovely memorable evening, on your own terms. And I was there less than 2 hours before writing this paragraph. If you are in Britannia you have access to the entire ship and all the facilities, with the exception of a small bit at the end of deck 7 where the grills restaurant and lounge are located. Plus one fairly pathetic sun deck on deck 11, and that's not patrolled or controlled either.

I have participated in shuffleboard on QV, QE and QM2, so that's definitely there. In good weather there's sometimes a competition advertised in the Daily Programme. In the case of QM2 the location is just before the photo in post 5. I did look for the Pickleball rules around there, but I couldn't see them But having spent a few minutes online reading up the rules, it didn't come across as at all complicated given the basic version is all of 4 paragraphs long. https://www.pickleballengland.org/rules/

No problem, and since then I've just seen another round of dancing in the Queens Room, which was busier, and again the two corners furthest from the band were not much used. I'm thinking why that is, and at that end there is a slightly raised gallery of seating and a few steps down from that gallery to the dance floor. The front of of that seating area, overlooking the floor, has a glass fronted barrier, so the movers and shakers are going to be a bit careful not to crash their arms into that barrier, or the steps, as they go around. At the other end, by the band, there isn't this barrier. That's the logic that I can adduce here.

From the QM2 box:

I was going to mention this. I think strictly speaking it was paddleball, since the balls looked like tennis balls (green and furry, as a non expert!) rather than the specialist pickle ball. I gather that for paddleball it's a tennis ball modified to reduce the ball's efficiency after being hit by the paddle. So as the saying goes, best to bring your own balls!

I'm on QM2 today, this is the facility there, on deck 13. I'm pretty sure I've seen them both on QE and QV close to the stern. On QM2 there is a small wooden box on the floor close to the court net with 4 paddles, 3 balls and a hand sanitiser.

I had a look last night quite specifically at this question, trying to work out how it would work for you. Now the context was that Queens Room wasn't that busy, between 8 and 14 couples on the floor. What I noticed was the two corners of the dance floor furthest from the band were not much used. The area is an oblong but the dancers were on an oval flow line, so those two corners were a bit beyond their circuit. So if you were in those far corners I think think you would be fine, not disturbing the other couples and not right in the middle - which would have been best, but it's not a place for the self conscious when it's not so busy. Had there been a lot more couples then maybe that would be different, but some music pieces are less popular with the dancers anyway. Of the two corners, the one port side is better than starboard since the keen dancers would be approaching the floor close to that starboard corner, but there is enough space to pass through even so. I don't really understand this but on the other side nearest the musicians, those corners were more actively used. As for the solo dancers, yes on every QM2 that I've been on, if it's clear you want to dance, someone will invite you. The provision varies a lot from sailing to sailing, in terms of whether there are dancers with name badges on (so facilitated via Cunard in some form or other). But in addition to that there are other solo dancers, both male and female, and it's all very collegiate.

I'm writing this from the sheltered balcony one floor above that stateroom (deck 6), one stateroom over. I've got some footfall noise from the joggers on deck 7, quite slight, but you won't hear that on deck 5. So yes, it should be quiet, it isn't near the laundry or lift areas where people can congregate I think it's possible to overthink the location aspect on QM2, she is remarkably stable, and I've done a few storm force 10s and barely noticed (and I'm prone to sea sickness). Yes the nearer to Britannia Restauant the less you will move but if there isn't much to begin with then your location doesn't matter so much. It's certainly a factor on smaller ships. A factor is where you are travelling - Bay of Biscay is notorious for example, but today I'm on a millpond like area just north of the Friesan Islands and you have to look outside to realise you are moving, she is just so stable.

Yes Queens Grill is your designated restaurant and that comes with a fixed table throughout, though in extremis you can be moved if your original allocation makes you uncomfortable. Open dining is for Britannia, where swapping tables is the norm, and that's different to Queens Grill. The point I am attempting to make is that if table flexibility is a big factor for you then Britannia may work better.