Kynance

@techteach - Hattie got there before me - thank you Hattie! I’d forgotten that it was the blackberry brandy which gives the black Bellini its name. Anyway, it’s highly recommended and because it’s made with Prosecco it’s also at the cheaper end of the sparkling cocktail range, which is just as well if you also like the Commodore’s Cure I mentioned in an earlier post!

Glad to see it has only had a slight price rise! 😊 Thank you @Host Hattie - the last time I had one was November 2019 and I couldn’t remember which commodore the cure was named for. Looking forward to the next one some time in 2023 hopefully. 😀

It’s taken me a while to find the list of ingredients but my favourite Cunard cocktail is the Commodore’s Cure: Pol Roger Cuvee Sir Winston Churchill, Plymouth Gin, Crème a la Fraise des Bois, lemon juice and sugar syrup. As far as I am aware, it is only available from the Commodore Club, from the menu of cocktails especially created to honour the Cunard commodores who received knighthoods. It also always used to be the most expensive, I think - not that the price stopped me from consuming a couple before dinner!! I also like almost all the Cunard “sparklers” - hibiscus wild royale, black Bellini, peach Bellini, kir royale etc etc. 😉🥂

@Host Hattie - you seem the most reasonable and even-handed of persons - please don’t apologise for your “rant” - I think your points were well-made and fair. If FCC is no longer being offered and travel insurance the only recourse - for people who do test positive - then I can’t really see that the vast majority of people will report symptoms they feel they can manage with medication they have brought with them onboard for a “just in case” scenario (which we have always done pre-Covid anyway). I am sure that many people who cruise really save hard for their trips and just won’t be prepared to lose half a holiday as you have done. Whatever anyone may think of the “morality” of that, I just think it is the direction of travel, so to speak. Therefore if Cunard really wants to encourage their guests to be honest, I think they will need to re-evaluate their approach to situations like the one you have found yourself in. Perhaps say that two consecutive negative LFTs means you are free to go about the ship as before? Just my humble view, for what it is worth.

@Host Hattie - so sorry to hear Mr HH has been struck down. I hope he recovers swiftly and you stay well so that you can resume your trip together in a few days’ time. Must be massively frustrating but hopefully you’re both being well looked after by Cunard.

Thank you!

@Host Hattie - very much enjoying your notes from QV. Thank you for taking the time to post them. I know you are not a fan of buffets but if you happen to walk through, could you please advise whether the Lido is back to self-service? I’m seriously looking at booking one of QV’s short voyages in November which still have availability but will have to convince a slightly grumpy Mr Kynance. He really prefers the Lido for breakfast & lunch but won’t be keen if he can’t serve himself. (He is fussy about his bacon!). On the other hand, having seen sticky toffee pudding on the Golden Lion menu, that may pacify him!! 🤣

I watched all of yesterday’s coverage of the Queen’s state funeral, save for an hour of the build-up. I found the events impressive and moving and a very fitting send off for Her Majesty. Come 5pm, after a whole day on the sofa with eyes glued to the TV, I was actually quite mentally tired. Goodness knows how our new king is feeling - I know he is a fellow keen gardener so I hope he can take solace from the healing power of nature with a bit a downtime amongst his plants, if he is able to. My other half and I went for an early autumn walk today - it was certainly what was needed after all the charged emotion of yesterday.

Stugeron 15 works for me too - and for the rare occasions when’s he has been affected, for my other half too. Fortunately, it doesn’t make us sleepy. The trick is to try to take it before you feel ill but it has also worked for us once we’ve had the onset of nausea. I also found a rumless mojito from the bars helped to reduce associated feelings of dizziness. Years ago on the QE2 my mum & I used to get anti- sea sickness injections on the first night, which fixed us for the rest of the trip. I believe these are still available (for a charge), if nothing else works. When we had them, you needed to head straight to bed as they made you very sleepy, very quickly.

We tried out Britannia Club on the QV on a short trip back in November 2018 - I did post my thoughts on this board when we returned. I am sure that thread is still on here somewhere… We liked the dining room itself - it was very elegant - and was much quieter than the main Britannia restaurant, which some people might prefer. On a short cruise, the additional cost per night was much smaller than for a longer cruise and I’m pleased we tried it out. We don’t ever eat breakfast in the restaurant - we go for a late breakfast to the Lido and my other half prefers the Lido lunch options too, so for a longer trip, paying a higher rate per night, I’m not sure that we would personally get the benefit. On our short cruise, I don’t think we ended up eating that much earlier than second sitting in the Britannia and we always book early enough and pay the Cunard fare to secure a table for two in the main restaurant, so aside from a few additional menu choices (which would mainly appeal to me), I think eating in Britannia with one or two visits to the Verandah and Lido evening alternatives, works better for us in terms of value for money. I would therefore say if you prefer a quieter, more relaxed dining experience and are likely to make better use of your reserved table than we would, then it may work for you on a longer trip. However, I’d certainly give Britannia Club a go on another quick trip - and we are due to try Britannia Club on the QM2 next October, on a 4 nighter to Hamburg.

As promised, here’s an uplifting photo of some Cornish coast - with a guest appearance by one of the cattle which the National Trust allow to graze in various areas along this part of the coast. We have often met the friendly cows on our walks but never specifically here. The weather has been rather mixed on this trip but was quite pleasant during our visit to Kynance Cove. We will be home in time to watch the Queen’s funeral on Monday on the TV. I did wonder about visiting London to pay my respects as the Queen lies in state at Westminster but waits of 30 hours are being forecast and as we are not home until Friday evening, I feel it is rather impractical, sadly. Instead, I signed the book of condolence on the Royal Family’s website.

We are down in Cornwall at the moment and were in the middle of packing when the death of our beloved Queen was announced. I had been following the BBC newsfeed on Thursday afternoon but it was still shocking and a moment of great sadness when the Queen’s death was finally announced. I would normally post a cheerful photo of a sea scene but thought I would share this instead - an improvised poster in the window of the village shop. Whatever you think of the verse, I think it was a charming sentiment and many people will indeed hope that the Queen and Philip have been reunited. I will hopefully share a lovely, uplifting photo of some Cornish coastline over the next day or two.

Same here! Visiting the Roman theatre was one of the highlights of our last cruise in October 2019 - we didn’t realise there was an indoor section to the exhibition either. Altogether, it was a fascinating few hours. Hopefully, we will make it back there one day.

We finally had a substantial amount of rain here, in the early hours of Thursday and into the morning. Ironically, it occurred just after our hosepipe ban was introduced. The rainfall was sufficient to fill two and a half, 100 litre water butts. We have had the luxury of not watering the garden for three whole days now but we will need to do some tomorrow, even if it is just the pots and baskets. We’re working out what measures we can take when we go away early next month to sustain our plants - we can only expect our neighbour to do so much with just the watering cans. We’ve already invested in some large plastic trays to fill with water and sit the bonsai pots in. We will get some more saucers to go under individual plants and some capillary matting which can be torn into strips and used as wicking. I do hope we get some more rain in early autumn otherwise planting spring bulbs into hard ground is going to be very hard work.

That’s a very nice whisky - visited this small distillery when spending a few days in Perth quite a few years ago now.

I definitely support what @Victoria2 has said. I have never worn anything approaching a ball gown on Cunard. Ever since I was a little girl and old enough to have a view, I have hated skirts and dresses and anything I would call “fussy”. That is not to say that I haven’t enjoyed Cunard’s gala nights, or formal nights as they used to call them, and have always worn what I hope are elegant tops or jackets with trousers and some nice jewellery, suitable to the occasion. For a while, I did have a lovely ladies’ evening trouser suit I was very fond of. My other half always wears either a dark suit, a black velvet jacket or his tartan trews, all with a long rather than a bow tie and I have always thought he looked very handsome. He has received many compliments on the tartan too. Neither of us has felt under-dressed and our approach reflects the diversity you will see among fellow guests who enjoy dressing for these evenings. It would be quite boring if we all looked the same! @escrick - you won’t stick out at all so I hope you go ahead and enjoy your cruise when the time comes.

As much as I love cats, I don’t have one of my own 🙁 but here is Jasper, my aunt’s cat. She was rather taken with his white moustache when she adopted him from an RSPCA centre.

I think that may have been me, Hattie 😊. Glad you have enjoyed Bosch. I did miss my favourite character from the original series, Grace, in the reboot, though. She’s also a bit of a style icon for me - I love her trouser suits. Sadly, I do not have the height or figure to carry them off in the same way. 🤣 We have been watching the new James May travel show - Our Man in Italy. My best friend thinks if I wasn’t with the present Mr Kynance, I should be married to James!! (I’d be fine with that, actually…)

I’ve posted about my gardening endeavours on this thread over the past couple of years, especially about my agapanthus collection. Unfortunately, this year’s display has been disappointing with quite a few plants taking a sabbatical from flowering it seems. However, I did get a single bloom out of one plant which has consistently refused to flower for at least 3 years, so there is always hope for next year. Aside from that, our lawn has turned brown and unripe apples have already started to fall from our crab apple tree. A friend who lives on the other side of London says her blackberries are ready to eat now, which is about a month earlier than normal. I don’t think 2022 will go down in history as a vintage year for gardening. I’m thoroughly fed up with all the watering that needs to be done and am looking forward to the autumn and some rain (fingers crossed). I’ve usually had enough of summer by the end of July - the garden always seems a bit ragged by August, the evenings are starting to drawn in again and I want to be able to put on a jumper! It has been really lovely reading everyone’s posts on this thread over the past couple of years and I have especially enjoyed all the nature related stuff and photos of your cats. 🐈‍⬛ 🐈😀. In case we get merged into a more general non-Cunard specific thread, all the best to you all and happy cruising, especially if like me, you are yet to make it back onto the high seas.

@navybankerteacher - the level of cover is exactly the same. I think there are changes in the UK insurance market to ensure the best deals aren’t just offered to customers who frequently switch providers so perhaps it’s a result of that. My car insurance doesn’t renew until December so it will be interesting to see if that’s cheaper too. (I’ve been with the same insurer for years because I am always too busy in December to try to find a better quote.) @Host Hattie- hope your bookings pick up. Maybe the prospect of some good weather & long airport queues will inspire more people to holiday at home again this year?!

It looks very much like we won’t be cruising this year - this morning I moved our 4 night short break to Hamburg on QM2 back to September 2023. I must say it was very easy to do, taking advantage of Cunard’s flexible booking conditions prior to our final payment date in the middle of this month. Given it was Saturday, I didn’t think waiting 20 minutes on the phone was too bad - I was even called back immediately when the line cut out just as we got to the important part of the call. The charming rep at the customer contact centre could not have been more friendly or efficient and I was very impressed with the ease of moving the booking. Given that a short break requires far less preparation and time off work, I suppose there is always the possibility of rebooking for October much closer to the sailing date if the prevailing situation changes but if not, I will continue to cruise vicariously via the wonderful blogs and trip reports kindly written by other forum members. We do have another week in Cornwall to look forward to but having spent a bit of money around the house recently, to be honest, I’m quite happy to be saving some cash by deferring our Cunard trip. In that vein, I was also delighted today to find out that the renewal premium for our house insurance is £83 less than last year. This must be about the only thing which has actually fallen in price in 2022! I’m enjoying catching some of the tennis at Wimbledon at the moment and also the Tour de France, which has just had its “grand depart” in Denmark. In gardening news, I am a bit disappointed with some of my agapanthus this year - it doesn’t look like the marvellous display of 2021 will be repeated. I think this may be down to the cooler and cloudier weather - agapanthus do like plenty of sunshine. Never mind, we did have a brilliant display of spring bulbs, so there have been other horticultural successes this year.

Although the border and immigration authorities of the respective countries on any itinerary may require a physical passport inspection, in practice Cunard will be sharing details of the passenger manifest with these authorities for immigration and security purposes, so the inspection also takes place virtually and information on passenger movements will therefore be available to host authorities. This will be done to comply with the legal requirements placed on Cunard. If Cunard is required to notify the host authority of anyone who failed to rejoin the ship following a port of call, or had to leave the ship mid-cruise, for instance for a medical evacuation, all of this data will be held on host authority systems and will be used for their purposes, as necessary. For anyone with an interest in data protection, you can check out Cunard’s privacy policy which is one of the links from the legal information landing page (found in the links at the bottom of the home page). This explains what personal information Cunard collects, the purposes it processes it for and with whom it shares that information. You’ll find several references to law enforcement agencies, security and immigration.

We received the Queen Anne package last week. It would make a nice souvenir, I think. I’m reserving judgement on whether she’s for us or not (like many others on this board, I’m put off by the look of the narrow and dark promenade deck and the higher density of passengers) but I received some good news from work on Thursday - I have just secured a promotion - so we might actually be able to afford to sail on her now!! 😀🤣