QM2 voyage M338 - 15 December 2023 - 7 nights - Westbound Transatlantic Crossing - reports onboard

[Pushpit]

Tuesday 19 December - lunch and dinner update

 

Here are the menus from the Britannia restaurant for lunch and dinner today, starting with lunch.

 

 

 

So a fishy lunch for me, the whitebait and the salmon, followed by treacle tart.

 

 

 

 

 

Then for the dinner menu today:

 

 

 

 

Here I took salmon again as the starter, the Turkish salad, corn chowder, the noodle main dish and the key lime tart. I've also included a photo of some of the petit fours.

 

(again turned for the purposes of the photo)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Earlier in the day I went to the Q&A from the Kings of the Boardwalk group who performed the soul night in the Royal Court Theatre the previous night. The 4 artists each sang a solo as part of the Q&A and they came across as warm and personable in this unscripted event.

 

[tag1000]

Love following along.  Thanks for the menus and the pics.  Must admit I am a fussy eater or rather have limited tastes and this is the first menu on your trip  where I would not be able to chose.  Don’t like lamb, fish or mushrooms!    Not Cunard’s fault but rather mine.  It would be Kings Court in for me with those choices but that’s okay!  
 

Really appreciate the time and effort you are putting in to this and allowing us to travel along with you!

[Gomac]

Thank you for running commentary. Very much enjoying this as my daily read with my morning coffee in eager anticipation of joining the QM2 on 3rd January after NYE in New York. It is getting us more and more excited getting a glimpse of what’s happening on board.

 

You’re very lucky to have Stephen Payne onboard, his lectures would be right up my street, alas I doubt he will still be sailing by the time we get on 😞 

 

One question…. Do they still have the ‘always available’ dishes in the Britannia restaurant at dinner? I seem to remember it being something on the lines of a steak and daily curry.

 

 

[exlondoner]

7 hours ago, tag1000 said:

Love following along.  Thanks for the menus and the pics.  Must admit I am a fussy eater or rather have limited tastes and this is the first menu on your trip  where I would not be able to chose.  Don’t like lamb, fish or mushrooms!    Not Cunard’s fault but rather mine.  It would be Kings Court in for me with those choices but that’s okay!  
 

Really appreciate the time and effort you are putting in to this and allowing us to travel along with you!

They would bring you chicken breast I expect.

[Winifred 22]

1 hour ago, Gomac said:

Thank you for running commentary. Very much enjoying this as my daily read with my morning coffee in eager anticipation of joining the QM2 on 3rd January after NYE in New York. It is getting us more and more excited getting a glimpse of what’s happening on board.

 

You’re very lucky to have Stephen Payne onboard, his lectures would be right up my street, alas I doubt he will still be sailing by the time we get on 😞 

 

One question…. Do they still have the ‘always available’ dishes in the Britannia restaurant at dinner? I seem to remember it being something on the lines of a steak and daily curry.

 

 

There is no daily curry. I have asked for steak in the past year and been given it but it is not listed on the menu as such. 

[Pushpit]

59 minutes ago, Gomac said:

One question…. Do they still have the ‘always available’ dishes in the Britannia restaurant at dinner? I seem to remember it being something on the lines of a steak and daily curry.

I think a few people were struggling with last night's menu actually. It wasn't an issue for me, I am not a picky eater, the army knocks that one out of you very quickly. But yes, I noticed that on a table close to me some people asked for, and got, spaghetti bolognese last night. I don't think Always Available is heavily promoted but there's no reason for people to be stuck with the food choices on the menu, the wait staff can sort out alternatives. In addition, and quite easily, you can play around with multiple starters and multiple desserts, if trying to avoid the entrées.

[Pushpit]

Wednesday 20 December 2023 - dawn issue - GMT-4

Location: At sea, north Atlantic Ocean, off St-Pierre and Miquelon,  45.1957,-55.9635

18.4 knots, direction 256° 

Force 8 winds SSE, rough seas.

 

Greetings this morning from QM2, and we are now only 100 statute miles from the European Union, in the shape of St-Pierre and Miquelon. And heading towards Sable Island 200 statute miles away, a sand bar way off the coast of Canada, and home to a flock of feral horses abandoned there long ago. Now my maths says that's about 17:00 hrs today, but hopefully the captain can speed up a little so we can see it in daylight.

 

I am reporting the information above as provided, but I really don't feel I'm in a Force 8 gale. The captain said that the beam hit of the wind would be largely absorbed by the stabilisers, and that's true enough. We are rocking a bit. 

 

Anyway here is today's programme. As a reminder, you need to be logged into Cruise Critic to see PDFs.

QM2Programme20Dec2023.pdf

 

[Mudhen]

1 hour ago, Pushpit said:

In addition, and quite easily, you can play around with multiple starters and multiple desserts, if trying to avoid the entrées.

I've often done this with great success. A soup, salad, and a few starters often work for me, rather than a complete main. Oh, and dessert too! Servers have no problem with this. Just ask!

[rmsEtruria]

5 hours ago, Pushpit said:

Wednesday 20 December 2023 - dawn issue - GMT-4

Location: At sea, north Atlantic Ocean, off St-Pierre and Miquelon,  45.1957,-55.9635

18.4 knots, direction 256° 

Force 8 winds SSE, rough seas.

 

Greetings this morning from QM2, and we are now only 100 statute miles from the European Union, in the shape of St-Pierre and Miquelon. And heading towards Sable Island 200 statute miles away, a sand bar way off the coast of Canada, and home to a flock of feral horses abandoned there long ago. Now my maths says that's about 17:00 hrs today, but hopefully the captain can speed up a little so we can see it in daylight.

 

I am reporting the information above as provided, but I really don't feel I'm in a Force 8 gale. The captain said that the beam hit of the wind would be largely absorbed by the stabilisers, and that's true enough. We are rocking a bit. 

 

Anyway here is today's programme. As a reminder, you need to be logged into Cruise Critic to see PDFs.

QM2Programme20Dec2023.pdf 964.45 kB · 30 downloads

 

Curious: in their information briefings, do they actually give distances at sea in statute miles instead of nautical ones, but ship’s speed in knots (= nautical miles per hour)? That would be annoyingly confusing (and even more annoyingly non- traditional).

[Pushpit]

1 minute ago, rmsEtruria said:

Curious: in their information briefings, do they actually give distances at sea in statute miles instead of nautical ones, but ship’s speed in knots (= nautical miles per hour)? That would be annoyingly confusing (and even more annoyingly non- traditional).

It's always nautical miles from the Bridge on deck 12, but when from my deck 6 stateroom I get my digital slide-rule out, you are going to get distances in statute miles. 

[rmsEtruria]

1 minute ago, Pushpit said:

It's always nautical miles from the Bridge on deck 12, but when from my deck 6 stateroom I get my digital slide-rule out, you are going to get distances in statute miles. 

Ah, good to know—and what a relief! (I won’t need my slide rule—not that I actually have one—to convert statute into nautical . . . .)

[Pushpit]

8 hours ago, Gomac said:

One question…. Do they still have the ‘always available’ dishes in the Britannia restaurant at dinner? I seem to remember it being something on the lines of a steak and daily curry.

I checked with the Maître d' at lunch just now, and yes they are able to provide dishes like salmon, mac and cheese, and steak, as alternative dishes to the main menu. He didn't refer to an "always available" menu but the room service menu has a number of items always available.

[Ellymay46]

16 hours ago, tag1000 said:

Love following along.  Thanks for the menus and the pics.  Must admit I am a fussy eater or rather have limited tastes and this is the first menu on your trip  where I would not be able to chose.  Don’t like lamb, fish or mushrooms!    Not Cunard’s fault but rather mine.  It would be Kings Court in for me with those choices but that’s okay!  
 

Really appreciate the time and effort you are putting in to this and allowing us to travel along with you!

Hi.  I think I could give you a run for fussy.  I’m currently onboard and it may have been me with the spaghetti bolognaise.  As I am really fussy and also gluten free the head waiter gives me the menu each night for the following day lunch and dinner.  I can then see if there is anything on that I like.  If not I just ask for something else and they have been very accommodating!  Head waiter is amazing.  So no need to struggle with the menus.

[Gomac]

1 hour ago, Pushpit said:

I checked with the Maître d' at lunch just now, and yes they are able to provide dishes like salmon, mac and cheese, and steak, as alternative dishes to the main menu. He didn't refer to an "always available" menu but the room service menu has a number of items always available.

Thank you so much for checking! It’s good to know 🙂

[Mudhen]

I'm hoping that you've left a few "treats" in the bars for us, as we board on Friday!

Thank you so much for taking the time to let us know what's happening onboard. I've read all of your posts and you've done a wonderful job.....enjoyed every bit.

Have a wonderful holiday season!

[Pushpit]

Wednesday 20 December 2023 lunch update 12:30 hrs GMT-4 but written up a bit later

Location: At sea, off Nova Scotia, Artimon Bank in the Laurentian Channel,  44.7414, -57.9230

17.5 knots, direction 258°, so back to a Rhumb line routing 

Force 8 winds SE, rough seas.

 

 

First off, many thanks to CruiseCritic for my little ship badge!

 

The yellow star in the sea of the first map is Sable Island. QM2 is rolling slightly, but I don't think it's too bad for a Force 8. I can certainly see fairly rough seas outside my sheltered balcony but the ship just sails through it all.  It's cloudy, visibility isn't good, a bit foggy.  Later on this evening we are going to go through a warm front, the wind will move to the north, and the captain warned us that she may list to the starboard side a bit after the wind change. They will move the ballast around to get her more upright, but it was advance warning of this.

 

We have now covered 2401 nautical miles from Southampton, and have just 792 nm to New York. We are 100 NM off Nova Scotia and we will pass Sable Island on the inside, so the island will be on the port side of the vessel. Then down to Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard. We go under the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge at 05:00 and into Red Hook for 06:15.

 

I managed to find another breakfast combination, menus in post 9. Here is the poached fruits, the muesli, then scrambled eggs with smoked salmon, with sausages and potatoes as extras.

 

 

==

 

After breakfast I went to Dr. Payne's lecture on his experiences designing the QM2. One of the many things I learned there is that the ship's pivot is in the Britannia restaurant - that's usually going to be the calmest part of the vessel, even though it's some way aft of midship. Which was interesting by the time I got to lunch, since I was allocated a really good window seat.

 

It's difficult to capture this in a photo, thanks to the windows covered in sea water, but this is my best attempt at showing the view from there.

 

 

Menus

 

 

 

 

 

I had crab cake, the lentil soup, the steak and the apple and custard pie.

 

 

 

 

 

It's gala night tonight, masquerade theme.

[Host Hattie]

Sorry for the delay in awarding your badge, our Community Manager looks for the word "Live " so it needed some manual intervention!

[spirit rev]

5 hours ago, Mudhen said:

I'm hoping that you've left a few "treats" in the bars for us, as we board on Friday!

Thank you so much for taking the time to let us know what's happening onboard. I've read all of your posts and you've done a wonderful job.....enjoyed every bit.

Have a wonderful holiday season!

I also have been enjoying your posts as we will also board when you arrive in New York City. 

[Pushpit]

Wednesday 19 December 2023 evening update.

 

Just a quick update. First of all, a rare visit for me to Kings Court for afternoon tea. And it certainly was a lot quieter than the bun fight in the Queens Room, with a bigger range of options.

 

 

 

Then as mentioned previously, it is the Masquerade Gala

 

 

I had the Duck Parfait:

 

 

Then the asparagus salad 

 

 

The roasted onion soup:

 

 

The venison

 

 

And finally the lemon souffle

==

 

[Winifred 22]

The lemon soufflé has to be my all time favourite Cunard dessert. In the summer I was greedy and had two !! . 

[TouchstoneFeste]

Sleeting out on deck this morning. Hope it may clear up as we approach land. Got our disembarkation materials yesterday :(

[exlondoner]

24 minutes ago, TouchstoneFeste said:

Sleeting out on deck this morning. Hope it may clear up as we approach land. Got our disembarkation materials yesterday 😞

First the landing arrangements arrive, which is slightly depressing, and then one comes back from breakfast to find the luggage mat is in the bed, and one knows it will soon be over, which is considerably more depressing.

[Liberal_Baggie]

It’s been a brilliant crossing. Enjoyed the back of house tour luggage nets are now been deployed at Red Hook we are told in case of accidental luggage falls. Cunard staff have been great sorting out our Vegan requests. We had a special Vegan afternoon tea in the Grills lounge yesterday and they are going to do a special Indian meal for the Two of us tonight we are in princess grill which is lovely. Have to say though that Britannia restaurant is looking extremely beautiful in fact the best I’ve seen it absolutely stunning. We have had new balcony furniture cushions delivered this week as the old ones are worn out so we will be using them in a few days time.we appear not to be able to leave as foot passengers before 8.45 meet up in the theatre which is a bit later than I was hoping as we’ve got ice skating booked and shopping planned. Anyone know if we can try to slope off earlier in New York and get the ferry to Wall St?

[Pushpit]

38 minutes ago, Liberal_Baggie said:

 We have had new balcony furniture cushions delivered this week as the old ones are worn out so we will be using them in a few days time.we appear not to be able to leave as foot passengers before 8.45 meet up in the theatre which is a bit later than I was hoping as we’ve got ice skating booked and shopping planned. Anyone know if we can try to slope off earlier in New York and get the ferry to Wall St?

As quite normal for Cunard, there have been 2 slightly contradictory letters out on this, but I think it depends on whether you are staying on board or not. So the Important Information US Immigration leaflet was along these lines, meet in the Royal Court, and then Preparing for your disembarkation leaflet refers to Fast Track Disembarkation on the overleaf side, between 07:15 and 07:45 hrs for those who can take all their luggage with them. Typically you just leave your stateroom/suite at that time and head down to the gangway, though there is often a 10 minute queue to get off here. You are supposed to register for this facility (but in my experience they don't check this at the time of disembarkation).

Edited December 21, 2023 by Pushpit

[Pushpit]

Thursday 21 December 2023 morning update 10:00 hrs GMT-4

Location: At sea, off Nova Scotia Cape Sable, Georges Bank,  41.9860, -65.8711

17.6 knots, direction 237° 

Force 9 - 10 winds SE, very rough seas.

==

Just a quick update, but the captain has made a rare all-ship broadcast at 09:15 to say that the weather was at the top end, perhaps slightly worse, than the forecast. So he asked us all the take extra care moving around, particularly on stairwells and to also watch out for any items loose in the stateroom. And yes we are rolling around more than I have experienced before on QM2 (including the Hamburg storm earlier this year), and a few things have slid off table tops during the night. The ship's anemometer has also gone kaput and I don't suppose there's much appetite to get it repaired at the moment. Indoors, the rolling comes and goes a bit but there's quite a big movement to and fro every 5 seconds or so. We are about 100 statute miles south of Cape Sable on Nova Scotia. This is the peak of the storm, it should ease off with a calm, cold but sunny arrival expected into New York.

 

 

 

 

 

Breakfast (menu in post 9). Same starters as yesterday, muesli and compote fruit. Then the main course is the haddock with fried eggs and sautéed potatoes. Hopefully it all stays down!

 

 

 

 

 

Edited December 21, 2023 by Pushpit