Got up this morning at eight o’clock as usual, and went out onto the balcony to see what the weather was like. It was sunny but cool for the time of year. We had another full day at sea to look forward to and, according to our Daily Programme, a packed itinerary of events. 🙂
After our breakfast, we hotfooted it down to the Royal Court Theatre for another one of Keith Muras’ fascinating presentations about his three years spent living in Moscow at the height of the Cold War.
We then stayed in our seats for the next talkat 10.00am, which was called “Navigation – It’s all about angles, lines and time” by engineer Andrew Roberts. This was really interesting to me; with all our voyages around the world and our Line Crossing certificates alluding to lines of longitude and latitude, it was right up our street. It’s really fascinating how the world was mapped out using lines of latitude (how far north or south you are) and longitude (how far east or west you are) using degrees, minutes and seconds, where one minute is equal to one nautical mile, which equates to 1.1508 statute miles.
Although we really enjoyed Andrew’s talk, he did make several mistakes in his narrative; whether these were genuine slips of the tongue or the information he had was not quite accurate, we had no way of knowing. But I felt some things could have been explained in a much simpler way. We did enjoy learning about John Harrison’s marine chronometer, and how it was (and still is) important to keep an accurate record of time when at sea. There is a very interesting article about Harrison on the Royal Museums Greenwich website.
The next talk was at 11.00am and was of no interest at all to me. It featured former England rugby player Will Carling; I am not in the least bit interested in rugby, so I left Trevor to it while I went back to 11046 to catch up with this blog.
It was shortly before noon when Trevor returned, and we decided to partake of a pre-luncheon glass of champagne each. We cracked open the bottle of Bollinger we had brought with us and Trevor poured it into two flutes. The plan was to sit out on the balcony and enjoy it, but there was still that nippy little wind making it just that bit too cold.
We therefore drank the cold, bubbly, refreshing Bolly in our stateroom, before heading off to the Artisans’ Foodhall for a light lunch. We’d enjoy the rest of the champagne later. 🙂
After lunch we returned to 11046 and I had a shower and shanpooed and blow-dried my hair. We had received an invitation to the Cunard World Club Party, which was at 5.15pm today. It meant that we would miss our sitting in the restaurant, so we decided we would make the most of the wonderful Cunard Afternoon Tea that is served in the Queen’s Room between 3.00 – 4.00pm each day.
I dressed in a cotton maxi tropical-themed dress, which was mainly shades of orange with silhouettes of palm trees on it. It went well with my orange Irregular Choice shoes. I wore a little short black cardigan, which I intended to replace with a sequinned wrap for the cocktail party later on. The invitation stipulated “Smart” attire, rather than all-out formal wear.
Afternoon tea was wonderful. We arrived at the Queen’s Room in good time in order to procure a table for two, as this is a traditional and popular event on Cunard ships. The “Brevis String Trio” were in the middle of the room playing a series of tasteful background tunes and, at three o’clock precisely, the white jacketed and white gloved waiters and waitresses emerged from doorways at the back with their trays of silver teapots, milk jugs and sugar bowls. 🙂
The food was delicious. Waiting staff came around with trays of finger sandwiches; including old favourites such as egg and cress, salmon and cucumber, beef and horseradish and ham and mustard. Next came a fabulous selection of cakes and pastries, from mini fruit tartlets to Victoria sponge to chocolate cake. Finally, selections of warm scones were proferred; either plain or fruit scones, each with their own little dishes of clotted cream and strawberry jam. In the meantime, they were still coming round with the sandwiches and cakes, so you really could eat as much as you wanted, and we knew we wouldn’t miss our dinner at all tonight. I cannot understand those people who can eat afternoon tea and still have room for dinner; they must have hollow legs! 😀
It was after four o’clock before we left the Queen’s Room, and we decided to go back to 11046 to get ready for the World Club Party; I decided I would enjoy my second glass of Bollinger as well. 🙂
Just before 5.15pm, we set off to make our way to the Pavilion Pool, where the party was being held. Apparently the Queen’s Room wasn’t a big enough venue. It seemed daft to have a cocktail party adjacent to the swimming pool and hot-tubs.
When we arrived at Deck 9, there was already a tremendous queue as they hadn’t opened the doors yet. In fact, it was a bit of a farce all round. We were queueing wall-to-wall in the corridor where the cabins were, which meant that people trying to get in or out of their staterooms had quite a job to squeeze past all the party-goers queueing there.
We knew when they’d opened the doors, as we felt a welcome cool breeze along the stifling corridor. Apparently the queue was because everyone seemed to be want to shake hands/ have their photo taken with Captain Inger Thorhauge.
It took us 20 minutes from the doors opening to our reaching the front of the queue. As I wasn’t dressed for a ‘formal’ portrait I didn’t want to have my photo taken, but Trevor did. In addition, the fact that it was open-air meant my hair was looking a bit wind-swept (again!).
Finally, we could enter the party, and it was not without some dismay that I saw that many of the guests were dressed in full formal wear, despite the invitations specifying ‘smart’. All of a sudden I felt scruffy in my cotton dress and my hair all over the place. In addition, the retractable roof over the pool was open and it was not particularly warm; in fact I was freezing in my strappy dress with its light sequinned wrap.
We looked around for somewhere to sit and then – more importantly – for the freebie drinks. We could see waiting staff going round with bottles of wine and giving people top-ups. Top-ups! We hadn’t even had one drink yet as we’d spent all that time standing in the queue. Eventually we decided it would be quicker to go to the bar, and we managed to procure ourselves a glass of sparkling wine each.
After that, it was a case of grabbing a glass from the trays of any passing waiters. Cunard (unlike the wonderful Fred Olsen) are very tight-arsed when it comes to giving anything away for free, so we were determined to get our money’s worth. 🙂
During this time, the captain took to the stage and made a speech, thanking everyone for their repeated custom. Then the mic was handed to the World Club team and they proceeded to announce how many Diamond, Platinum and Gold passengers were on board; there was an award for the person who had the most nights on a Cunard vessel. One person had done over 100 cruises on Cunard ships alone! Impressive.
Once the speeches were over, we saw that the waiting staff were going round clearing up all the empty glasses. We asked a passing waiter if there was any more fizz and he said he would try to get us one; he came back a few minutes later with a glass each for us (or rather, half a glass). People were starting to leave now; it was clear the party was over.
By now, however, the sun was out and if you found a seat out of the wind, it was really very pleasant sitting there. I went to the loo and, as I was walking back to where Trevor was waiting, I spotted a table with rows of clean empty wine glasses and several opened bottles (i.e. only half full or less) of wine. We assumed they had been put there so passengers could help themselves (as they do on Fred ships) but, as we poured ourselves a glass of white wine each, a voice spoke up with “How are we getting on here?” We turned to see a barmaid who admonished us with a “It would have been nice to ask, you know!” When Trevor pointed out to her that there was no-one around to ask, she said “Well, we stopped serving once the captain had finished her speech!” When we pointed out that we didn’t know that, she pursed her lips disapprovingly and stalked off. Really Cunard, we’ve spent thousands and you are begrudging us a glass of cheap wine each?!
As we sat in the sun enjoying our ill-gotten gains (ha ha) we were not in any hurry; the show was not until eight o’clock (it was 7.30pm now) and we could always go to the later show if we wanted to anyway.
The performance tonight featured an excellent trio of male singers called The Flyrights, who took their interesting name from a Nat King Cole song called Straighten Up and Fly Right. They were excellent; they sang soul, Motown, a capella with amazing harmonies and some disco classics. They really were great entertainers and several people in the audience stood up at the end.
Afterwards, we went along to the Golden Lion as usual, for the trivia quiz. Or rather, Trevor did. I saw that the sunset was at 8.53pm so I went up to our balcony straight away and managed to get several snaps of the great orange ball as it disappeared below the horizon. I was back in the Golden Lion just in nice time for the quiz, but it was different tonight as it was called “Gridlocked”. Each person was given a sheet with a grid on it, each square containing a quiz topic. You had to fill the answers in the appropriate squares, but you were only allowed to get so many wrong. We didn’t win.
We ended the evening by going up to the Commodore Club for a nightcap, before returning to 11046 around midnight.
We had another sea day to look forward to tomorrow, and we slept very well.