sfred

Absolutely!! I was one of the very few awake and outside in the early morning. Of course being partially still on Australia time helped considerably.

Arthur the 2022 bear (ursus cunardus) is aboard, as are the plush ships. But no reindeer like were aboard QV.

As @Lanky Lad indicated, if you have a table waiting and you know where it is, you can access the Britannia restaurant through doors off the D staircase, opposite to the Queens Room entrance.

Thanks @exlondoner. Mrs sfred and I are very thankful to be back again. It has been such a long time away. QM2 felt wonderfully familiar as we boarded yesterday.

Well, the problems with embarkation checkin continued for our QM2 Norway voyage. All of our above details were correct and ready to go at the Mayflower terminal. Checkin took 2 or 3 minutes and we were through to security and onto the ship. I'm sure the IT people in Carnival House are now working extra hours to fix this bug and make sure it doesn't happen again! 😄

Hi everyone. Cruise critic bumped me off shortly after boarding yesterday and I was unable to log in until this morning 2 Nov. We had a very nice evening last night and I was up early today for the usual walk. Winds are westerly so it was nearly still across the decks. A sunrise photo attached below. I still have 2 bars of 4G on O2 with the English coast visible to port so I'll try to post this now before losing mobile coverage.

It was quite rainy and windy in Southampton overnight. For those who arrived on QM2 in the early hours, how was it coming in? The weather sites have the sea conditions in the channel as a little choppy - 4 to 5 meter waves.

Thanks @Host Hattie! FYI for those also boarding later today in Southampton, QM2 is at Mayflower Terminal as originally scheduled. The gangway issue that @Bedruthenmentioned perhaps has been fixed.

It has very quickly turned dark and rainy this afternoon in Southampton after the earlier sunny morning. We're inside with a pint of Doom Bar at the Red Lion, practising for QM2's Golden Lion.

QM2 has come within range of shore AIS this morning, 22 knots at heading 102 degrees, in advance of arrival at Southampton tomorrow.

Thanks @LittleFish1976. I won't be able to come close to the great photos that @photosgmanaged. But I am happy to try to answer any questions that anyone has. There are several others on this QM2 voyage also, like @Tonopah and @TheOldBear, so we should get a good range of experiences and @TheOldBear has already started a thread. We're in Britannia Club for the first time on QM2 so are looking forward to trying that out.

Safe travels home, @photosg. We've really enjoyed your contributions from your voyage. They have been very helpful for our QM2 Norway itinerary starting Tuesday. We arrived in London this weekend after the flights from Australia via Singapore.

Correct! It was an unseen cruise-by on our list, and an itinerary location for QV's recent Norway fjords voyage. @photosg was aboard, and has contributed many great photos of their experiences in a separate thread here on Cruise Critic. Romsdalsfjord is port/cruise-by number 597 (we're getting close to 600!), and number 37 for Norway.

Many thanks! Hope you have a great day in Santander.

Here is a new cruise-by, courtesy of another Cruise Critic participant, @photosg. They have very kindly given me permission to contribute the photo here in our Where in the World game. (Thanks!!) Apparently it had become dark by the time the Cunard ship arrived at the exact cruise-by location in the itinerary, so this was as close as they got while it was still daylight.

Thanks @photosg! Is this photo the one? If so, can I have your permission to post it over in the "Where in the World" thread?

We've had to pull all our winter gear out from storage also. Not much call for wooly things in Brisbane. Even winter days here are typically mid-20s C, and southern hemisphere summer is already here this week with 30-34 C each day in advance of our departure for London. So I think Norway will be an "interesting" change. I like the occasional holiday in the cold, although I'm quite glad to not live in it. Will you be "shredding your axe" while aboard (guitar visible in the back right corner of your photo)? 😎

Are you on QM2? We've been in QG Q6 9.003 before (on an upgrade from PG), and it is a very acceptable Q6 location. I realise that a forward cabin has the risk of greater pitch movement, but I like to feel I'm at sea and QM2 has good stability throughout. So personally, I wouldn't pay for a change from Q6 to Q5, but that's me. Now, if the offer was for Q4 or higher, that's a whole different proposition. Unfortunately that's something we've never been fortunate enough to do, either paid or courtesy of the upgrade fairy.

Best wishes for your crossing segment, @TheOldBear! We board in Southampton on the 1st. When we booked (so long ago it seems), we considered adding either the east or west transatlantic, but it was easier at the time to arrange a London return flight from Australia. On the ventusky.com weather site, it looks like you'll have some waves in mid-Atlantic. The North Sea and the coast off Norway are calm (for now).

Ah, I found the signpost. Looks like it is on Princes Parade between the Landing Stage Terminal and Liverpool Waters? Google street view shows the hedge, the signpost, the Road Closed Ahead / Diversion sign, and the lamp post. I'll guess your photo was taken prior to 2018? The lamp posts look to have changed shape from a double lamp like in your photo to a single lamp on street view images.

That's Liverpool, based on the lamppost, and the signpost showing arrows for William Jessop Way, Princes Square, and Princes Parade. But I can't quite find the precise location of the photo.

Given that @sogne contributed two photos, one of Lismore lighthouse on Eilean Musdile and the other of Firth of Lorn, should we add two cruise-by locations to the seen list? Or is Firth of Lorn the only official Cunard cruise-by and the lighhouse does not count as such?

Happy to see that Ursus Cunardus have made a return! I hope they will be on QM2 next week. @photosg, did you happen to get a photo of your Romsdalsfjord cruise-by during your Norway segment? It is an unseen cruise-by in the "Where in the World" game. Best wishes for the rest of your voyage!

Thanks @Colin_Cameron and @exlondoner. I've changed the language for Stornoway to Gaelic, and Holyhead to Welsh. Also upon further consideration, I've changed Barcelona from Spanish to Catalan. Those changes grow the number of unique languages to 54.

FYI, narrowly missing out for the number 10 spot, tied for number 11 at seven Cunard ports each, are Japanese, Thai, Vietnamese, and German.