First days at sea

To begin with, our ability to update our blog site will be constrained since the ship is experiencing difficulties connecting to the internet. Moreover, we are not able to use our computer in our cabin as we originally were told. This requires us to visit the ship’s computer center and wait our turn. Finally, Larry no longer has the necessary technical support supplied by Dennis Fennessey. This will naturally slow things down a bit as well.
Nevertheless, on Sunday the 13th, we boarded the Queen Victoria at pier 92 in Manhattan. The unloading of our heavy luggage and the boarding of the ship went much more smoothly than we could possibly have anticipated. Once on the ship, we found our cabin and began the process of unpacking and storing our clothing for the next three months and as we put things away, the cabin although tiny, appears big enough to meet all our needs. Storage is a challenge.
The ship is beautiful. If you remember how the Titanic looked in the Decaprio movie, the Queen Victoria looks the same: Beautiful woods and marble, tremendous stairways, Chandeliers and the like.
The best feature of our cabin is our balcony. We’re on the starboard side of the ship (right side going forward). Being able to stand on our private balcony and seeing the sights and sounds is terrific. We departed the pier at 7:30 pm and witnessed a fantastic historical event. For the first and only time, three of Cunard lines ships (Queen Elizabeth2, Queen Mary2 and the Queen Victoria) left their respective piers together and made their way down the Hudson River to the Statute of Liberty for an awesome fireworks and music display. Our pictures are a little fuzzy but the video we took is great and we’ll share this upon our return. It was also fun to watch the Queen Elizabeth2 follow us down the east coast for the first two days of the cruise.
We are having our dinners at the late seating and after our first dinner, we took a leisurely walk around the ship marveling at the facility. On our first day at sea, Don Kredel and Larry played in their first duplicate bridge tournament while Ruthanne did the laundry at the shipboard laundry mat. Next stop, Ft. Lauderdale. :-)