As you probably know from my previous Blog, I was very lucky in that I got to go down to spend a night onboard the brand new and eagerly awaited Cunard Queen Elizabeth on Saturday. You may have seen the Queen on TV as she was in Southampton for the official naming ceremony, being the Godmother of the ship.
So what were my thoughts of the ship? I did say that I would give you my honest and open opinion so here goes....
Upon entering Southampton and getting closer to the port I started to feel very excited as we could just about see that famous Cunard Red Funnel. The ship itself looked quite big sat in port; my initial thought was that the back of the ship seemed very short and straight down rather than the normal tiered effect. I am going to assume that this is Cunard trying to minimise the "overlooked" effect that you can get from being on the lower deck and overlooked by the higher decks, but who knows!
See what you think?
Upon boarding the ship, the staffs were very friendly and really looked the part in their Cunard uniforms, very smart indeed I thought. One of the first things that I noticed was the Art Deco design that Cunard had promised, it really did look Regal and in keeping with the whole Cunard brand with lots of creams, gold’s and blues featuring in the decor.
One of the main themes of this ship, I would imagine due to the name and the fact that Her Majesty is the Godmother, is the Royal Family. There were lots of beautiful portraits of the Royal Family but the one that really caught my eye was this stunning picture of Queen Elizabeth.
I stayed in an A3 balcony cabin which was mid ship. I have to be honest, the cabin decor did not grab me when I walked in, it was all very neutral and quite Blasé. The bed however, did look very comfortable and I was later to find out that it was (when I passed out after one too many!)
Our meal in the Britannia Restaurant I have to say was gorgeous; I was certainly not disappointed with the food of the service received. The only thing i do need to be honest about is the challenge that I had form a customer who wanted to see how well they could deal with her wheat allergy. I asked the waiter for a wheat free roll and all he offered me was a brown roll! I am going to defend them though in saying that as it was an agent’s weekend they may not have been fully prepared as they would for a normal sailing.
We were all dressed up in our lovely frocks and the boys in there suits and we then boogied the night away in the Yacht Club. They had a live band for most of the night and then into the early hours the DJ kicked in with some old classics (i'm the one in the red!)
The Atrium looked Very Grand indeed with a superb centrepiece of the ship.
Overall, I would say that the ship itself is very beautifully presented with both style and comfort taken care of. She showed inpecable service from the staff and the food was delicious. If she continues with this then i'm confident her future passengers will have a wonderful time when they travel on her. The only thing for me is that she didnt really grab me with the WOW factor I was excpecting but I think the reason for this is because I had never been on a Cunard ship before so was comparing with Celebrity Eclipse, which is uber modern and contemporary. It did not disappoint me though and I will highly recommend her to my future passengers.
Royal Caribbean has announced today that they will be giving away, that’s right GIVING AWAY 10,000 flights across many Mediterranean sailings for 2011! 
