Cruises

Has anyone traveled via cruise to either here or to the states for their final journey?  Glenn and I are thinking about using a cruise to make our journey back to the states but curious about the price etc and the pros and cons on it?

thanks in advance

We've had someone on here recently arrive on a cruise liner and had a lot of praise for doing so. I think she also listed price, etc. Was it the QEII? Trying to recall, sorry!

My own experience is from when I was 13. My family was moving back to the US from Germany. The SS United States from Le Havre to New York City. It was the most fantastic thing I'd ever done for many years to come, and very few things have rivaled it since. I loved it. Five days of pure pampered luxury.

Then again, I love even short ferry rides. Something about travelling by a floating "city".

Hello,

When my husband and I left the US, we flew to NY and took the QEII to England.  It was not only part one of our honeymoon, but we felt it was befittting of leaving the US!

We sailed May 1 and it was a five day crossing.  (I think it's now been extended to six days.) I don't remember what the price was now because it was eight years ago.  We had a very good time, but there were a few things about our experience I can share:

The food was outstanding and there was an old-fashioned air about the ship.  They sat an officer of the ship at each table, to mingle with passengers.  The one at our table was the chief engineering officer and a total gentleman.  He had a cocktail party in his cabin one night and invited everybody from our table.  I wonder if this happens on the newer, big, "hip" ships?  I can't say for sure, but I suspect not and we thought this was quite special.

We were the youngest paying passengers on board, by at least 20 years!  (Possibly an exaggeration, but possibly not!)  This didn't bother us though because we weren't looking for a fast paced cruise.  We like all kinds of people including pensioners.  There were a lot of very nice, interesting people to talk to.

We thought we were clever when we got the cheapest cabin, thinking we wouldn't spend much time in it.  While this was true and we didn't expect our cabin to be big, what we didn't expect was a bunk bed!  Oh well; it made for an interesting honeymoon, if you catch my drift.   

If you are thinking about sailing transatlantically, make sure the cruise lines sail during the time of year you want to go.  It's not a year-round route.   I don't believe they sail late summer through autumn because it is hurricane season.

We really enjoyed it.  It's probably not everybody's cup of tea, but it's nice to be completely looked after and pampered for five days. 

I could go on a bit more, but don't want to bore anybody.  Let me know if you want to discuss it further.  Bon voyage!

Kellie

We're hope hope hoping to do this, we received a bunch of brochures yesterday from Cunard.  Chrishamil is the one who took the cruise, she has the link to cunard (I think it's www.cunard.com but hers definitely works) in her "Anybody want to sail to SoHampton?" thread in this board.

It's pricey.  $1500 per person for an inside cabin.  The biggest cabins can run as high as $25k, but of course that isn't even an option for us.

Our big snag right now is, they do not accept passengers under one year old.  We really don't know what to do about that, as we'd hoped to sail in April but our baby will only be 5 months.  The Queen Mary's last Eastbound sail in 2005 is Nov 1, at which time the baby will be 11 months.  Will they let that slide?  We don't know.  We're hoping it's a policy and not an insurance thing...fingers crossed.

We want to sail so badly, especially me since I'm terrified to fly...but if it's going to delay us until spring 2006, after my pregnancy already putting off our planned Fall 2004 move...

Sigh.

Anyway, it looks fantastic and you can request brochures on the cunard website.