Ah Memories!

Today is another jaunt back to my transatlantic travels. I LOVED the QEII. I honestly could have travelled on her 365 days of the year, had I been a rich person. Yet, I always felt I was a bit of a fraud. Some people saved for years  just to be able to go on a "trip of a lifetime", and here I was, using it simply as a way to get from point A to point B - because I do not fly. As if it were a Greyhound bus, doing an epic 5 day cross country, the only difference being that it was crossing an ocean ... and oooh so much more comfortable!

At the time, hubby was working in Georgia, in a lovely own called Valdosta. We'd been staying in a motel for about 3 months, when it came time for me to leave. He drove me to Atlanta to catch the Amtrak up to New York ... which decided to run late and my journey was tense as I kept checking my watch to see if we were making up any of the lost time. Luckily, in New York, I had an awesome taxi driver who got me to the port with moments to spare before the ship was due to sail ... only to find it was delayed awaiting some passengers whose plane was arriving late.

I daresay they were part of a fly/cruise combo, as I don't think they'd have held it up for me had I called and said my train was delayed!

On my 2nd sailing, I was more relaxed. I knew what I liked, and knew what I was ok with, or just not bothered about. I dined in the restaurant the first evening, but the people on my table just didn't "click" like on the first trip, so that was my only formal dinner. The rest of the voyage, I hung out in the Lido and ate from the buffet there.

Itertainment did I want to attend? 

It was a brilliant journey. One of my favourite actors from my teenage years was one of the speakers. Simon Williams, who had been the son, James Bellamy, in "Upstairs, Downstairs".

I went to listen to his talk, and was trying to take a photo, unobtrusively, and he saw me, stopped talking, grinned and struck a pose. I am sooo annoyed as I cannot find the photo to put on here. He was really entertaining, talked about his acting career, and told funny little anecdotes about his life.

What was even sweeter was that, for the rest of the trip, whenever he saw me in the Lido, he would stop and chat. Just a regular guy.

Another highlight was seeing a band from my childhood, Wayne Fontana and the Mindbenders.

I caught them during rehearsal, to pick their brains on a song that was a memory for me, but whose title had been evading me for years. It had been in the charts during the same time they'd been in their heyday. We all hummed it, and they remembered it. Miki and Griff 1963!

They too were just regular guys, and we chatted like old friends. That evening, I went to their performance and was just as enthralled as when I was a kid watching them on our black and white telly.

I know I have been blessed to have done some of the things, I've been able to do, in my life. I've had some wonderful experiences. 

Here's a documentary about the QE2, it's an old one, as she is now retired and has been sold to a company in Dubai, to become a floating hotel, as her predecessor, the Queen Mary, is, in Long Beach, California.

This brings back so many memories! I hope you enjoy!

Have a wonderful day, my friends!