Queen Victoria Jan 28 2023: Transiting the Panama Canal

Let's just start by saying that the Panama Canal Transit, through the original system of five canal locks, is remarkable. Halfway through, I turned to Phil and said that I had been afraid that it would be anticlimactic; and that it was absolutely anything but.

The sky was beautiful as it was only around 6:30 AM when our day in the canal began (dawn was around 6). We looked out on all the tankers, bulk carriers and container ships waiting to start their passage through. 

We were very fortunate to have a narrated trip starting from just before 7 AM all the way to our sailing out into the Pacific around 5:30 PM. Richard Wainio, the former Canal Authority Administrator (who had lectured several times on board) engaged us with history, statistics, and anecdotes. 

Phil set up a video recorder (with time lapse) which is posted below. Frankly, we nerded out looking at all the equipment, mechanical procedures, ship watching, and experiencing the amazing journey. A silver lining to being confined to quarters was that it forced us to focus on the journey instead of running around the ship looking for "the best" photo ops and viewing angles. A big plus was that our cabin was optimally located for viewing the transit.

We had breakfast just before entering the Canal and lunch in the middle of our cruise through Gatun Lake. Our room service meals have been very good. We get a call every day from the Purser's Office to see how we are doing and if we need anything. Cunard has been very good to us.

The transit takes about 10 hours, in the hot, tropical sun. I'm glad we were well prepared with sunscreen and water. Our reward is a certificate, confirming that we've been through the canal.

Here is our 10-hour transit reduced to just over a minute, as viewed from our balcony:

Queen Victoria at sea January 27 2023

 Low-key day, with (of course!) in-room dining. We are both feeling better, though tired. I said, well, we could be at home in chill, dismal Philadelphia, and with me struggling to cook and clean while being sick. Instead it's a warm holiday at sea with someone else cooking while we recuperate.

I spent the morning reading on the balcony while Phil napped on and off. One of the ship's doctor's came up to check in mid-morning. I came in about noon to cool off and have a pre-lunch nap.

Late afternoon/early evening we watched the ship's Insight lectures, then had a later dinner. Crashed early as tomorrow. Saturday the 28th is our Canal crossing.

Queen Victoria, at sea Jan 21-23 2023 en route to the Caribbean

 days at sea brought grdually warming temperatures and clearing skies....we spent most of the first two days running around the ship, exploring all the various lounges, bars, outdoor spaces, etc.

We managed to find time to attend the evening shows and the lectures. Of course, being Cunard, they have lectures (and celebrity lecturers, some some cases). This trip we were fortunate to have a retired Canadian astronaut who did several stints on the Int'l Space Station. One of the highlight lecturers is a former bureaucrat from the Panama Canal Authority, who is quite good.

We are watching our dining choices; being in Princess Grill we have a few extra perks (including anytime dining from 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM). The food has been uniformly excellent and the highlights for me include lots of South Asian curry and curry-related dishes. 

Surprisingly, there are a lot of folks dancing at night and learning to dance at classes during the day. The first night we were surprised to look out over the Queen's Room to see about twenty couples dancing traditional Scottish dances (and learned a little more about that). 

1200 passengers (of about 2400 total) are on the full World Voyage. 

Queen Victoria Jan 26 2023: A Port Day: Oranjestad, Aruba

The storm breaks! Thursday morning we tested for Covid; barely seconds after the nasal sample fluid hit the test strip a very dark and well-defined line indicated I had been infected. Phil was Negative.

Even though I had developed some coughing and nasal dripping, I thought it was just a cold. Oh, no.

I immediately reported it to the medical staff; Phil had the option to move to an inside cabin (to avoid getting infected). He chose to stay in the stateroom with me. Our dispensary opened and I started my five days of Paxlovid, in addition to Advil cold/flu tablets. Room service would become our dining option (but we could get our Princess Grill menu as room service too). 

Phil went ashore in Aruba and ran some errands at Super Food and did some sight-seeing while I napped and read. 

Super Food is a gigantic supermarket. It's fascinating because of the abundance of Dutch products (Aruba being one of the four countries making up the Kingdom of the Netherlands). For example: four kinds of StroopWaffles. I easily spent an hour or two exploring.

The divi divi trees are a photogenic, wind -shaped native tree.

Two large books from the ship's library having been obtained in advnce of my test "just in case". Lots of ebooks were opened that afternoon.

Basically there are six days of strict confinement; then test every day till Negative again.

We had tea in the stateroom on Phil's return, then he tested himself again. Positive! Exactly the scenario we had envisioned and had provided against. SO at least we are on the same confinement schedule, and he didn't move to an inside. It's good that we have such a big cabin to spread out in.

Queen Victoria Jan 24 2023 A Port Day: Philipsburg, Sint Maarten

We arrived at 7 AM, but were not the first ship docked; by the end of the day, there were three other (larger) cruise ships docked; we guesstimated about 7,500 tourists could have been ashore. 

Our final plan for Philipsburg was to walk through town and see some local artist murals, spend some time in the sun at the town beach, and to head out to Maho Beach where you can see planes close overhead that are headed to land at the airport.

We'd decided to test ourselves for Covid before going ashore, and were both negative. I was exhausted, however, from lack of sleep- the first two nights featured loud mechanical/metallic sounds of varying frequency and intensity that kept waking me up. In the course of the third day at sea we spoke with a couple who suggested we rally *should* register a complaint about it, so we did. The night before arriving in Sint Maarten it had gone away. We'll probably never know what caused it, but that was the end of it.

Our mural hunt netted us most of the murals and a nice look about the town, which has seen better days. Of course, in 2017 it was badly damaged by Hurricane Irma and has suffered several other hurricane strikes since. Our beach time was pleasant; we'd gotten two chairs, an umbrella, and four beers for $25.00. We crashed out till about noon, then I went back to Queen Victoria for a deeper sleep and Phil went out to Maho Beach.

Maho Beach is known as a "must do". The beach is at the foot of the runway, so it looks like the arriving planes are just feet over the beach. Actually, I was disappointed. I think the planes are actually closer just outside of Fort Mifflin, at the Philadelphia airport. I stayed long enough to watch two planes land and headed back to the boat.

At 5:30 PM, the ship pushed off and headed to Aruba.

Queen Victoria: Friday January 20 2023; boarding in NYC & the start of the voyage south....

...."Don't you know who we are?!"...... 

As we are now Platinum Class in Cunard's "frequent sailor" program, we receive Priority Boarding; Phil and I are both looking forward to frequently trotting out that phrase in the coming weeks, ha ha....

After Thursday's activity, we crashed hard. We both woke up around 6:00 AM, just in time to have the room electric clock go off. We forgot to check that "Alarm" mode was disabled- that's a running joke with us, due to several unfortunate previous incidents over the years when the previous guest set the alarm to an ungodly time.

Breakfast in the hotel (generic) but the coffee was decent. Cleaning up and repacking has taken up the morning, now waiting to take things downstairs, check out, then get an Uber to the dock, and see about boarding.

We got another taste of the World Voyage, Southampton to New York leg, courtesy of Anchor Group Films:

https://youtu.be/hkJsHKL2OhE

Boarding.....surprisingly, we used all the money we saved by *not* taking cabs/Uber/Lyft yesterday in the rain, and opted to Uber to the Manhattan Cruise Terminal in bright sunshine. We left the hotel at 10:25 AM and arrived and left off our checked bags by 10:30 AM. We took some exterior ship photos- including of our stateroom. Shortly after 11 we finished checking in and were waiting to board....for the record, Manhattan Terminal is trickier to get to, but easier and faster checkin and security; Brooklyn is easier to get to, but more difficult to get through security and checkin

Boarding!!! January 20

 We've had an uneventful day, so far. We were so tired  last night that I set an alarm, just to make sure we didn't sleep through breakfast. As it turns out, the alarm wasn't needed. But we definitely slept later than we usually do.

Staying at the Hampton Inn, breakfast was included. It was about 7:30 when we headed down for breakfast.

Breakfast finished, we headed back to the room to stow away all of the bottles we bought yesterday. It's a good thing we had a spare, little dufflebag. Our luggage count was now 7 pieces to keep track of, rather than 6.

We didn't think we'd be able to fit all of our bags in a regular taxi, so I ordered an Uber 'XL'. We asked for it to pick us up at 10:20, and he was there right on time. And, even with a van we still filled all of the storage. It's only a 10 minute ride from the hotel to the cruise terminal. Check-in wasn't starting until 11, so we had some time to kill. We checked our three big, heavy bags and, without the burden of those bags we set off to take some photos of the ship. We got a nice shot of our soon-to-be-home from the top deck of the parking garage.

We didn't have to kill much time. Check-in start at 11. We were through that in 15 minutes. Then we had another wait, until the ship was cleared to board. As we're now "platinum", one of the perks is priority boarding. So, once the go ahead was given, we were some of the first to board. We made a beeline to our cabin to drop off our hand baggage, then off to lunch. We had a relaxing lunch, accompanied by the first of our many wines.

Our next task was to unpack. That process took longer than I expected... Over an hour to get everything into it's rightful location.

Now, finally time to explore the ship. We know the QM2 like the back of our hands, but the Queen Victoria is new to us. Lots to discover!

New York City Jan 19 2023

We had planned a busy day in NYC on Thursday and hoped the predicted rain wouldn't be too intense. As it turned out, it was never more than a drizzle.

At 6am it was pouring, and we thought we'd have to take a taxi to the station. Around 8am, however, a miracle happened. The rain had completely stopped. So we hightailed it out of the house and walked our luggage to 30th Street station.

Lunch was at the Amtrak Metropolitan Lounge in Penn Station. The lounge has some really nice lunch offerings.

Since we had originally thought we'd be staying in the financial district, our plans revolved around locations near Wall Street:

• Stopping at the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) office so Cliff could get a replacement 'Senior' transit card.
• the National Museum of the American Indian (a branch of the Smithsonian in DC). This was a fascinating museum, but it was worth a visit just for the building - an old customs house, with some great nautical murals featuring the great ocean liners of the 20s and 30s.
• a wine tasting at a boutique wine store from which we had pre-ordered a couple of bottles and
• visiting the Cunard building. Since we're sailing on Cunard it seemed only appropriate to visit the building that had been their New York headquarters. Built in 1920, it served as their offices until 1968. Unfortunately, the building is private and now closed to the public. It would have been nice to get a glimpse of the interior. What I've seen from photos, the domed lobby (which was the original ticketing hall) is gorgeous. We did get photos of the First Class and Cabin Class entrances as a consolation.

You'd think we were preparing for an around-the-world trip with the amount of booze we ordered and are carrying. Gin, vermouth, Dimmi Liquore Di Milano (an obscure Italian liqueur), and 3 bottles of red wine; all picked up in New York from two different liquor stores. This is in addition to the bottles of whiskey, Montenegro (an amaro), pre-made coffee martinis, and wine that we're lugging from Philadelphia. I think that it should keep us in (good) spirits for three weeks.

Dinner, at V(IV), was excellent. It's a Thai restaurant that had excellent Google reviews. And it's decorated in an over-the-top Asian theme. 

Not much was on the agenda for Thursday evening except, perhaps, taking some exterior photos of the ship at night. A hotel across the street from the Cruise Terminal has a rooftop lounge. We were hoping to get a nice view of the ship from up there, but it was closed for a private event. So, back to the hotel, by way of the same route we would use the next day.

Friday will be breakfast at the hotel, followed by possibly rolling our big bags to the Cruise Terminal (about a 15-20 mins walk) to leave them with the porters. "Possibly" because, based on the dry run, it may be a longer excursion than anticipated. We will head back to the terminal where we're planning to get some more exterior photos of the ship. Our plan is to board around Noon. Lunch will be, aboard, in the Princess Grill. Then to unpack!

One week to go: preparations winding up 01/13/2022

As you saw in an earlier post, the departure for the Panama Canal transit voyage is from NYC....but there were changes in store for us. Normally, Cunard uses a dock in Red Hook, Brooklyn as its departure terminal, so we booked a hotel not far from the Wall Street Ferry slip to ease our getting across to the dock. The ferry from Wall Street is just about the most convenient way to get to the Brooklyn terminal.

In early December, however, we received info that Queen Victoria would now be docking on the Hudson, at the Manhattan Cruise Terminal. That's in Upper Midtown at 55th Street, not too far from Times Square. 

Phil scrambled to adjust our plans and we booked a new hotel about fifteen minutes' walk from the Cruise Terminal.

As it stands now (01/13/2023) we are taking Amtrak to NYC, arriving about 11:30 AM on the 19th (a day before departure). We have time for a leisurely lunch in the Metropolitan Lounge at Penn Station's Moynihan Hall, then a twenty-minute walk to the hotel. We plan to drop off our luggage, then run errands, including a wine tasting in Lower Manhattan. Phil discovered a very cool Thai restaurant near the hotel, so we are planning on having dinner there. If the weather is decent, we hope to walk over and take a few night shots of QV at dock. 

We have to take a Covid test the day before departure and demonstrate a negative result. It's completely on the honor system now!

This past week has been a flurry of cleaning & tidying-up, meeting the cat sitter, and for me, using up our fresh food in meals. Phil has prepped the cat food dispensers and water fountains, so they will be ready to go.

We've also been doing some research for our cruise port calls and have finalized (we think!) what our plans are for each destination.... but more on that later.

Queen Victoria & Panama Canal Transit: Itinerary & Packing

As we prepared for the trip, one of the realizations we had was that the cruise we are on is the first leg of Queen Victoria's 2023 World Cruise and that it is celebrating Cunard's Centenary of sailing world cruises. Extra exciting!

We have four "gala nights"- Masquerade; Roaring Twenties; Black & White and Cunard Red & Gold. In addition, we have a "special night"- Robert Burns Night, celebrating the birth of the Scots poet Robert Burns. There will be a parade of the haggis, toasts, and readings. As our contribution to the theme, we have tartan pocket squares for our jackets.

Our itinerary includes: 

• Philipsburg (Sint Maarten), 
• Oranjestad (Aruba), 
• Panama Canal Transit, 
• Huatulco (Mexico),
• Cabo San Lucas (Mexico) and the final stop: 
• San Francisco. We get an overnight stay on QV there, before we take Amtrak's "California Zephyr" east to Chicago (three days, two nights in one of the big family bedrooms). 

Right now, we have two large hard-sided suitcases (with wheels); a garment bag with our formal wear; a smaller roll-aboard stocked with booze, and a daypack each with change of clothes, toiletries, electronics, etc.

Packing has included a mini-pharmacy of Covid treatments in the event we become ill and are "confined to quarters". We have to take a Covid test the day before departure and demonstrate a negative result. Hopefully, we'll stay negative the entire trip! 

Both of us have lots of e-books and at least one poolside-compatible paperback, along with a portable Monopoly game. We can check out books from the on-board library of about 6,000 volumes & there is a book exchange (like a "Little Free Library"). There are also some boardgames that we can check out of the Library. 

Two of the folks who *were* scheduled to take the complete World voyage- but unfortunately had to cancel- made these two videos. 

The first is a "teaser trailer" and the second is of QV's departure from Southampton UK last week:

(40) Preview of 2023 Cunard Queen Victoria World Cruise - YouTube

(40) Episode 1: The Centenary World Cruise Begins - YouTube

The start of our Panama Canal voyage January-February 2023

How the trip started...

We were on a QM2 crossing in December 2021, when the Voyage Sales office dropped off the complete Cunard voyage catalog for the next few years. We always buy a few Future Cruise Certificates when onboard, but this time a specific voyage caught my eye. We'd been toying with the idea of a Panama Canal transit for a while. Most of those we'd looked at sailed from Florida. What caught my eye in the catalog was a Queen Victoria Panama Canal transit that sailed from New York. Since we're in Philadelphia (just 90 miles, or so, from New York) and have sailed on the QM2 out of Red Hook numerous times, that was a huge plus.

At our appointment with Voyage Sales we were delivered the bad news that our Panama Canal trip was a leg of the World Voyage, and that our leg was sold out. We went ahead and put our names on the waiting list. I expected that we'd hear that there was an opening in a few weeks. Nope!

Almost every week I signed onto the Cunard site and attempted to make a dummy reservation, to see if any cabins had come open. In a few weeks, in late January, a balcony cabin seemed to be available! A quick email to our travel agent, and he confirmed that we could put a deposit down. That was easy, we had two Future Cruise Certificates from last December. We were at last certain of going.

I don't like the idea of 'Guarantee' cabins, but our new Booking Confirmation showed that's what we had reserved: a category BD (aft balcony) guarantee. I thought we'd be OK because that grade had cabins above and below, so it'd be quiet. And being at the aft the ship wouldn't bother us, we both have our sea legs. Normally, the far forward and far aft locations have much more 'motion'.

So, rather than signing into the Cunard site to see if any cabins were available, now I was signing in on a weekly basis to see if we'd been assigned a specific cabin! Week after week: nope, still just a guarantee.

Then, on December 9th, about a year from when we made our reservation (and just over a month before departure), we got an email from our travel agent advising us of an upgrade offer from Cunard. His words: "This is a good deal". It was, it was a *really* good deal. So we jumped on it. Not only was it a good deal, but I'd been corresponding on Cruise Critic with "Roscoe39". He had just cancelled his 2023 World Voyage, and his now-free cabin was what was being offered. Even though it's a Princess Grill cabin (5002), it's larger than many of the Queens Grill cabins. Because it's so large, it often sells out immediately. We couldn't believe our luck!

So, that's the convoluted tale of our embarking on the Panama Canal transit, from wait list to being in a Standard Balcony then jumping to a huge Princess Grill cabin. We leave in exactly a week, and can't wait.