Saturday, January 26, 2013

The Queen Elizabeth - Getting on and getting settled


A fond farewell and many, many thanks to Nancy and Judd for our delivery to Port Everglades, Fort Lauderdale, FL.  They dropped us off right on time....2:30 p.m., as Cunard requested.


You may note from these pictures that the line is quite long....you are quite right.....as a matter of fact, the line did not move for TWO HOURS!!!!! Many people had been waiting since 11:00 a.m.  We were among the lucky ones who arrived late.....U. S. Customs came aboard and required individual fingerprints of each of the 1,500 debarking non U. S. citizens   AND each of the 1,100 debarking non U. S. crew members.....It took NINE (9) HOURS for the total process and no one from the ship was allowed to leave.....for a tour, to explain the problem....for any reason....Dare we say,  lots of grumbling....we were to sail at 6 p.m......got onboard after 5 p.m. and to the credit of the crew, captain, etc....we sailed at 6:15!!


Does this look familiar????  Same chaos....just piled on a different bed.....unpacking for a MONTH onboard is much more fun than PACKING!!







Just a FEW of the many, many photos around the ship of various passengers....and the history of the vessel.....by the way, this is the Queen Elizabeth, not the QE II, even though this vessel is named for the current Queen Elizabeth who is, in fact, Queen Elizabeth II...go figure!!