The cruise holiday market is one of the boom sectors at the moment, and you can see how it makes sense for people in these cost of living and inflation ridden times. For a headline rate that is generally cheaper than a villa or nice hotel holiday to the mediterranean you can spend a week on a ship with meals and entertainment thrown in and get to visit some interesting places. But what are the actually like – is this just suburban hell transplanted to a floating prison or are they a comfortable and stylish place from which to see the world and even destinations in their own right?
To find out we have arranged a series of trips, paying our own way, on several of the cruise lines. We have mostly used the short, taster cruises of three or four days that they offer to tempt novice cruisers (is it just me or is that an unfortunate phrase?) to try the experience.
The first of these is the grand daddy, or perhaps more appropriately, the grand father of them all: Cunard.
Cunard was formed following the n 1839,award to Samuel Cunard of the first British transatlantic steamship mail contract and at the end of the Second World War, Cunard was the the largest Atlantic passenger line having acquired its rival, the White Star Line. By the mid-1950s, it operated 12 ships to the United States and Canada. Its most famous ships have included the Carpathia, which rescued passengers from the Titanic, the Acquitania, and the QEII. However air travel caused a long term decline in demand for liner travel between the U.K. and the U.S.A., and Cunard’s initial tilt towards the cruise market was hampered by older ships an lack of investment. Eventually Cunard was acquired by Carnival Corporation, the large U.S. cruise ship operator, since when Cunard has enjoyed something of a renaissance, alongside a broader increase in demand for cruise travel.
Cunard currently operates four ships: the Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mary II, the Queen Victoria and the newly launched Queen Anne. I was on the Queen Victoria, one of the smaller Cunard ships with space for approximately 2,000 passengers. She was launched at the end of 2007 and last refurbished in 2017. I booked a three night taster cruise to Hamburg and back and last year for the very first time boarded a cruise ship. What would the experience be like for someone more used to villas in Sicily, road trips across the U.S. or relaxing with my wife and daughter on the coast of Sri Lanka?
The first impressions were very good: boarding swift and friendly. To be fair, as a newbie, I had made the mistake of taking seriously the instruction as to the boarding time (they assign these to stagger embarkation and do the same for disembarkation) which was quite close to the scheduled time for leaving Southampton. Everyone else was clearly more experienced and already onboard the ship.
And what a beautiful ship it is. I once took a tour around the Queen Mary now moored near Los Angeles, and though that was pure elegance. This was elegance further refined, as I hope the photographs show. Inlaid wood, polished brass, deep rich carpets and a staircase curving its way upwards. Simply wow.
I made my way to my cabin where the excellently friendly steward – a calming helpful presence for the next three days – showed me round my cabin and promptly popped off to double the welcome gift of a bottle of sparkling wine. The cabin was spacious, clean and well organised with a decent balcony. Things looking very good indeed. Time to explore the ship.
Which was rather wonderful and does feel a bit like being in a 1930s ship, albeit a modernised version. A great example is the two story library with a lovely wooden spiral staircase connecting the floors, and clever angles that bring out the detail in the architecture. It’s a great place to while away a few hours, albeit in a more civilised version of the race for sun loungers you need to get your seat early.
Speaking of sun loungers, there is a pool an several hot-tubs and, to my amazement, these were proving popular as we crossed the North Sea in a storm in January. Not for me, but in better weather it’s a pretty nice place. Just by the pool is the Winter Gardens, which looks exactly like a winter garden should: a curved glass roof providing an airy setting for a lounge bar showing sports and other events on TV. It was a good place for a drink, and handy for the buffet restaurant, The Lido.
However the bar I preferred was The Commodore Club – a very elegant space at the front of the ship with commanding views out over the sea as we ploughed through it. Clubby in style, and with an excellent and quite reasonably priced drinks menu, this was where I inevitably gravitated, happy to sit there with a book and a martini watching the coming gale crash over the ship from the comfort of my deep leather chair.
From there to dinner, which is one of the things Cunard publicises the most: the main restaurant for Britannia level passengers – which is everyone but the lucky few able to afford the punchily priced Princess or Queens Grill suites, which have their own dining rooms floating above the centre of the ship. One day maybe.
So off to the Britannia restaurant, which operates two sittings and where you are allocated a table that you keep for your trip. That part worked very well – I was allocated to a table of seven other singletons, and it really did help provide a bit of social terra firma. Not least because the fellow passengers are a bit self selecting – people looking for an alternative to Benidorm are thin on the ground on Cunard ships. Rather, an interesting bunch of people from the U.K., Europe and the U.S. among whom some properly interesting conversations were had. Or to put it simply, my fellow passengers were friendly and polite. Great stuff.
On the other hand, there is no way of describing the food in the main restaurant as anything other than awful. The menus sounded great – salmon, rack of lamb etc. But the quality of the ingredients was poor and the execution as bad. I just don’t get it. Fellow diners said that the food is often variable on these short trips but the restaurant comes into its own on longer voyages. I hope so, because this was awful and you could see it in that most people deserted it after an initial try. I tried it twice but then I am a masochist. It’s such a shame as the sight of everyone dressed up in black tie for gala evenings and the beauty of the room had the potential for something quite special.
What made it even stranger is that the food elsewhere on the ship was superb. The Lido restaurant is a buffet, but the quality was outstanding. From the salads, to the curries to the roast meats all excellent. And plentiful well cooked vegetables – perfectly cooked and with texture not the mush you sometimes dread. Breakfast up there was great other than for my waistline – proper sausages and bacon and as much as you want. As for afternoon tea, well Cunard is not going to mess up afternoon tea. The other place I tried, the always heaving Golden Lion pub also served up a chicken tikka masala which was spot on.
When it came to entertainment it is not a ship packed with arcades, rollercoasters and all the whiz bang entertainments that some other lines promote (but it does have a very well regarded kids club). But what it does have is all in keeping with the feel of the ship: an elegant theatre with surprisingly interesting guest lecturers is very popular, there is a small but friendly casino – where a few hours at the roulette table with everyone in black tie was simply memorable, along with quizzes and the like in the Golden Lion, a card room for bridge and all sorts of classic deck games like shuffleboard. There is also a spa and a nightclub on the same high level as The Commodore Club that was extremely popular and rocking way past my bedtime.
Arrival at Hamburg was impressive – manoeuvring the ship into a tight space and transport into and out of town seamless. If you have not been to Hamburg before do not miss its premier attraction – Miniatur Wunderland. It’s the world’s largest model railway housed in a 19th century warehouse by the canals. I know that sounds nerdy, but it isn’t. Just trust me and go.
The Queen Victoria filled up with people joining from Hamburg, some of whom I suspect were staying on for part or all of the world tour that it was to commence immediately following its return to Southampton, but at no point did the ship ever feel overcrowded and there as always a nice corner to be found or space on the promenade deck to get some of your daily steps in.
So what was it like overall? It was highly enjoyable. A relaxing and elegant place to spend a few days with enough not to be bored and – main restaurant aside – very good food and drink. Add to that a day in a city as interesting as Hamburg and you have a very pleasant little trip indeed, perfection perhaps if what you are looking for is some peace to read a few books. Which is a much underrated activity in life.
Cunard is not something that it would be easy to create if it did not already exist. So try it at least once because I am not sure there is anything else out there quite like it.
Next up something very different: a short cruise to Cherbourg and back on MSC Europa with my wife and daughter in May – will let everyone know how that one goes.
David travelled independently and booked through seascanner. Specalist agents often have good offers on cruise travel. At the date of publication, Cunard is offering Britania balcony staterooms on a similar four day cruise from Southampton to Hamburg and back for £499 per person.
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