Last night we were able to get a good long night's sleep (yesterday we got up early to beat the crowds to the ferry terminal to the islands at Battery Park). We even skipped the hotel's breakfast to pack and do a little last-minute shopping for some quasi-essentials (a belt for me, extra memory card for the digital camera, that sort of thing), but managed to slip into an Au Bon Pain late in the morning for a bite and coffee.
We were loaded on the bus by 1:00 and left shortly thereafter to drive straight south to the tip of Manhattan and a tunnel to Brooklyn where the Queen Mary 2 was docked. Security clearance and other matters took a while; we didn't board until shortly before 3. I took photos all along the way.
Our room has a king-sized bed, plenty of built-in closet space and cupboards and drawers, its own bathroom, an enclosed balcony -- which is to say, a space measuring maybe 4 x 10 feet, with two chairs, and a large
"window" cut through the hull. We're pretty completely sheltered from the wind there. The room also had a complimentary bottle of champagne and a pair of glass flutes waiting for us on arrival.
The ship had a required emergency drill at 4, then many of us headed out on the decks to watch New York and New Jersey recede behind us, with the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island in the foreground. The ship cast off about 5, and we passed beneath the Verrazano Narrows bridge (between Staten Island and Brooklyn) about 5:45. Exquisite timing on the part of our hosts, since dinner was at 6.
So far, we've seen only a little bit of the ship's interior, but it really is astounding. Roughly 3,000 passengers are in a position to enjoy a movie-and-variety show theater, a 150-seat planetarium (different shows reportedly narrated by Harrison Ford and somebody else famous), 12 -- count 'em -- 12 bars, pubs, and lounges (several with their own pianists or jazz combo; and I understand there's even a rap DJ for the night club space), a library, an Internet Centre (from which I am typing this), a casino with blackjack, slot machines and other amusements, and who knows what else!
We've been on the water 3 hours and 20 minutes, and I've only just begun to feel a little sea-like motion; the premises seemed solid as a Manhattan hotel through dinner. The only thing that suggested that was NOT where we were was the gentle vibration of the engines through the floor, since we were dining on the second level . . . well, that and the water flying by the portholes while it was still light out. We'll be crossing one time zone and setting our watches forward each of the next six days.
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