171 Years of Greatness! Transatlantic Power!

Well it’s July and if you are anywhere near the Untied States you will see that the whole country is in a frenzy celebrating the 4th of July (I myself, am celebrating on the Queen Mary!!). It’s a great holiday!...Definitely one of the most fun, and its great going to watch fireworks with your family and friends. At the same time, I think, considering the history and importance (not just to us, but to the whole world) behind the day, it’s important to reflect upon the meaning of the Fourth and just what we are all celebrating…CUNARD LINE’S BIRTHDAY!!! (*GEEKOUT TIME!)

Yes, today July 4th, 2011, is the 171th anniversary of the maiden voyage of the genesis of the line, Cunard’s first ship, the RMS Britannia, on a two week journey from Liverpool to Boston via Halifax! Today marks the establishment of the world’s greatest institution, founded on the principles of free trade, timely mail service, global communications, speed, strength, and safety! Today we celebrate the first day of service for the greatest name in travel history!



I will be posting a longer (knowing me, a much much longer article about my beloved Cunard!! So stay tuned!



…oh and I suppose there are also a few people celebrating the United States I think? ;) j/k Happy Independence Day!! During this patriotic time, don’t forget to remember out great Nation’s Flagship, the SS United States, and her current fight for her survival! (((Yesterday, July 3rd, marked the anniversary of her record breaking maiden voyage)))

Queen Mary, meet Queen Victoria!

Wow! Tonight has been really incredible! It was amazing! It was a spectacle of Cunard's greatness! It was so great, I nearly had a heart attack (not to mention the weird sounds and faces I made, as I “geeked out”).

For those of you who don’t know, the Queen Victoria, which has been based here in Los Angeles for the last few weeks, sailed over to Long Beach to – as Cunard puts it, "rendezvous with her older fleet mate and first Cunard Queen, the Queen Mary." It was beautiful! (*tear).

Now, in the over 40 years that the Queen Mary has been in Long Beach, this is only the second time that one of Cunard’s ships has visited her there. The first time was in 2006, when the great and beautiful Queen Mary 2 came to meet to her namesake and predecessor. That was really, really incredible, and I really wish Cunard would do that again! (even though I don’t think I was far enough along in my shipgeek-ness at the time, to really completely appreciate that moment…nowadays I would be head over heels in love).

It makes me really happy to see Cunard acknowledging the Queen Mary. Often, companies tend to forget about their history and move on. When Cunard does things like this though, it draws attention to their history and the Queen Mary, and in my opinion it shows that they care. I LOVE YOU CUNARD!!!!!!!!! AHHHH!!!!

Anyways, back to tonight (even though, by the time this is posted it will be last night), or rather today (cause it all really started before night time). In the early afternoon, I left my hometown of Pasadena (about 20 some odd miles north of the Queen Mary) for the Port of Los Angeles in San Pedro. I was going there to see the Queen Victoria one last time before she left LA.

Upon arrival there, I saw her, the Queen Victoria, looking beautiful while docked at Berth 93 at the World Cruise Center. After fainting a couple of times (from the sheer awesomeness), I took many pictures from many different angles. Then, after being there for an hour, I left and headed on over to the Queen Mary in Long Beach. Luckily for me, the Queen Mary was free today, in honor of the event, so I just walked on.

After squeezing on to an elevator with 50 gazillion other people, I was on. Oh how I love to be on the Queen Mary…there really is nothing else quite like her, and even though I go there often, I never get tired of it. I walked around a little bit -noticing the crowd gathering already- and then bought myself pizza and a cookie (a tradition of mine). After I had finished eating, I went over to the aft boat deck, where many other shipgeeks were already gathering. There we waited for the next hour or so, waiting for the Queen Victoria to show herself. It sounds funny to say (or write) this, but, you really could feel the anticipation in the group. Everyone seemed excited, waving little British flags that had been handed out, and talking about our favorite thing…ships!

I had considered going back to San Pedro, to watch the ship depart from there and then race back to the Queen Mary for the rendezvous, but after figuring that there would be no time to do this, I walked forward to the Queen Mary’s bridge, from where, I could see the Queen Victoria moving in the distance. I took a few pictures, and then went back to the aft decks.

As Queen Victoria made her way on over, more and more people showed up. This actually took me be surprise. I expected a fair amount of people, but to be honest, I didn’t expect as many as we got. Queen Victoria doesn’t have the same “star power” that the QM2 has so I didn’t think she would draw that huge of a crowd. I am very happy to say that I was wrong…there were a ton of people!

(above image - "Queens Victoria & Mary" by flickr member Don & Stella )

Finally, Queen Victoria started to approach us. It was a beautiful sight in the light of the fading sky. The ship was all lit up for the occasion, and I swear there are not many sights more beautiful than a ship, lit up at night, or twilight. She got closer and closer (much closer than the Queen Mary 2 was able to get in 2006) and everyone was scrambling around trying to get the best picture they could. After about 10 or 15 minutes, a fireworks show started up, with fireworks shooting from the Queen Mary herself, her breakwater and a barge floating in the harbor. It was short, but quite beautiful! And very exciting!

After that, Queen Victoria turned around and very slowly sailed away as the crowds dispersed. I was one of the few that stayed and watched her till she was completely gone.

(above photo -"Long Beach, Ca." by flickr member RickWarrenPhotos )

It was a great and fun time. It was also great to be around that many other shipgeeks…we really are a special breed if you ask me. :D

I ended my Cunard night by walking around the Queen Mary which was nice…even though, I kid you not; at one point someone seriously thought that I was a ghost (interesting). And while I have been pretty much to every public space on the ship (not every one though), I did find a few new places (even though I wasn’t really supposed to go into these new places, strictly speaking ;) ).

I am home now, very happy after a great day. There were a couple of bummers though, firstly that I did not talk to anyone there! It’s kind of funny, but believe it or not, I am pretty shy. I wanted to talk to other people, especially some Cunard employees who were there, but when the time came to do it, I had a hard time getting myself to do so. The other bummer is how fast it all went. I have been so excited waiting for this day, and now its over. On top of that, Queen Victoria and Cunard, won’t be back on this side of the continent till December!

Oh well, that aside, I still had a great day!

For more photo's of the event you can check out our Picasa Album https://picasaweb.google.com/104983304629890664189/QueenVictoriaQueenMaryTheMeetingOfTheTwoQueens3311#

This past few weeks. The SS United States, Cunard in Los Angeles, and other industry news!

EEEEEEE!!!!!! I am still glowing! Why? Well if you don’t know by now…Cunards Queen Victoria and Queen Elizabeth were here in Los Angeles!!! It was beautiful!! Too beautiful........I almost died. But that’s not all that happening lately, nope. There is also news of RCI’s plans for a new class of ships, some small updates on the Carnival Splendor (the one that caught fire), Oceana’s newest ship is out and sailing, the SS United States has been bought and some other news!

Cunard!
AHHHHH!!!!! AHHHH!!!!! IT WAS BEAUTIFUL!! Seeing two of the Cunard Queens here in my home town was incredible! The day started off very early, like at 3:30 am early!(…usually I have not even gone to sleep yet at that time.). I got up this early so I would be able to travel from Pasadena to the port (a drive of about 30 miles I’d say) in time to see the Queen Elizabeth sail into port. Unfortunately, when I got there to San Pedro (the port district of the City of Los Angeles) there was some very thick fog and I was not able to see the ship sail in through Angles Gate (the entrance to the Port to Los Angeles), however I was able to go to a park across the quay from the cruise terminal. From here, I was able to see the QE come up the main channel through the fog and dock at the terminal. It was beautiful and I was totally ship geeking out!! (photo at right- "Queen Victoria" by flickr member "Voyager One")

There was only one problem I had. For some reason, it had been decided that the QE would use one of the lower terminals. Let me explain…the cruise terminals at the Port of Los Angeles are arrange in a ‘L’ shape. Two berths are parallel to the main channel, the other terminal and berth is perpendicular to the channel (you see it in the beginning sequence of “The Love Boat”) and it’s perfect for ship spotting as there is a small park and boardwalk located across the slip from it. This later terminal is where I wanted the ship to dock but alas, they docked at the other lover terminal. This terminal isn’t horrible for ship spotting as there is a long walkway that has a good view of the ship but it does put more distance between the ship and you not to mention a large parking lot and a chain link fence. As it turns out, the Sapphire Princess and the Norwegian Star ended up taking the 2 other berths.

As you know, I have my problems with the Queen Elizabeth but seeing her in person was great. I have to admit I am really starting to like this ship (even though I stand by all I have said before) and have never been able to resist a ship in Cunard color. She’s still not as good looking as her sister the Queen Victoria but she’s not as bad as she looks in some pictures. After looking at her pretty much all day she departed from LA in the dark as me, my family (who I dragged along with me) and some other shipgeeks watched.

Next day, it was the Queen Victoria (my favorite of the two)!!! For the sake of keeping this article at a shorter length I shan’t go into the details of the day. I think it will suffice to say, that the day went pretty much like the day before had gone…she docked at the wrong terminal (Disney Wonder got the one I wanted for QV), I geeked out and she was beautiful! I should also mention that despite that fact that the QV had been to Los Angeles before, this was my first time seeing her, which made it very special to me. Unfortunately, I was not able to watch her sail out as I had to get back up to Pasadena but I am sure it was beautiful!!

The only thing that would have made the weekend better was if Cunard had allowed me to visit!!




Royals New Ship?

Speaking about RCI’s better then expected results for the 4th quarter of 2010 and the year as a whole, Richard Fain Chairman and CEO of Royal Caribbean also stated that RCI is working on a new class of ship.

In his own words…

"I know the question, when will you be ordering another ship is out there, and
it's waiting to be asked -- it almost always is," said Fain. "I have previously
confirmed that while we look forward to a period of slower growth, we do not aim
to stagnate."

“It will probably be the start of a new a series, which
would incorporate our latest learnings about efficiency and about guest
amenities.”

“We’ve been working intensively on developing a design that
reflects our innovative spirit but in an efficient package and we think we are
near an acceptable outcome,”

Of course, the online cruise and ship geek communities like Cruise Critic or my favorite Cruise Talk at Travel Server, have been buzzing with speculation and predictions about this new class of ships. Everyone is sure that the ships will be smaller then the Oasis class (that is pretty much what Fain said) but can’t seem to agree on just how much smaller. Some are predicting ships around 180,000grt and others are predicting a more modest 120,000 to 130,000grt ship. Some speculate that these ships will not have all the bells and whistles of the Oasis Class or the Freedom Class, others say that these amenities (like the Boardwalk or Central Park on Oasis) can and should appear on these new smaller ships as they are what RCI is know for.

If I can throw my own predictions into the mix here… Personally I think that RCI will or should go smaller with this new class; maybe around 110,000 to 130,000grt in size. I also think that while many of the newer features on RCI ships should be retained, I think these ships should be toned down slightly. My reasoning for these ideas is this…I have read many reviews and opinions that have said they would like to see smaller ships from RCI. For many, the Oasis, Freedom and even the Voyager class are just to large for them, they prefer the likes of the panamax (the largest size that can fit in the Panama Canal) Radiance Class ship. A class of ships sized in between the larger classes and the smaller classes in RCI’s fleet could at like a bridge or stepping stone, for people transitioning to the larger ships. A smaller ship also has more versatility then a larger ship. It can serve more destinations and be put to work on up and coming markets, for example, Australia or Asia. Also some destinations like Alaska, Hawaii or other Caribbean destinations, are more suited for smaller ships (if you can call 120,000grt small).

What ever comes out, I am sure it will be great! RCI are know for their newbuilds. Its very exciting!

Oceana’s New Ship!

Oceana (a luxury line) just put its first new ship, the Marina, into service this past week. Oceana is a relatively new cruise line, started in 2003, and up until now has only had 3 “R” Class ships which were built in the early 2000’s for the now defunct, Renaissance Cruises. A few years ago Oceana ordered a duo of new ships for the line. These new ships would be larger and hold more people then the original ships but were still heavily related to them.

A few days ago, Oceana hosted a naming ceremony for the ship at its home port of Miami. The ship was christened by Entertainment Tonight star Mary Hart. After this the ship set off on a preview cruise with travel agents (which are responsible for the vast majority of Oceana’s bookings) and invited guests. So far the ship looks good (maybe a little dated looking in some areas, but that works for Oceana’s passengers) and the reviews are really good.

The United States has been bought…

The world famous Ocean Liner, the SS United States, has recently been bought from its previous owners, NCL, by he United States Conservancy, a group dedicated to the future career and preservation of this American flag ship. (photo at right - "The SS United States coming in" by flickr member "Captain Zenith ")

The sad thing is that most American’s have never heard of this ship, their flagship and Ship of State, the United States (also know as the Big U). They don’t know of its unique mark on the USA’s history, they don’t know of its career or the way it came to symbolize a powerful post WWII United States to the rest of the world.

The United States Conservancy and I would love to change that.

Short history of this ship…
After WWII, the US wanted to build a passenger liner to serve on the North Atlantic and compete with Brittan and France for the passenger trade. The ship was to be safe, reliable, fast…like really fast, and comfortable. On top of this, seeing the way the glorious Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth heroically served the allied forces during WWII, delivering hundreds of thousands of troops to the front, the US wanted a liner that could do the same in a time of war.

The answer to these demands was the beautiful United States, our nation’s new Ship of State. Setting sail on her maiden voyage on July 4th, 1952, she shattered all previous transatlantic speed records (……the Queen Mary’s speed record…-_-…). After that she went on to have a successful but short career. She carried many of the worlds most elite on almost every voyage and never once did she have any kind of mechanical failure delay her. Throughout her career she was an icon of American ingenuity, innovation and power. However due to the emergence of clumsy jet travel, transatlantic travel by ocean liner began to decline. Because of this, the United States Line (her owners) decided to with draw her from service and lay her up. After that she was passed from owner to owner having all her interior fittings removed until eventually she was bought by NCL with the intention of putting her back into active service in Hawaii. These plans never materialized for many reasons and as such the Big U remained laid up in Philadelphia. Through the last few years the United States Conservancy has worked tirelessly to insure that this ship is preserved and protected. In 2009, NCL announced that it was taking bids for the ship which of course attracted the scrap yards. In response to this the Conservancy ramped up its fund raising in effort to by the ship themselves. Luckily due to the generosity of some people and NCL, the Conservancy was able to reach an agreement with NCL where the Conservancy would buy the ship for only 3 million…even though this was less then the bids from scrap yards.

This past week the transaction became final and the SS United States is under the owner ship of the Conservancy. Now comes the real challenge…the Conservancy only has a limited amount of time to raise money and come up with a viable way to save this historic ship. Keeping up a ship is not cheap and to say that this will be a difficult undertaking is a large understatement. But I sincerely hope that they will succeed…this ship is too important for it to just be scraped or laid up forever. It’s a symbol of our country and needs to be saved. I would encourage anyone reading this to donate to the cause or do anything you can to help the Conservancy in this important effort.
PLEASE LOOK HERE... http://www.ssunitedstatesconservancy.org/

Anyways, sorry it has been so long since I have written on here. I haven’t forgotten about this blog or my readers (who apparently now number in the thousands :D ).
Hope by the time you finish reading this really really long article that I have the next one ready for you. I currently have 3 other ones in the oven.

Stay tooned!!

Above photo- the SS United States (top) passing her fleetmate the SS America (bottom) in New York City.

A Cunard Day in NYC!

I am sorry about the lack of post over the last couple of days, I am afraid I got lost on the path way of life…basically I was busy so suck it up! ...and I mean that with all the love in the world.

This last Thursday (January 13th) a historic moment occurred as all three Queens in Cunard's fleet met in New York harbor. Lucky onlookers watched as The Glorious, The Perfect, The Alpha, The Omega, The Incredible, The Majestic, The Beautiful and by the Grace of God, Empress of the Seas, Sovereign of the Oceans, Inheritor of the greatest name in maritime history …THE RMS QUEEN MARY 2 (!!!!!), the beautiful Queen Victoria and the lovely Queen Elizabeth, sailed out of New York together. (QM2 is my favorite ship currently in service)

This is only the second time in Cunard history that Cunard has had 3 Queens in New York at once (that partially because Cunard only ever had two Queens up until recently). The Last time was 3 years ago to the day when the QM2, the beautiful Veteran queen of the ocean; QE2, and the brand new Queen Victoria sailed in and then later out together from the port.

The lucky passengers arriving at the port on the QE and QV had just had a special treat as they got to experience a tandem crossing...where both ships crossed together side by side across the Atlantic to NYC. Meanwhile, the passengers on the QM2...well they are just lucky!!!!

In honor of this historic occasion, Cunard’s Commodore Bernard Warner rang the bell (from the original Queen Elizabeth’s engine room) to signal the end of trading for the day at the New York Stock Exchange, the Empire State Building was lit in red for Cunard and passengers and land based onlookers alike, were treated to a Grucci fireworks display as the 3 grand ships lined up in the harbor by the Statue of Liberty.

It was a beautiful event! Seeing 2 or more Cunard Queens together is really something very special. I remember almost 5 years ago when the QM2 met the Queen Mary in Long Beach for the first time! I was there and nearly died from happiness!

Now that the event is over the Queen are heading their separate ways, QM2 on her world cruise (an eastbound one… grrr that means she wont come anywhere near me!), Queen Victoria is on her way here to Los Angeles where she will be based for a few weeks and Queen Elizabeth is on her first world cruise which will also bring her here to Los Angeles a day before the QV. Before that though the QV and QE will be meeting again in Ft Lauderdale, FL, today actually, then they will head off on separate cruises.

Now, I want you all to know that I am trying hard to get permission to visit and review the ships. Its pretty hard to get permission (because of security) but its not impossible, in fact a friend of mine just visited the QE in Southampton. I am trying several different routes to reach this goal…this dream, if you will, but I am not above begging so…ahem…..…PLEASE CUNARD!!!! PLEASE!!!! I WILL WRITE GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE Queens!!! PLEASE!!! I AM YOUR BIGGEST FAN!!!! PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE!!!!! I LOVE YOU!!!....pretty pretty (QM2 pretty) please? My devotion to you is undying!

...ahem....sorry...for that outburst, I just really do love Cunard! *geek squeal! Anyways whatever happens I will be there at the port to watch as these two ships sail in! It will be a glorious day!

Happy 2011 from Pasadena!!

Well I have had a thoroughly fun, thoroughly Pasadena-ish and thoroughly Cunard-ish New Years so far. Sorry I have not blogged about it yet, but as I am sure you, my dear readers, can understand, I have been quite busy!

Picture at right is from Rambling of a ShipGeek's flickr account. ramblingshipgeek

Any who, late as it is I wish all of you a happy and prosperous 2011 and I hope you had a great New Years holiday! May this year be full of cruises and ships for all of you!

My 2011 started off great, also most importantly to this blog and to anyone reading this, my New Years has been very Cunard-ish like I said. First of all, there was the Rose Parade. For those of you who did not see the Rose Parade in person, or at least on TV, you missed out because it was beautiful! The marching bands were all great, the horses were cool, and all the floats were beautiful (remember that in the Rose Parade, every square inch of visible surface on the float must be covered with some kind of plant material) and of course one float in particular stood out as the most beautiful...CUNARD’S FLOAT!!!

Unfortunately during the parade, the float went by rather fast and I didn’t get to see as much of it, in action, as I had hoped. However I saw enough and let me tell you, it was nice. The Float had won the ‘Queen’s Trophy’ for the best use of Roses (there were a ton of them) and onboard had many people waving and dancing to a live band playing Big Band music, as well as Cunard Bell Boys walking along side the float. From front to back, it had a black and white bow (decorated with different kinds of seed to replicated Cunards livery) flanked by dolphins, made from silver leaf, jumping out of an ocean of blue and white flowers. After that there was a lounge space with bottles of champagne, a ball room with dancers, and a stained glass ceiling with a giant chandelier, a live band and then a grand staircase with a large golden globe and a floral graph depicting the three Cunard Queens. All that remained after that was an area with the Iconic Cunard funnel (which was giving off smoke) and 2 levels of out door deck space. It was beautiful and despite the fact that it went by too fast, I did get a video and some pictures. Both of which can be seen on Ramblings of a Ship-Geek’s Youtube channel and soon, it’s Flickr account!

From Rambling of a ShipGeek's youtube account...

My experience with this float did not end there though, for the very next day I spent ten dollars and did a ton of walking up hill and in the rain (ok no rain…yet) just so I could go to the float viewing and take almost 100 pictures (which are now available to view on our Flickr page) of the float. I also took pictures of the other floats just in case you readers are interested (they will be available on Flickr soon).

After that I expected my story with the float would end, and that I would probably not see it again….But I did!

First some back story…every year a couple of days after the Rose Parade (usually on the second) the floats are taken back to the ‘float barns’ where they were built and decorated. When this happens some of the floats pass down the street in front of our house on their way to one of these barns (so its like we get our own personal Rose Parade right outside our door!). Well this year after the floats passed, my cousin, a friend and I, decided to follow the floats in a car and pick up and flowers that were dropped along the way. Our flower scavenging lead us to one of the barns, the so called ‘Rose Palace’, where we discovered that if you asked nicely they would let you come in and pick what ever you wanted off the floats. We came back home with the motherlode!

With our flower hunting success we decided to go out early the next morning and ask for more flowers. Well next morning comes and as we are standing in front of the Rose Palace we chicken out and decided to go to another float barn in a city called, Irwindale. I am glad we did!....I had a date with destiny.

When we got there we stood outside for about 10 minutes trying to work up the courage to ask if we could go in and look, and pick flowers. Eventually we did and I think you can all guess what float I made a beeline to...yup, the Cunard float! We ended up picking tons of flower from the float and then tons more from the other…a ton a flowers which are now all over the place in my house! I was really hoping that I could take something with the Cunard logo on it but I had to settle for just flowers. Oh well..at least they were Cunard flowers! We were there for about an hour picking flowers and by the time we left my car was full of them.

This is where I finally said goodbye to the Cunard float. But the story of Cunard and me is not over, oh no, it will go on forever until the stars turn cold! I look forward to next years Rose Parade with the hope that Cunard will continue participating in it. But for the immediate future I am looking forward to 2011, QV and QE (Queen Victoria and Queen Elizabeth) being here in Los Angeles in just a few weeks (LET ME VISIT THEM CUNARD!!! PLEASE!!!...pretty please?), my first cruise, which I am determined to do this year and a great year for this blog to grow even more!

I hope you all have a great 2011 and I hope you continue to read and enjoy this simple blog!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

A Cunard New Year! less the 24 Hours Till the Rose Parade!

Well less the 24 hours left until next year! and less the 24 for hours from now I will be watching as Cunard's "Grand Celebration at Sea" sails down Colorado Boulevard here in Pasadena!! It is a pretty exciting time to be a shipgeek and more specifically a Cunard-geek, in Pasadena! I will be posting tomorrow with pictures from the Parade and most of all with pictures of Cunard's float!

For those of you who do not know about or read Cunard's blog... here is a interesting and relevant article.

http://wearecunard.com/2010/12/a-new-year%e2%80%99s-day-grand-celebration/

HAVE A HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

The Rose Parade and Cunard!!

Well I am very excited for this coming New Year! A whole new year for cruising, blogging, geeking out over ships, visiting the Beautiful and Ever Perfect…Queen Mary in Long Beach and also…The 2011 Pasadena Tournament of Roses Parade!!

Why am I so excited about a Parade?? You ask. Well for one, it’s the world famous Rose Parade! Secondly, I am from Pasadena, California and I love the Rose Parade and Pasadena, Thirdly…this year, for the first time ever The Great, The Powerful, The Amazing and Historical Cunard Line (….*geek drool…) is going to have a float in this, the greatest of all Parades!

Named “A Grand Celebration at Sea”, the float will be Cunards first ever foray into this Parade even though, interestingly enough, Cunard has had a connection to Southern California for decades. The float is designed to show different scenes and experiences that you could have on a Cunard ship like a Grand Ball, a grand staircase, a big band orchestra, a large floral graph of the Three, current, Cunard Queens, a Cunard funnel and other such er…um…..grandness. AHHHHHHH!!!! I LOVE CUNARD!!!!...sorry, I had a geek out moment there :D. (The picture below shows what the float will look like)

For those of you who might possibly not know what the Rose Parade is….first of all I would suggest you get out from under that rock you live beneath, because if you hadn’t heard of the Rose Parade, well…you must live under a rock. Secondly, the Rose Parade is a very large parade that we have here in Pasadena every year on New Years to celebrate the coming of the new year. Millions of people every year watch the Rose Parade all over the world. There are marching band, horses and of course the floats. The thing that is special about this parade over others is the floats, because in the Rose Parade every single visible inch of them has to be covered in flowers or some kind of plant material. As a result the floats are really quite beautiful and now with the addition of a Cunard float the parade will be incomprehensibly beautiful! ;)

I will try and get pictures from the parade route of the Parade and most importantly of the Cunard float. I will be sure to post those here so be sure to keep reading!!