Jackie's Blog

Lots more about the Queen Mary 2 crossing. I'll come back to this one...

 The Queen Mary 2 was moored just a short distance from our hotel but still too far to carry our enormous amounts of luggage. A quick Uber trip followed and our luggage was being whisked away from us while we started the embarkation process. We also had two pieces of hand luggage each- both containing things we could not afford to lose or break- including Dottie's ashes. We were very impressed by the speed at which they checked us through passport control and customs, and issued us with our new cruise cards. Before we knew it, we were being greeted by the crew and on our way to our cabin. The cabin had a small protected balcony but was plenty of room for us and our luggage, which most impressively arrived not long after us. We unpacked the majority of our clothes etc and found that there was more than enough closet and drawer space, as well as a huge space under the bed to store our actual roll on bags. We were very glad we had packed soft bags as they took up very little room....

 On Tuesday May 21st, we picked up our enormous rental car in Lynn, MA (which we needed because of all the luggage). Another good thing about travelling by ship is that there are no luggage restrictions, you just have to be able to fit it all in your cabin! We drove to Hartford, Connecticut and stayed overnight there to break up the journey to New York after Dick had already worked most of the day. Old and new- just like Boston Rewarding ourselves with local beer. The next day we followed the Hudson river into New York and booked into our hotel in Brooklyn. We returned the rental car, and then went exploring... A very hot day but a local pub (the Strong Rope Brewing company) with views to the Statue of Liberty solved the problem. It felt like we were going on holiday. We were not due to board the ship until the following afternoon, therefore the next morning we went for a walk along the waterfront in Brooklyn and spotted... The Queen Mary 2- our home for the next week. She is the l...

 We had a weekly countdown, and once we hit May it all became a reality. The house was due to close on May 16th, therefore the moving jobs became a little more personal. Literally cooking everything left in the freezer, and not buying anything other than fresh food. Starting to go through all my herbs and spices and getting rid of older ones or getting rid of those you buy for one recipe and never use again! I do buy some spices (especially Indian cooking ones) in bulk so some of those were vacuum sealed and packed away. The only foods you can pack are non perishable ones, so some dried food was also packed but why take up valuable container space with things you can buy later?  Starting to pull out clothes to take with us in the large soft but wheeled suitcases. This one was hard as we had to plan for at least three months living on a canal boat (with limited storage) through the English summer months and through the Autumn too. This meant layers- largely of thinner clothing ...

 You forget how a lot of different activities going on around you can make an old dog nervous. Dottie had already moved with us from California to Massachusetts. That time she was 8 years old and we drove with her across the US. You can find a blog of that journey in the archives. She was nervous then too as we self-packed to save costs but she recovered quickly.  Dottie, at 13 years old, was usually very relaxed, and being a little deaf in one ear would sleep for long periods of time but she started sleeping wherever we were. Usually by Dick's side in his office, or wherever I was in the house. Me being constantly on the move around the house made this much harder for her. Her dog beds were moved around more often which was also a little confusing but she still loved her walks.  By March, we had Dottie's place booked in the kennels on the Queen Mary 2 to bring her back to England and we had all the steps in place to ensure she had all the required vaccinations and checks...