Another fantastic Travelrite International group cruise upon the famous Queen Mary 2 concluded in late March upon arrival into Hong Kong. Our group of 45 enjoyed a wonderful four week cruise from Sydney to Hong Kong with interesting ports of call as well as plenty of days at sea to enjoy the ship. The Queen Mary 2 certainly did not disappoint. We all enjoyed beautiful meals in the sumptuous Britannia Restaurant, spectacular shows in the Royal Court Theatre, fascinating lectures on history, geography and film stars as well as our own bingo, deck games and trivial pursuit.
We boarded in Sydney on 22 February 2011 and had overnight on the ship with a free day in Sydney to explore the sights and make ourselves at home on board the QM2. Our first destination was to be Christchurch but this was curtailed due to the devastating earthquake there. We instead enjoyed a lovely tour of Wellington, the New Zealand Capital. After day at sea we visited Auckland with a tour of the City of Sails. Our next port of call was Guam. Guam was the site of World War II fighting between the USA and Japan is now a popular tourist destination. We stopped at the WWII museum and beautiful Two-lover’s point.
From the heat of Guam we travelled to the cold of Japan. We berthed in Osaka and had a sightseeing tour of nearby Kyoto. During our tour of the Golden Pavilion we actually had snowfall. Our next port in Japan was to be Nagasaki, however the terrible earthquake and tsunami occurred on route and the port was closed by the time we arrived. We continued on to our fourth country; China, where we had wonderful tours of Beijing (and we saw the Forbidden City) and Shanghai (a highlight for many tour members).
Our final destination was Hong Kong which was enjoyed by all – especially the shoppers.
The Queen Mary 2 is certainly a grand Cruise Liner. I would happily recommend joining its world cruise – with a superb mix of interesting ports of call and days at sea to enjoy the ship. Photos from this tour have been loaded on our facebook page: Travelrite International. Please visit our web site for future fully inclusive escorted cruise tours: www.travelrite.com.au
Nigel Walliss
Tour Manager