Elizabeth, meet Elizabeth . . . as two ships bearing almost the same name come together for the first time under the blazing desert sun of Dubai.
Cunard’s newest ship, Queen Elizabeth, arrived at Port Rashid on the return leg of her maiden world voyage to a welcome from her illustrious ancestor QE2 which has been laid up at the port since 2008, awaiting conversion into a floating hotel.
Passengers on the new ship – launched last October by Her Majesty the Queen – lined the rails to get the best view, but will have been unable to get too close to QE2 which was a tantalising few yards away behind a mountain of ballast.
Rob Lightbody, of the QE2 Story website, explains that the liner still has a skeleton maintenance crew of 40 on board, and that while conversion plans are on hold because of Dubai’s financial crisis, he still expects the work to be completed eventually.
Coincidentally, QE2’s only ever meeting with her own predecessor, the original Queen Elizabeth, came 40 years ago this month. By that time, the ship had been re-named Seawise University and was undergoing engine repairs in Aruba en route to Hong Kong where she later caught fire and sank.
So this week’s meeting is the first time in history two maritime Elizabeths have been together in port. An exchange of blasts on the ships’ whistles was expected to mark Queen Elizabeth’s departure today. She will be back home in Southampton on April 19. Cunard flagship Queen Mary 2 will be in Dubai on Sunday.
Thanks to CUNARD for the pictures
About the Author: John Honeywell
John Honeywell is a travel writer specialising in cruise ships and cruise travel. Winner of CLIA UK's Contribution to Cruise award 2017.
I worked on the QE2 from 1991 until 2000. It was a superb iconic ship to work and live on, I have many great memories, and made some very good friends working as a butler in the penthouses. I hope qe2 is revived and has some future.
Beauty and the Beast
You can see all ELEVEN superb photos from the Cunard flyover of the two Queen Elizabeths at http://www.TheQE2Story.com/forum
Beauty and the Beast is the perfect description of this picture. The beast, of course, is the new Queen Elizabeth, a ship not worthy of the name of the ship named in honor of the late and great Queen Mother Elizabeth, the last Empress of India.
QE2 was and is a beautiful and sleek ship that looks almost French in exterior appearance. However, with a British Ensign and Cunard funnel, no one could (except when she was first launched and had a white funnel), could confuse her with…a Carnival ship with a dark paint job.
The new “Queen Elizabeth” looks like a bloated cruise ship and is in no way an ocean liner. I can only imagine what Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II, must have thought when she first saw this whale, named for a ship named in honor of her mother (or could it be that this one is named for the Tudor Queen Elizabeth I).
Cunard should be ashamed of itself. It missed an opportunity. It could have taken the occasion to create a modern liner with the best of the attributes of the QE and QE2, a beautiful liner with two funnels. However, instead of having a bow remeniscent of the QE or United States, the new QE could have had a bow in the tradition of the QE2, which itself had a bow that looked like the Norway/France and of course, The Normandie.
Instead, we have a bloated Italian ship that could have gone to Holland America (itself kind of ironic given the history of Holland America). Instead of an interior that is truly British, it looks Las Vegas, i.e., pastiche. SHAME ON YOU, CUNARD!
Beauty and the Beast is the perfect description of this picture. The beast, of course, is the new Queen Elizabeth, a ship not worthy of the name of the ship named in honor of the late and great Queen Mother Elizabeth, the last Empress of India.
QE2 was and is a beautiful and sleek ship that looks almost French in exterior appearance. However, with a British Ensign and Cunard funnel, no one could (except when she was first launched and had a white funnel), could confuse her with…a Carnival ship with a dark paint job.
The new “Queen Elizabeth” looks like a bloated cruise ship and is in no way an ocean liner. I can only imagine what Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II, must have thought when she first saw this whale, named for a ship named in honor of her mother (or could it be that this one is named for the Tudor Queen Elizabeth I).
Cunard should be ashamed of itself. It missed an opportunity. It could have taken the occasion to create a modern liner with the best of the attributes of the QE and QE2, a beautiful liner with two funnels. However, instead of having a bow remeniscent of the QE or United States, the new QE could have had a bow in the tradition of the QE2, which itself had a bow that looked like the Norway/France and of course, The Normandie.
Instead, we have a bloated Italian ship that could have gone to Holland America (itself kind of ironic given the history of Holland America). Instead of an interior that is truly British, it looks Las Vegas, i.e., pastiche. SHAME ON YOU, CUNARD!