Direct comparisons between the experiences of the Titanic’s passengers and travellers on modern passenger ships are uncommon, especially from those with more than a passing interest in the history of the lost White Star liner. There are no end of online blog and vlog reviews of cruise ships cataloguing amenities in a way aimed at those with a leisurely interest, but very little in the way of insight for those of us who know our electric camels from our electric baths.
I recently enjoyed a three-day cruise from Melbourne to Sydney on Cunard’s Queen Elizabeth and I hope to impart a little of that journey to those of a certain Olympic-class disposition. Given the long, illustrious history of Cunard, I naturally expected to find nostalgic touches harking back to the golden age of sea travel, and I was not disappointed. Still, I was surprised to find myself picking up on little, unexpected ghostly reflections from the Titanic story often after I realised they had actually occurred.
The Queen Elizabeth is a magnificent ship. As a Vista/Spirit class liner built at the Fincantieri shipyard in Italy she is an upgraded design on a large and very successful class of sisters built in the early to mid-2000s for, among others, P&O, Holland-America, Carnival and Costa.
I don’t count myself as an anti-cruise ship fanatic. I feel that the understandable “dreams of yesteryear” so evocatively noted by Walter Lord can give rise to grouchily protective attitudes towards the early twentieth-century liners in particular. How many times have we heard about bygone beautiful lines and rakes versus modern gigantic monstrosities, as if nobody at the time bemoaned the arrival of the Olympic Class when considering the sheer elegance of the Oceanic and her near contemporaries, and that’s before we even consider the end of sail. However, I was a little bit apprehensive about my upcoming cruise. What if the experience was a completely fake world of ersatz plastic wood-effect panelling, a sort of sea-going holiday camp devoid of charm and hordes of us fighting over buffet fodder and jacuzzi space? Like many Titanic enthusiasts, a Cunard trip felt like the closest I might get to that untouchable world of so long ago and I worried that it might be so different as to fall into disappointment; after all, with a gross tonnage of 90,900 the Queen Elizabeth is almost twice as big as the Titanic.
I need not have worried. Although the Queen Elizabeth is without doubt a larger ship, the tonnage is kind of deceptive. In many ways, the ships are quite similar in terms of dimensions. The Queen Elizabeth is only four metres wider than the Titanic, and just twenty-six metres longer. Much of the extra GRT is no doubt down to the extra decks and much larger superstructure on the Queen Elizabeth, but from a purely aesthetic, dramatic perspective there is only about thirteen metres difference between the waterline to the highest point on the Queen Elizabeth, and the waterline to the top of the funnels on the Titanic. In essence, to look at the Queen Elizabeth close-up is to feel the colossal size of the Titanic, something which is underplayed in so many of the Mega Cruise Ship v Titanic visual comparisons so often shared on social media.
Early afternoon, January 12th 2024.
After a morning at the strangely dissatisfying Titanic Artefact Exhibition at Melbourne Museum (too many people; too many mistakes in the artefact blurbs), our party made its way to the Station Pier Terminal to board the Queen Elizabeth. Although our Uber through the streets was more prosaic than the Boat Train carrying the Titanic’s passengers from Waterloo, I got to feel that literally breathtaking moment when the great liner soared above the local buildings. We were delivered right into the heart of the terminal and it was here I received my first surprise. Depictions of the Titanic’s sailing day show passengers visualising the whole ship in bright daylight, soaking up the entire outline of the ship and its majesty from prow to poop. However, after the approach to the terminal everything went dark as the endless, ambient deep-navy, lower hull of the ship towered over the terminal building. It became impossible to absorb her size at such close quarters. Here and there were glimpses through to portholes and gangways. As we approached our entrance on Deck 3 I stopped and had my “Father Browne moment”, looking along the port length of the ship aft from midships, then quickly towards the bow. There was an enormous sense of what I can only describe as permanence, a deep feeling of mountainous grandeur and solidity. This was the first of my ghostly surprises – I was shocked at my unwitting, instinctive reaction. As crazy as it sounds, for a very long moment I actually genuinely felt at my very core that this ship was unsinkable.
Immediately upon stepping aboard I was able to understand the weirdly familiar beam of the ship, which led to my fascination with its comparative dimensions as noted above. There was an excited sense of hurried preparation from the crew; shepherding passengers firstly to muster stations then to staterooms (as they are still called). The ship was full of flowers, a string trio was playing – haunting echoes of that long ago April day right out of Titanic Voices by Hyslop et al …
“It is difficult to convey any idea of the size of a ship like the Titanic, when you could actually walk miles along decks and passages, covering different ground all the time. I was thoroughly familiar with pretty well every type of ship afloat, from a battleship and a barge, but it took me fourteen days before I could with confidence find my way from one part of that ship to another by the shortest route.” — 2nd Officer Lightoller, Titanic & Other Ships
Immediately, Lightoller’s problem became apparent to us as well. It actually took two of the three days on the ship for us to actually register just how large she was. Part of this was down to the staircases – I couldn’t help but smile at experiencing my second glorious grand staircase of the day after the replica at the Titanic exhibition: it seems grand staircases are like buses – you wait forty years to see one, then two come along at once! Upon entering the ship we headed to our staterooms via the forward staircase. This created a visual image in our mind: along deck three, up the stairs, over to the port side and then a decent walk astern to our cabin (Thomas Andrews’ dulcet directing tones in my head…). However, the identical character of the fore and aft stairways had us climbing the aft stairs then heading astern before becoming aware we were heading away from our rooms. It just didn’t click that there could possibly be another long walk to the forward stairs. As a veteran of many large car ferries who thought he knew about big ships, the dimensions of this giant became increasingly awe-inspiring. Now when I look at the Titanic’s deck plans I think how often passengers, even seasoned travellers, must have ascended the aft grand staircase, mistaking it for the forward one, then had moments of confusion as they saw the entrance to the Café Parisian rather than the corridor to their lush B Deck stateroom.
The Queen Elizabeth is powered by six Mak M43C diesel engines; while unimaginably more advanced, they are surprisingly similar in function to the reciprocating engines on the Titanic – in essence they are piston engines driving a crankshaft (although in QE’s case they generate up to 86,000 hp). The ship has a cruising speed of 23.7 knots, although the maximum we experienced on board was a nighttime thrust of an eerily familiar 21.7 knots. While in our room we could feel the engines as a very light throb underfoot, and we barely noticed her begin her sail away from Melbourne. We rushed out onto the open deck 3 promenade, then up to the very top deck to experience the drama, but it was curiously low-key. We expected hundreds, if not thousands, of fellow excited travellers, but it seemed that most people were still settling into their staterooms or already enjoying the multitude of public rooms aboard. The lack of occasion was a disappointment, it almost resembled a bus leaving a station, but perhaps this was down to the fact that for many of us it wasn’t a once-in-a-lifetime experience and that the cruise experience was the reason for the journey rather than the destination itself.
The only remaining vestige of Cunard’s White Star heritage is the famed White Star service still proudly advertised in all the marketing literature. This was really startling and wonderful, and the best example occurred when leaving our room for pre-dinner drinks. I happened to bump into our room steward, JoJo:
“Good afternoon, Mr. Brannigan! How are you settling into life on board?”
Why was this so special? At this point I had been on the ship for about two hours – JoJo had personal responsibility for over twenty staterooms, yet he instantly got my name right as I left room 6076…even though I was the second name on the booking and my wife does not share my surname. And all of this after disembarking those same staterooms just a matter of hours before we boarded. We had a brief chat, and it turned out he was a grand old sea dog with over thirty years of experience with Cunard under his belt. He still pined for his first love, the QE2. This was very reminiscent of Lightoller’s declared longing for the Oceanic and Commodore James Bisset’s romantic memories of the Caronia. A streak of gold running down through the centuries like the sheer stripe on the Titanic.
We boarded in very casual Aussie gear, but after freshening up we changed into smart evening wear, as is standard on Cunard to this day. The atmosphere across the ship lifted magically as dusk fell and we headed out into the Bass Strait. Smart suits, beautiful dresses, the carpets soft underfoot (though not quite ankle deep) and the lighting sparkling softly through the endless corridors … we headed to the Commodore Lounge directly above the bridge. Stewards swept effortlessly between tables and bar, quietly serving up cocktails and fine Scotch around a gentle murmur. When the pianist took a break I could see a solo-travelling gentleman here and there, immersed in a book (perhaps The Virginian?) with a highball to hand. The chat among the little coteries was quiet and reflective, a sense of calm relaxation and a strange sense of inertia despite the clear movement of our gigantic home through the darkening sea. I felt a flicker of a long-ago smoke room with mother of pearl and dark wood sparkling against the bright orange of a roaring fire, except this time the gleam was from a setting Tasman sun.
Instead of the obvious modern choices of Espresso Martinis or Mojitos I pulled my Titanic rank and insisted that we all go for a Punch Romaine, a nod to the same served on the Titanic on her last evening, and offered as a tribute to the legendary Cunard skipper Sir Arthur Rostron of Carpathia fame. I’m pleased to say we all found it to be utterly delicious – imagine a liquid and very boozy lemon meringue pie and you’ve got it…
Then, to dinner.
Down the decks we descended, staircase by staircase from Deck 10 to Deck 3 to get the feel of the ship’s size. It was remarkable how little the stairs were used and how full the elevators were at all times. Could it be that the Titanic’s legendary forward staircase was used as a frustrated alternative to busy elevators? I couldn’t help but notice how quickly the staircase novelty wore off on this liner. Perhaps I’m just lazy, but I wasn’t the only one and it’s interesting to see that our friend Mike Brady noticed this on his recent superb overview of the Lusitania. Then a long walk aft to the glorious Britannia dining room.
This majestic room really did bring us back to the grand old days. Crisp, white linen on the tables, six-course meals with commensurate cutlery (start from the outside and work your way in…) and a sense of otherworldliness in that time seemed to be suspended, with a sense of supreme happiness, satisfaction and well-being in the air. On that last Sunday night on the Titanic, the First Class ladies’ evening wear was described as more beautiful than ever and it has been recalled as a particularly special dinner – the sheer horror of events to follow must have been even further amplified by the dichotomy with the last meal.
Towards the end of dinner, when I began to think of brandy, cigars and my clear calling as a master of the universe, my wife noted the stewards busily setting up empty tables for breakfast the next morning, happily chatting as they worked. I instantly thought of the dining saloon stewards on the Titanic, that late-night rattle of breakfast silver as described in A Night to Remember. But what I was witnessing was so ordinary, so unworthy of further comment or even a second thought: this was a startling example of how even the mundane can become legendary when afforded ferocious context.
It had been a long day, so we decided to retire early. Our cosy cabin contrasted starkly with the cold blackness beyond, and while lying in bed I “felt” the ship for the first time. The low, distant purr of the engines was accompanied by knocks and bumps more akin to aeroplane turbulence than the rocking motion of a relatively calm sea. I drifted off but stirred just before midnight to the sound of doors slamming shut further down our corridor, the sound of late-night revellers returning from one of the many public rooms still open on the ship, happy chatter…it was almost uncanny:
“Through the long white corridors that led to the staterooms came only the murmurs of people chatting in their cabins … the distant slam of some deck-pantry door … occasionally the click of unhurried high heels – all the usual sounds of a liner at night.” — Chapter 2, A Night To Remember
Happily, I woke to see the morning. A quick jaunt onto our private promenade deck balcony afforded us delicious lungfuls of the most bracing sea air. Our unmade bed raced along the sparkling sea and the world felt full of promise and excitement. An ocean liner conjures up a double helping of magic – the thrill of the day’s fun ahead, and the more distant anticipation of the arriving at the end of the journey. These constantly entangled feelings are somehow uniquely wonderful to this experience, and once again the calamitous horror of this spell being broken by disaster came to mind. I have often been guilty of yearning to go back in time to the Titanic’s sinking, to see who was where, to witness the bravery, the cowardice, the epic drama of that night. A full day and night on the Queen Elizabeth dispelled that dubious ambition forever.
We decided to have breakfast in the Britannia Dining Room, way down on Deck 2 aft. Afterwards we decided to have a stroll on the Deck 3 promenade but to our frustration we had trouble making our way there because weirdly placed walls seemed to hem us in. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you my first experience of a watertight bulkhead. Couldn’t they just cut doors through them or, even better, have them only go up as high as Deck 1 below us? Did nobody in the shipyard think for a moment of my first-class experience? Yes, I’m ashamed to say that for a few moments, these thoughts actually went through my head.
Our promenade walk was as satisfying as you might imagine. Thankfully the walk was well enclosed and we were protected from the elements; I could easily see why the long A-Deck promenade on the Titanic was partially shielded: the ladies on the Olympic must have been blown like kites on rough Atlantic days. However, I felt our view at times was somewhat cluttered by ugly low-hanging lifeboats. I can’t explain how often these ocean-going idiotic moments kept passing through my mind although in my defence I would admonish myself within seconds of them appearing.
There is a suggestion that Cunard rebuilt its fleet on the nostalgia evoked by the 1997 movie Titanic, and at first glance there seems to be plenty of evidence for this, although it could also be argued that the public rooms in particular are the latest incarnation of the line’s (and their competitors’) evolution over the centuries. For instance, the Garden Lounge harks back to the Mauretania’s Verandah Café (1907), also the double-deck main dining room is similar in concept to the legendary facilities on the 1907 liners and the 1930s Queens. The aforementioned evolution can be seen in the double-deck Queens Ballroom on the latest Queen Elizabeth, an improvement on the single-deck structure on the Queen Mary. The Verandah Restaurant and Café Carinthia are reminiscent of offerings on the first Queens, but White Star must take the credit for introducing such establishments with the À La Carte restaurants on the Olympic Class. The architects of the current Cunard ships must take enormous credit for blending almost two hundred years of interior design evolution and the latest cruise facilities within a format of classic opulence to create a seamless, homogenous whole.
Eventually, we made our stately entrance into Sydney Harbour. First, the pilot came alongside, expertly dropped off by his dedicated motorboat, and then the jolly tugs shepherded us along like puppy dogs as we approached the famous dock. As we passed Fort Denison, I thought again of Lightoller and his gun-firing high jinks in 1900; the morning was gloomy as we approached the Opera House. At first, we were a little dejected: who doesn’t want a glorious sunny morning when arriving in Sydney by sea? However, I quickly began to appreciate the Turner-esque glory of the maelstrom sky, swishing pools forming around our turning hulk, tugs straining and whisps of cloud giving the effect of the belching smokestacks which create so much atmosphere in those classic Titanic photographs in Belfast Lough as she headed out for her trials. It was a magnificent, almost tear-inducing place to be, utterly awe-inspiring.
There are very few places in the world that can absorb the senses as completely as Circular Quay … the Syndey Opera House to the right, the Harbour Bridge to the left, but we could see hundreds of mesmerised landlubbers gawping silently at Queen Elizabeth as she slipped effortlessly into her berth. Such is the majesty, personality and overwhelming romance of a grand liner upon us mere mortals.
As we were swept away from the ship in yet another taxi, I couldn’t help but look back and see that world-enclosed beauty tower above me one last time; the lights and excitement of the city called as the small town of dazzling enchantment, honour and glory disappeared behind us.