Look who paid a visit yesterday…
…
She’s big, and visible for miles around.
I just happened to be driving nearby the cbd and there she was, my picture doesn’t do her justice, looking down the street she dominated the view.
I moved up to the Donkin reserve for my next picture and on returning to my car was suddenly flanked by 2 coaches with Cunard in the windows, day visitors on a tour of the city.
She arrived early morning and departed last night for Cape Town, the stopover was to enable passengers an opportunity to visit one of the many game farms in the area and hopefully catch a glimpse of the big 5.
For all of it’s history and beauty one thing that Cape Town doesn’t have is an abundance of game parks / farms in easy driving distance of the city.
Here she is in the harbour, dominating the skyline…
Boadicea's Chariot 
G’morgen, Soutie! ‘Large’ objects in a landscape are a bit like the full moon – they seem enormous to us but shrink when photographed. A cherished expert will no doubt tell us why. 🙂
Môre Janus
Quite right, I was actually a tad disappointed that my efforts (admittedly from a cellphone) didn’t quite capture the scale of her. Imagine my delight when I found that my good friends at http://mype.co.za/ had exactly what I was looking for?
I remember the QEII paying us a visit way back. She entered the bay, cruised around the coastline allowed photo opportunities for both us landlubbers and I assume the passengers and headed off to Cape Town (or was it Durban?) She didn’t dock because she was ‘too big for our harbour’ we were told.
But, I think that the QM2 is bigger? Longer? Wider? Taller? How does that work then?
I happened to bump into a now retired mate of mine who used to work at the harbour, and I asked him.
Simple he said, these modern ships have engines that allow them to move sideways, the QEII wasn’t actually too big, just not maneuverable enough!
Perhaps Jazz could explain if he sees this
Hi Soutie, I, write this from beautiful, sunny Harare and so I shall not witness QM2’s presence in the Mother City. However, I was immediately struck by your observation, ‘…….what Cape Town doesn’t have is an abundance of game parks / farms in easy driving distance of the city.’ That is very true, but, I am not entirely sure that Shamwari and its like do justice to the African wildlife experience. Seeing the Big 5 in the Eastern Cape does not really count. One might just as well take a trip to Windsor Safari Park. 😉 But then, I suppose those who choose to travel on such a vessel, probably do not want to go camping on the banks of the Chobe or Zambezi.
I have just heard it is raining in CT and is likely to continue to do so for the next 3 days.
My permit to return here as a ‘Returning Resident’ is with the committee as we speak. It is looking positive, but until my passport has been stamped, nothing is certain. I cannot wait. There is so much opportunity here and it really does have the most wonderful climate in the world and some of the nicest people. Don’t believe too much of what you read in the media. Things are a lot better than one might imagine and there is a great deal of optimism. Funnily enough all that most people want is stability, they do not really expect significant improvement. The holding of elections tends to be disruptive. The people will vote for change, but the ballot boxes are being stuffed as we speak and so ZANU will retain power. Things will revert to normal and people will find a way to survive. Democracy is such a silly form of government. Well, it is in Africa, anyway.Come to think of it, Kennedy stole the election in 1960 and Bush stole it in 2000, so such behaviour is not unique to this continent.
Howzit Sipu
It’s very autumnal here, grey skies, blustery and a chilly 16°C 😉
Addo national park is just the ticket for the big 5 in their natural habitat, perhaps too rustic for QM2 passengers I suspect that you are correct that most went to 5 star Shamwari, Kariega, Pumba or the like.
Great to hear from you, I’m pleased that things are working out for you up there, good luck with the documentation, keep us posted.
Thanks for the photo, Soutie. Doesn’t she look awful? Just like any other oversized floating box one sees cluttering up the Riviera or damaging Venice as it goes past the Giudecca, to offload frequently oversized tourists.
They have made the boats too big and very ugly and full of big and ugly people!. Then they go to small places where they disgorge thousands of passengers that swamp the pleasant little town that they are visiting. How anyone can pay good money to go on such floating hell holes/death traps is completely beyond me! This is a huge problem in Alaska.
Once one turned up in Milford Haven for some reason, probably had some kind of problem. It was truly monstrous in size. I fled!
I think all modern cruise liners look awful, but their sheer size is quite awesome when you get up close.
May be awful, but hear the moans from some places when the cruise liners for whatever reason do not call in to various ports. Huge loss of revenue for the locals.
Even small craft these days can move sideways, Soutie. They have bow thrusters at both the bow and the stern, so I suspect that big liners have something along these lines.
Would be awfully useful for parking cars!
Morning all
‘awful’ ‘too big’ ‘ugly’
They do say that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, The upper decks (the white ones) still have that sleek cruise liner appeal, I think it’s the addition of capacity between the water line and main deck (I count 10 / 12 levels) that create the box effect.
She certainly looks good from a distance
Here she is leaving
picture from http://mype.co.za/new/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Jester_Queen_Mary_2.jpg
We very rarely have cruise liners docking here (12 /15 a year), other than a game farm visit there really isn’t much noteworthy down here and if the ship has just cruised the east coast of Africa then there’s no need.
Perhaps a reluctance to risk Suez and the Somali pirates is sending more craft around Africa.
Just for interest. Any passengers from this area who had perhaps booked a cruise on the QM2 couldn’t embark here, they had to make their way to Cape Town (700km away) and board there, our backwater province has no facility for customs and passport control 🙂
That is one ugly *******. I blame CAD.