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Queen Mary 2: the ultimate trans-Atlantic liner.

Article Excerpt
Sailing to Europe aboard a great ocean liner developed into a much coveted rite of passage for educated Americans by the early part of the 20th century. The rich enjoyed the grand-hotel opulence of first class, while below decks students, teachers, artists, and writers occupied more affordable accommodations. When land receded astern, uninterrupted days at sea took on a rhythm, and the best steamship lines knew how to give passengers one heck of a good time. Friendships and love affairs blossomed, and the "Grand Tour of Europe" ahead promised to be equally exciting.

Cunard Line proffered the industry's best know motto, "Getting There is Half of the Fun." The phrase entered our vocabulary, and a Cunard crossing became a sought after way of life, to be repeated as often as time and money permitted. The in the late 1950s the jet airplane came along to ruin the party. By the 1970s the rapidly dwindling choice of ships spiraled downward to just one, the Queen Elizabeth 2, often billed as the last trans-Atlantic liner.

Then in 1998 Carnival Corporation, the world's largest cruise company, bough Cunard, and within weeks announced an order for the largest ocean liner ever, to be named Queen Mary 2, and the approximately 150,000 gross register tons, twice the size of the Queen Elizabeth 2. Constructed with a long (1,132 feet), lean hull that has both the required strength and the speed to withstand and hopefully avoid "The Perfect Storm," the QM2 is a true thoroughbred and stands in stark contrast to the rest of the world's cruise-ship fleet, which is designed for placid seas.

Her slim lines allow the QM2 to maintain the exacting trans-Atlantic schedule between New York and Southampton, England, regardless of most adverse weather conditions. If a storm should cause her to reduce speed, a considerable reserve of power can propel her up to 30 knots to make up time lost. A cruise ship with a broad beam and relatively blunt bow would experience considerable stress slamming into head seas and would have to slow considerably to avoid giving passengers an uncomfortable ride. For added strength, the QM2's steel hull from the keel to the boat deck is 50 percent thicker than the norm (the extra strength results from heavier welding procedures and stiffening of the bulkheads).

This is the ship 1 had been waiting for, to cross the Atlantic in the high-style manner enjoyed by previous generations but in a decidedly more updated fashion. The Queen Mary 2 stirred my emotions when I saw her sailing past New York's skyline, an imposing, floating masterpiece with a charcoal gray hull and crowned by the trademark Cunard red-orange funnel. At her New York berth, she towers over the surroundings...