A Brush With Royalty

Imagine, if you will, a ship as big as a Las Vegas hotel. Now imagine two ships that big. Now imagine a harbour large enough to accommodate both of these behemoths as they manoeuvre for docking at two adjacent landings. This was the situation at Sydney Harbour yesterday as the Queen Mary 2 and the Queen Elizabeth, two gigantic cruise ships of the Cunard line, rendezvoused in the waters of Port Jackson and pulled up to landings at Circular Quay and Garden Island (the latter in the front “yard” of Russell Crowe’s house). Jayne and I decided against joining the special escort cruise of a Sydney Ferry that welcomed the ships as they entered during the early morning hours, and opted instead for a city bound expedition in the afternoon. We took the Manly Ferry at about 2:00 pm and were amazed as the vessel pulled around the opera house to dock. There at the overseas terminal sat a ship that was longer than the Sydney Harbour bridge, and definitely too tall to pass underneath it! I had heard the Queen Elizabeth, the smaller of the two ships, is larger than the Titanic, and I can certainly believe it after walking around the thing and snapping numerous pictures.





We decided to take a look at the Queen Mary 2, so we left the Circular Quay area and walked across the Botanical Gardens to do so. That walk was extremely pleasant, except for the few yards that had to be covered near the Palm Grove centre where the “flying fox” bats roost. Hundreds of these creepy creatures hang upside down from the branches of trees that canopy the walkway, and ample evidence of their ability to defecate while so posed could be observed on the pavement. As a result, we did not linger there as much as the rest of our stroll towards the streets. We arrived at the second landing and were again amazed at the size of the ship. So large is the Queen Mary 2 that one of the large Captain Cook Cruise ships that was docked alongside it looked no larger than a rowboat. Apparently the ship was using the Captain Cook vessel to ferry their passengers to Circular Quay and back again, and they were entering and exiting the shuttle by a gangway that opened up from far down the hull of the ship. It was truly impressive.






Our trip back was uneventful because we made every connection with perfect timing, arriving back at our apartment about six pm. What marred an otherwise perfect day was the continuing coverage of the earthquake in New Zealand, and its obvious impact on our Aussie neighbours. Obviously the two nations are very close culturally and, in an exaggerated way, geographically. Television coverage of the rescue effort was displayed on the ferry and the news talked about little else when we turned on the television in the apartment. What is obvious to me through this entire terrible tragedy is that an economically advanced country like New Zealand is going to be able to handle this devastation with much greater efficiency than those poor folks in Haiti. All the same, it’s quite a shock to everyone around us.