We booked this World Cruise segment from Sydney to Hong Kong the day Cunard opened up the books a year and a half prior to departure. Having cruised on QE and also on QV before we knew what to expect but Cunard makes their World Cruises always more special. The guests on this segment were overwhelmingly Australians with Brits, Germans and Americans also strongly represented. A port call scheduled for Cebu (Philippines) was cancelled prior to departure with an unclear explanation that suggested some security issue. Puerto Princesa was substituted and turned out to be quite acceptable.

We were lucky with the smooth seas throughout and generally sunny and warm weather. There were about nine days at sea which nicely augmented the port days. Shore excursions were a mixed bag as is usual on most cruises, some very good others not so much.

We took most of our dinners in the Queens Grill and were rewarded with uniformly excellent food and service as were the two dinners we enjoyed at the Verandah Restaurant. Most of our other meals we ate at the Lido and they were quite adequate. Having the Grills upper deck available to us for lounging and sunbathing was a nice bonus. Read more