Truly a floating hotel operation as good or better than top land-based counterparts, cruise ships take a tremendous amount of work to keep clean and maintained. Still, from time to time ships are pulled out of the water for dry dock maintenance that can‘t be done while in service. When it was time to go through that process with Queen Mary 2, Cunard Line chose to go a different direction. More than a remodeling, the Cunard remastering of their flagship brought far more than new carpet and a fresh coat of paint, addressing a number of ongoing issues that extend beyond the hardware.
As the ship sailed off on her first voyage after the extensive remastering, we followed along as she headed out to sea.
“I get out of the taxi and it’s probably the only city which in reality looks better than on the postcards, New York.” ― Milos Forman
“London is satisfied, Paris is resigned, but New York is always hopeful. Always it believes that something good is about to come off, and it must hurry to meet it.” ― Dorothy Parker
“The city seen from the Queensboro Bridge is always the city seen for the first time, in its first wild promise of all the mystery and beauty in the world.” ― F. Scott Fitzgerald
“I look out the window and I see the lights and the skyline and the people on the street rushing around looking for action, love, and the world’s greatest chocolate chip cookie, and my heart does a little dance.” ― Nora Ephron
“The Remastering is a testament to Cunard’s attention to detail, incorporating inspiration from our past that continues to propel the powerful Cunard story, which we think will strongly resonate with today’s travelers,” - David Noyes, CEO, Cunard Line“
“One belongs to New York instantly, one belongs to it as much in five minutes as in five years.” ― Tom Wolfe
“There is no place like it, no place with an atom of its glory, pride, and exultancy. It lays its hand upon a man’s bowels; he grows drunk with ecstasy; he grows young and full of glory, he feels that he can never die.” ― Walt Whitman
© 2026 CHRIS OWEN