We left home on a snowy Monday morning. Our neighbors gave us a lift to the airport so off we set with the 5 suitcases, 2 roller boards, one backpack containing camera equipment, and my large handbag in the back of their truck, plus 3 bags of garbage that we dropped off at the dumpsters on the way.

We had to pay $285 for the extra bag, so we were quite distressed when we changed planes in Seattle to discover that Delta could not find our luggage, and refused to let us on the plane. Just as they were about to close the door they let us know they had found the bags, and finally issued our boarding passes, and off we went. The distress about the loss of luggage was however surmounted by the fact that the power supply to Brian’s computer chose to die at the same moment as we arrived in Seattle and he was unable to do any work during our lay over.

The flight to Heathrow was uneventful, and it was a sunny day for once, so we got to see the Thames from the plane as we were landing. All of our luggage arrived intact, and we collected it and headed off to Southampton with Smiths for Airports. We checked in to the Grand Harbor Hotel, they kindly allowed us to leave the luggage in storage so we didn’t have to take it to our room, and headed off to Curry’s to buy a new power supply. We then took the train to Waterloo, had dinner with a friend at a great restaurant near to the station, and took the train back to Southampton, arriving there after midnight. It was a long day.

We spent Wednesday buying yet more stuff to squeeze in to the cabin. We went to Asda (actually that was very important in terms of chocolate purchases – you need a lot for 3 months), Majestic Liquors (you can buy VC by the case there), Boots, and M&S. All very conveniently located within walking distance of the hotel. Mind you lugging all of the stuff back there in the freezing cold was quite the challenge.

That night we met up for a lovely evening with some other Cruise Critic members at the Jury’s Inn.

When we got back to our hotel, I couldn’t sleep even though I was totally exhausted. It was hard to believe that after all the months of planning and counting down the days, we were finally going to board QV.