Navigator of the Seas, Queen Mary 2 & Oceana (II)
Summer officially returned to the south coast on the 25th August 2007 after going on its own holiday for the past couple of weeks.  Phew what a scorcher as they say in our papers!  It was flipping boiling down the marina with hardly any breeze and was pretty packed as well.  Quite a few were tourists as apart from QM2, they had absolutely no idea what the ships were.  Well this day heralded a couple of firsts.  Navigator of the Seas was docked port rather than starboard!  Thud!  Taken them four months to get it right!!!!  And she was also due to pass Mary for the ONLY time this year thanks to them having her the wrong way all this time.  Oceana was also in Mayflower Terminal.
Navigator was due to leave at 4pm, the same as when I cruised on her and being port meant she'd be out quicker instead of time wasting.  The other two were both listed as 5pm.  They were doing tender drill on Mary as Navigator sounded eight bells for lifeboat drill.
I was getting a little annoyed by now as the camcorder, after filming, putting it on standby then filming again, would flash up, "Cassette Cleaning".  It had never done that before so naturally it was worrying.  We put it to the back of our mind as we waited for Navigator to cast off while Mary did her own lifeboat drill.  Finally she did just over ten minutes late which was still better going than I had but looked very strange not trudging up to the turning circle after all these months of getting used to it.  Once she'd straightened and began to pass Mayflower Park she blasted three times.
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			(C) Copyright Patricia Dempsey 25th August 2007 Not to be reproduced without permission