I did a taster cruise on the Queen Mary 2 just to see if I would like it. It was part of the transatlantic to Hamburg something I hadn’t realized but it did mean that a good half to threequarters of the passangers were German. We had a wonderful welcome in Hamburg the Hamburgers as they call themselves made a carnival out of it. There was some good points and bad ones but you can never be perfect. As the cruise director said this was a tranatlantic journey and it showed. The library was fantastic, I am a Harry Potter fan and the new book had come out the Saturday before we sailed on the Tuesday. They were able to reserve it for me and I managed to finish it before we returned to Southampton. The planatarium was also something no one should miss. On the downside I felt there should have been more activities and lectures and I wasn’t that impressed with the Britania dinning room but as there several other dinning area’s that wasn’t a problem. Something I really didn’t like was the amount of smoking allowed. I had expected in the light of the new British laws the ship to be almost totally non smoking. This was not the case all of the bars on the starboard side of the ship allowed smoking and this perminated throughout the corridors in the end I avoided that part of the ship alltogether. But all in all it was an enjoyable experience so much so i have booked a tranatlantic crossing for next year.