My parents immigrated to Canada from England when I was only 4/5. Then they moved on to California when I was 12. It wasn't until I was 17 that I went back to England, by myself, for one year. On my return trip to America, I traveled on the Queen Mary, sailing from England to New York which was a very memorable experience.

I was 17/18 (birthday while traveling) at the time, and I sailed on this ship just before it was retired to Long Beach California. My aunt and uncle put me on a train, in Manchester, with a little lunch bag filled with typical English food, an English Meat pie, jam tart etc.,  My aunt didn't want me to go hungry on the boat, but she didn't need to worry, there was no chance of that,  as I had never seen so much delicious food in one spot in all my life.  We said our tearful good-byes, and I was too excited to feel any anxiety about making this journey by myself.

I was amazed at the size of the ship, and just couldn't get over how posh, (elegant) it was.

At the time it was actually cheaper than flying. Don't forget that in those days there was also the different classes on board. The cabin I had was somewhere in the middle of one of the lower decks, right next to the engine room, and was that ever a noisy experience. It was very, very small, 'couldn't swing a cat in it'.  I shared this tiny room (no window) with an elderly woman. At that age, I was still a very shy person, so I would escape this room as quickly as I woke up and return as late as possible.

It was a fairly rough crossing, not too much sun even though it was in June. It took 5 days to cross the Atlantic. I did a bit of wandering around on the ship. I went into the first class section (not supposed to really). I was walking down one of the corridors and as I approached the end I could see a beautiful balcony coming into view. As I looked down over this balcony I saw many sparkling, massive chandeliers, rich ruby-red carpet throughout and warm gleaming brass rails off-set with cool marble accents. This huge beautiful room was filled with lady's and gents in evening dress, music filling the air, competing with the tinkling of glass, laughter, and all the hustle and bustle of wondering people.

In the evening, I'd sit at the back of the boat and watch the wake trail off into the horizon, and often would sit there for hours, even into the evening when the moon would show the white water off to it's best. While I was writing letters to my friends, a few people would stop to have a chat with me. One evening, one of the staff members came up to me. He said he had seen me sat there often, and told me that he and his friends were having a party in his cabin, and invited me to join them. I knew that the staff were not supposed to "fraternize" with the passengers (times have certainly changed on that point) but that was not the reason I declined his offer, it was just my sheer timidness. Often wonder if I had taken up his invitation if he would have acted like a gentleman or a lech. :-)

Anyway when I got off the ship, I had a large trunk (yes trunk) and when the ship docked in New York, it took some finding in this enormous pick-up area. Absolute chaos, managed to locate a type of cart and wheel this typical trunk out to where all the taxi cabs where lined up. Wow, was that an experience in rudeness. Cab driver wouldn't help me lift up the trunk, had to find a porter, of-sorts, to help me. Then when the taxi driver dropped me off at the Greyhound bus depot, I was faced with a similar problem two more times. Getting this trunk out of the boot of the taxi, then again into the greyhound bus. Can you imagine, even the bus driver said he wasn't responsible for loading my trunk into the base of the bus. Since I was only 18, and feeling lost in the middle of nowhere, I guess I finally let a few tears trickle down my cheeks, and a kind passenger took pity, he was actually a huge Texan who manhandled this trunk as if it was a lady's purse. He put a smile back on my face and then started to talk my head off.

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