I have always been fascinated by the brave Pilgrims who risked everything for freedom. So this October, I took a trip on the Cunard Line’s Queen Mary 2 (QM2) to retrace their voyage across the Atlantic. Embarking from Southampton, England, at the same time of year as the Mayflower’s historic journey in 1620, the QM2 disembarked in New York, a mere 200 miles south of the Pilgrims’ landing in Provincetown.

The Mayflower vs. the Queen Mary 2

As you might imagine, my fellow passengers and I had quite a different experience than the Pilgrims, whose food supplies were dangerously low by the end of their journey. We had tasty meals, treats, and libations 24/7, from eight restaurants and 13 bars and lounges.

There were a dozen live entertainments each evening, and numerous options to amuse and educate us throughout the day, including a Planetarium, Shakespearean actors, movies, and trivia games.

With seven outdoor decks (versus the Mayflower’s one), the spacious QM2 is more than 1,000 feet longer than the Mayflower’s 110 feet.

Though beautifully elegant in line, the ship is so massive that 36-foot swells feel like the gentle rocking of a baby’s cradle.

Passenger ships have transformed in function from passage for migrants, to holiday transport, and finally to the pinnacle QM2, an end as well as a means. Are you yearning for an adventure couched in luxury? Here’s what you can anticipate!

The People

Most of the passengers on the QM2 are above retirement age, with the means and leisure time to spend eight days traversing the Atlantic for the fun of it. Many are cruising devotees.

I traveled with my dear friends Sally and Bill, neighbors in the Village. Some of the other passengers on board were New Yorkers, but I also dined with travelers from the UK and New Zealand. The Captain’s daily noon ship’s address was translated into French and German. Still, it was a pretty homogenous, coupled crowd, with far more canes, walkers, and wheelchairs than strollers.

I met three lovely fellow travelers the first night at dinner, and we became shipboard friends. The Butlers teamed up with me to play music trivia a few afternoons in the Carinthia Lounge, and Ellie taught me what it means to be “rinsed”! The four of us dined together on the final evening of the cruise, meeting first for a glass of wine in the Golden Lion Pub. It was sweet to share moments of companionship with them.

Favorite Spot to Read

My favorite spot on the ship was Aft Deck 8, with its Terrace Bar and dozens of loungers surrounding a hot tub, which people enjoyed in all kinds of weather.

I loved to slip off my shoes and sip a Cunard Spritz, accompanied by Alexander McCall Smith’s latest novel, The Perfect Passion Company (thanks, Kim!) while watching the wake of the ship unspool hypnotically.

The Library

I brought books along, but if you want to pack light, the QM2’s library won’t let you down. Beautifully wood-paneled, with charming brass touches, it was the largest library at sea when it was built.

Located at the front of the ship, surrounded on all sides by incredible ocean views, it’s a charming place to browse and read. Or you can borrow a book to read in numerous other delightful nooks and crannies about the ship. I loved walking into the Carinthia Lounge and seeing four people at a table—all reading—and three reading actual, physical books!

The Piano

I was worried about missing piano class while on the trip, so I made arrangements to practice piano on board. The piano was in a sort of utility or holding room on the lowest deck. Maintenance workers, cleaners, and maids passed through constantly as I stumbled through my scales.

There were a number of piano-playing entertainers on board, all of whom had to practice on this one piano. Both times that I played, an entertainer came and booted me off. One was a jazz player, Vladimir Zincenko. He insisted I keep playing but a few minutes later popped his head in, clearly anxious to start tinkling the ivories. So I packed up my sheet music, and that night I went to hear him play. That was another highlight of the trip, dressing up and enjoying a glass of wine in the elegant Chart Room while Zincenko’s jazz quartet played crowd-pleasing standards, including one of my favorite Miles Davis tunes from Kind of Blue.

The Pilgrims

I can’t help contrasting my voyage with the Mayflower Pilgrims’ story as Thanksgiving approaches, 403 years after their historic Thanksgiving on November 21, 1621. (Historians argue that the first Thanksgiving in North America was in 1565, in St. Augustine, where 800 Spanish settlers celebrated with the Timucuan people.)

The Mayflower left from Southampton on September 16, 1620, and set anchor at Cape Cod in what is now Provincetown Harbor two months later, on November 21. Due to delays and bad weather, they arrived much later than planned. Running out of supplies, they were forced to land and winter at Plymouth Rock, rather than their destination of Jamestown Colony, 600 miles further south.  With the ground frozen, they were unable to build huts and spent the first winter on board the Mayflower. Almost half the passengers and crew (which numbered about 30) perished from tuberculosis, pneumonia, and scurvy.

The First Thanksgiving

As every schoolkid learns, the Wampanoag Native American people helped the Pilgrims survive that first winter by teaching them food gathering and other skills. A year after landfall, the 53 surviving members of the original 102 Mayflower passengers celebrated their first fall harvest, along with 90 Wampanoag people. The Wampanoag feasters brought five deer. No doubt wildfowl and seafood were on the menu as well. Corn, if consumed, would have been cooked into a mush. Historians say that mashed potatoes and cranberry sauce would not have graced that 1621 table.

Thanksgiving Wishes for Bounty and Friendship

Life is never easy, especially for those who journey to a new land (or city) in search of a better life. Those of us reading this column have much to celebrate this Thanksgiving. I hope that everyone has food and friends to share it with this day.

An abbreviated version of this article first appeared in Chelsea News and other papers in the Straus News group.

Style Notes

• Elegant, slinky black twenties-reminiscent gown in silk jersey with silk satin bodice. Andrea T New York. 147 West 35th Street (by appointment only).

• Jimmy Choo silver platform sling-back sandals. Jimmy Choo sample sale, 123 West 18th Street.

• Vintage glittery rhinestone purse. Pippin Vintage, 104 West 17th Street.
• Costume pearls. Dressew. 337 West Hastings St., Vancouver, BC.

• Pink pearl drop earrings with silver art deco detailing. Penny Whillans Designs. Victoria, BC.

Postscript: The First Consensual Government

Plymouth Colony was the third permanent English colony in the Americas—after Canada’s Newfoundland (est. 1610) and Jamestown Colony (est. 1607). Before disembarking from the Mayflower in 1620, 41 male passengers signed the Mayflower Compact, to form a social contract in which the settlers consented to follow the community’s rules and regulations for the sake of order and survival.

As British author Rebecca Fraser explained, “Plymouth Colony was the first experiment in consensual government in Western history between individuals with one another, and not with a monarch.” Of course, historians forget that First Nations and Native American peoples were self-governing for millenia before the arrival of European settlers in the Americas.

On November 23, 1920 (as reported in the New York Herald that day), at a commemoration ceremony for the 300th anniversary of the Mayflower landing, then Massachusetts governor Calvin Coolidge, who became the 30th U.S. President a few years later, said of the Mayflower Compact:

“The compact which they signed was an event of the greatest importance. It was the foundation of liberty based on law and order, and that tradition has been steadily upheld. They drew up a form of government which has been designated as the first real constitution of modern times. It was democratic, an acknowledgment of liberty under law and order and the giving to each person the right to participate in the government, while they promised to be obedient to the laws.

“But the really wonderful thing was that they had the power and strength of character to abide by it and live by it from that day to this. Some governments are better than others. But any form of government is better than anarchy, and any attempt to tear down government is an attempt to wreck civilization.”

Interesting words to contemplate today.