Tuesday – “Illuminating” Entertainment (or, From the Ocean To the Stars)

Our out-of-this-world experience on board the QM2 was taken to another level this afternoon with a visit to Illuminations, the ship’s full-scale planetarium. Here we enjoyed a virtual tour of the stars and other visual spectacles in outer space during a crash course in celestial navigation narrated by actor Harrison Ford. I learned how the QM2 crew’s predecessors used the stars of the night sky to navigate the seas long ago. (A nice back-up, perhaps, to the QM2’s navigational system except that they have not one but TWO sophisticated backup systems already in place, if required.) The planetarium also doubles as the ship’s grand cinema, 500-seat lecture hall and broadcasting studio. One way or another, you’ll likely spend some time in it during your cruise.