The Titanic Memorial Cruise – Titanic Trip Pt. 3
14 April 2012 – Day 7
“Last night was an awful time for sleeping as the sea was very angry, almost as if it were trying to toss us off of its surface.”
~Lydia
We woke early, since sleeping was impossible, and got dressed. The memorial services were being held that evening and I wanted to dress well for the day, so I wore a black walking skirt and a purple and gold jacket blouse, both pieces from the early 1900s. Billy dressed in clothing similar to the era as well. After breakfast, we promptly started our day with lectures.
We enjoyed a lecture titled ‘Titanic: From dreams to Nightmare to Myth’ and then immediately made our way to another lounge. Commodore Ron Warwick was presenting his own story, ‘My Dive to RMS Titanic.’ We very much enjoyed his presentation and it was my favorite yet. He was lucky enough to dive down to see Titanic in person and we were captivated by his experience.
The thing that stands out in my memory the most about this weathered sea captain is his stance. The ship was tossing about the ocean and the curtains on the stage behind him were swaying in huge arcs, at least 5 feet out from the stage and then the same distance back into the stage. Wait staff were stumbling through the lounge trying to serve drinks and a few even fell from the uneven roll of our vessel. Mr. Warwick stood in front of the stage. He stood with legs wide, knees bent, hands behind his back, and he swayed with the ship as if he were a part of it. Never did he take a step to steady himself. He was perfectly at home on those waves. Afterward, we met him briefly and it was a wonderful experience.
Afternoon
We took lunch in the Palms Cafe and then went our separate ways for a few hours. Billy, smartly, took a nap. I, however, wandered the ship and found myself as far forward on the decks of the bow as I could get. My mind was on the coming memorial services and on those that had sailed these waters 100 years before me. They walked and stood with me every second of the day. I stared out at the water until my face was numb from the frigid wind rushing over it, and I stayed until I couldn’t take the cold anymore, until my eyes streamed from the rush of the wind.
A little later, I tried to attend another lecture but found myself not feeling well. Instead, I retired to our cabin and joined Billy in a nap of my own. After waking later, and feeling much better, we made the nightly trek to play Bingo before dinner. No winnings but still loads of fun.
Evening Sets In
“This sunset meant a lot to me and I am very happy that we got to see it. 100 years ago today, many people watched the last sunset they would ever see. It meant a lot to me to watch it tonight. More than I can put into words.”
~Lydia
I desperately wanted to watch the sunset that night. I could feel it in my bones as to the importance of it. Billy and I climbed the many stairs to the Observatory Lounge as evening drew closer. One of our table mates was also there, so we all watched together. For the most part, we sat in silence as the sun sank. There was a bit of a double horizon that evening. A layer of clouds that was so flat it looked like it could have been the ocean, sat between the water and the sky. As it got darker, it became harder and harder to distinguish the two. Finally, darkness descended.
A Tribute To Titanic’s Orchestra
Grupetto was playing again, so we went to the Neptune Lounge to listen. It was an incredibly moving performance. Their set was a tribute to the Titanic Orchestra. Between each song, the bandleader would come forward and speak. He would state the time onboard Titanic, the ship’s condition, and what the orchestra did. They played Nearer My God To Thee and I think the entire room cried. If they weren’t yet, they soon would be. The band leader stepped forward. He said a few words about Titanic and then turned to his bandmates. He said six simple words that tore at the hearts of everyone there. You could hear the tiniest catch in his voice as he spoke them.
Gentlemen, it has been an honor.
They played their last song and we wept for those that had been lost and the brave men that tried to calm them till the end.
15 April 2012 – A Final Goodbye
At 11:40 PM, the Captain came over the intercom and gave a short speech followed by two minutes of silence for those that had perished. We stood in our dark cabin for those short minutes, staring out at the pitch-black water. When the silence ended, we made our way up to the Neptune Lounge for the indoor memorial service. The names of those that had died were being read aloud and shown on a screen. If they started on time (11:42 PM) and didn’t repeat, they were still being read when our indoor service started at 1:00 AM. So many people. So many lost.
A Night To Remember
The outdoor memorial service immediately followed the one indoors and by the time we got out on deck, many hundreds were already gathered there. We watched from the rail of Deck 11 which gave us a wonderful view. Unfortunately, we didn’t hear much of the service because we were right next to the funnel, and it was putting off quite a bit of noise. At the end, we watched as they cast the memorial wreaths into the sea, and we silently said our farewells. The mood of the ship was one of mourning and deep respect.
We found a quiet spot on deck after the ceremony ended and took time to reflect. There was another ship on the ocean with us that night, the Azamara Journey. It had sailed from New York, filled with passengers paying their respects. I tried to imagine myself down on the water in a small lifeboat, looking up at her. And then I tried to imagine watching from that small boat as she began to sink. I was wearing clothing from the early 1900s, including a fur coat, and I was freezing. It must have been an absolutely terrifying night. The water was so dark, black as oil, and it swallowed what little light our ships cast down. The stars overhead shown like diamonds, but their light was not enough.
An Odd Occurrence…
It was common knowledge that the Azamara Journey would be joining us at the wreck site, but there had been rumor that there could be more ships coming. Because of this rumor, I didn’t think it odd to see a light in the distance that appeared to be approaching during the memorial service. I even remember thinking that it was such a shame that they were late because the memorial service had already begun. After a good fifteen minutes or so of watching this light on the horizon approach, it stopped coming closer. Then, oddly, it started to depart.
I watched it, absolutely mesmerized. All I could think of was the reports of the mystery ship on the night Titanic sank, reports of seeing lights from a ship that was surely coming to save them. And then, to the despair of hundreds, seeing them recede into the night. Others on deck near us saw them too and were just as baffled as we were. Turns out, many of the passengers onboard our ship saw them. There was never an explanation to Titanic’s mystery ship, and there never was for ours either.
15 April 2012 – Day 8
At 4 AM, we finally went to bed. The memorial service had been emotionally exhausting, and I sat for hours watching the water outside our cabin window, feeling heartbroken yet somehow at peace. I slept deeply that night.
We slept late and ate lunch as our first meal of the day. We’d scheduled a formal afternoon tea, so after lunch, we changed into period clothing.
We took our tea with lovely views from the Observatory Lounge. It was a calm day on the ocean and we truly enjoyed ourselves. There was one person, though, who I think was having a lousy time. We were seated near another table where two ladies were dining with the captain of the ship. They continuously commented about how ugly the view was over the ship’s bridge while the captain silently stewed. I don’t think they ever realized they were insulting his ship and it was the most awkward meal to overhear!
Once we were finished, we headed to our regular Bingo game, and after, spent some time in the library. I loved the library. Not only am I a book lover, but I’m a puzzle lover as well, and there was always a puzzle or two going. All of the offerings brought for the memorial service were also on display in the library. Seeing everything from so many corners of the earth was a wonderful way to pass the time. Over 20 countries were represented onboard and there were tributes from many, if not all, of them.
The evening sped through dinner and romantic walks along the deserted decks of the ship. We took in a show and then happily climbed into bed for the night.
16 April 2012 – Day 9
We got an early start with breakfast, followed by paying our cabin bill for the journey so far. Money was something we had a very limited amount of and we wanted to be sure we didn’t overspend. I spent the next hour taking a napkin folding class, and trust me; it was much more fun than it sounds! Billy did our laundry, so really, we had a riveting morning.
He also bought the commemorative book for the voyage, which was beautiful but also a bit of a letdown. Billy’s name wasn’t in the passenger list, as well as quite a few other names, and instead was printed on an insert page. Small details, but I was disappointed nonetheless.
We had lunch and then went out on deck for most of the afternoon. The weather was warming up and it was downright gorgeous outside. We changed into swimsuits and spent some time relaxing in the hot tub before coming back in for Bingo. After the games, we were entering Halifax and went back out on deck to watch. It was our first glimpse of land since we had sailed from Ireland on 10 April and it was a lovely sight.
By the time we had finished dinner, we could go ashore and put our feet on solid ground, which was an odd feeling after so many days on the water. We did some shopping in a little area right at the dock and then boarded the ship again to get some rest for the night.
17 April 2012 – Day 10
Halifax was more than we could have expected. It is a place filled with history and stories, and we yearned to have spent more time there. Our first excursion started at 9 AM. We boarded a tour bus and drove through the city, seeing many historical places, mostly Titanic-related. We stopped off at the maritime museum for only 50 minutes and tried desperately to see as much of the Titanic exhibit as possible. There were quite a few artifacts there, including an original deck chair and Sydney Goodwin’s shoes, who was for many centuries was referred to as ‘The Unknown Child.’ It was moving, to say the least.
The Cemeteries
Our next stop was Fairview Lawn Cemetery, where most of those who were pulled from the sea were buried. It is a lovely place and we solemnly walked through the grounds, reading the names, and sometimes just numbers, on the headstones. Our second excursion of the day stopped here as well, so we had the chance to really take our time. It was a beautiful experience and a beautiful final resting place for the 121 souls from Titanic who were buried here.
The rest of our second excursion took us to two more Titanic burial grounds. The first was Mount Olivet Cemetery, a Catholic cemetery, and the other was a Jewish cemetery, Baron de Hirsch. Both were peaceful and heavy with the weight of their history. We walked quietly, paying our respects to each grave as we slowly passed.
In the Jewish cemetery, I noticed small stones on top of many of the headstones. I’d never seen that before and asked our tour guide what the purpose was. He said that it is a Jewish custom to leave a stone when a grave is visited instead of flowers because flowers wilt and fade away while the stones remain. The stones can be interpreted as the memory, how the memories of a person are ever-lasting, and just as the memories remain with us, the stone will never wither.
Back Out To Sea
That evening, as we sat down and ate dinner, we watched Halifax disappear over the horizon. We’d only had one day in that beautiful city, and yet it touched us so deeply. I know there is much more to Halifax than Titanic, but for me, it was one giant memorial to the great liner and those that lost their lives that fateful night. It was profoundly moving to stand there, among the hundreds that never saw America, knowing that we would be completing the journey for them, in their honor.
18 April 2012 – Day 11
The morning started with packing. I didn’t want the journey to be over and I wasn’t ready to say goodbye yet. We slowly packed until lunch, ate our meal in the Palms Cafe, and then returned to the room to get ready for dinner. With my hair curled and our formal clothes laid out, we went to Bingo with our friends. I won but had to split the pot with 7 others, so we only won £12 each. But hey, it was still fun!
Billy and I dressed for our last formal dinner aboard the Titanic Memorial Cruise and then strolled to the dining room. We relished in the joyous atmosphere of the evening. We’d become good friends with those at our table and also with our servers. The same wait staff had attended us every night and we had grown very fond of them by this point. We talked with friends long after dinner had ended. Quietly, we took one last late-night stroll around the deck. This would be our last night at sea and we wanted to take it all in, to hold on to the memories as tightly as we could. It was raining that night, so we didn’t stay out long. That was just as well because we had big plans for the morning and really needed to get some sleep.
We spent the rest of our evening packing our bags, an incredibly bittersweet moment. Looking back at the very beginning, it was hard to believe we were there. The cruise was winding down and things were coming to an end, but after all, we’d done it. We’d sailed the ocean to visit Titanic and say our own goodbyes. We’d done it.
19 April 2012 – Day 12
“The air was cold and the sky foggy as we sailed into New York early this morning. It was beautiful. We saw the sun rise as we stood on deck and watched the city come into view. It was so bittersweet. How ironic that the only sunset we should happen to see was on April 14th, the night Titanic sank, while the only sunrise we saw was the morning we made it to New York, a place so many never lived to see.”
~Lydia
We woke before dawn and braced against the frigid morning air. The decks of the ship were packed as hundreds of us gathered to see this momentous occasion. We were completing a journey that more than 1500 people never did. In my heart, from the very beginning, I felt I was completing it for them, giving some sort of closure. I think many of us felt that way, which was why we all gathered on deck to quietly watch as we sailed into New York.
As our ship passed Chelsea Piers, she gave three long blasts of the horn. It was a salute to the place where Titanic would have docked had she completed the journey. This was followed by a minute of silence. There was no fanfare to welcome us to New York as there had been in Ireland, no memorial tribute painted on the quayside. Instead, there was one woman standing near the water. She was dressed in period clothing and she waved a white handkerchief to us for the entire time we could see her.
New York
After we started to dock, we went inside to grab a quick breakfast before our excursion for the day. We scarfed down our food and hot-footed it to the Neptune Lounge where we got some poor news. One of the tour guides was in an accident on the way to work so both tours couldn’t go simultaneously. They needed 40 some-odd volunteers to take the tour later in the day, so Billy and I, along with our friends from Australia, all put our names on the second tour list.
Lucky for us, we got to go through customs with the first tour group which gave us time to walk around for a while. We chose to walk down to the Intrepid, a retired aircraft carrier that is now a museum. We took in the ship and a submarine before heading back to the Balmoral for our tour. It was late in getting started and ran much later into the night than planned, but we had a wonderful time and were able to see so much, including many a Titanic memorial.
Goodbyes
This was our last night onboard the Balmoral and it was time to say goodbye to the new friends we had made. I’ll be honest, I shed many tears at the time and it still makes me emotional thinking about it. Our beautiful journey together on the Titanic Memorial Cruise was coming to a close. We hugged and exchanged contact information and tried to make the night pass as slowly as possible. No one was ready to leave. We weren’t ready for it to be over.
But just like the stones in the cemetery, the memories are still there, solid, like we’d lived it only yesterday.
“As I lay my head to rest one last time on board the Balmoral, I wish everyone on this ship Godspeed and Safe Travel. May we never forget those who perished and may we never forget how we remembered and honored them.
To all, farewell. But not goodbye. May we meet again someday.”
~Lydia
