I Cruised on Cunard’s Newest Ship Queen Anne: Here’s my Full Review!

I took a cruise onboard the newest ship in the fleet from one of the most famously formal cruise lines: Cunard’s Queen Anne.

Having previously taken cruises onboard both Queen Elizabeth and Queen Mary 2, I wasn’t sure what I’d think of this one - I’d seen some incredibly positive reviews of this new ship, but also some pretty negative ones. The positives suggested that I’d find this ship to be an absolute stunning feat of engineering and a modern masterpiece at sea, but the negatives suggested that I’d find her a ‘modern new build with no character compared to her fleet mates’.

In all honesty, I was a bit nervous about this cruise, because I loved all of my previous Cunard cruises, and I was slightly worried that this one simply wouldn’t compare. However, there was only one way to find out, and that was to head to Southampton to board Queen Anne to see for myself.

If you’ve just found my site for the first time, welcome! I’m Fraser, and I use this site and my social media channels to share my cruise experiences. If you’re on YouTube, then people do come over and support my channel by subscribing. You can find me over there by searching for ‘Fraser at Sea’, or by clicking here.

I boarded Queen Anne at Ocean Terminal, Southampton, for this cruise.

I took this cruise with my friend Laura, who you might remember from other cruise videos over on YouTube. We aim to take a cruise together every year, so if you haven’t seen her around before, you’ll probably see her popping up again at some point in the future! 

In this article, I’m going to share with you my full review of cruising onboard Queen Anne. I’ll tell you about our itinerary, our stateroom, our favourite and least favourite parts of the ship, and so much more of the passenger experience. I’ll also cover the topic of dining, as it’s different to what you’ll find on the other Cunard ships. Later in this post, I’ll also share with you how much we paid for this cruise and if it felt ‘value for money’ or not.

We embarked the ship at Ocean Terminal in Southampton, England and it was one of my easiest embarkations to date. We arrived around 2.30pm, which was within the allocated time window allocated to us during the online check in process, and it took us 10 minutes to go from the front door of the terminal to the gangway of the ship. I’ve boarded other ships at this same terminal and it’s taken MUCH longer, so we were off to a great start before we’d even got onto the ship. 

Embarkation was a breeze - it took us such little time to get onto the ship after arriving!

As soon as we got onboard, it was CLEAR that this ship was completely different to the other ships in the Cunard fleet that I’d cruised on previously. Everything was SO modern - far more than I’d expected it to be. One of the first venues that we came across was the Queens Room, which is among the most heavily critiqued venues on this ship.

You’ll find a ‘Queens Room’ on each of the Cunard ships - it’s their trademark ballroom that loyal Cunarders have grown to love. 

Onboard Queen Mary 2, Queen Elizabeth and Queen Victoria, this space feels like a very traditional and formal ballroom. I always think that I could imagine my grandparents waltzing around those rooms to songs from times gone past. On Queen Anne however, it’s a completely different vibe.

The Queen’s room on Queen Anne feels very different to the rest of the fleet.

The events in here will largely mirror the Queens Rooms elsewhere in the fleet, but it does feel different.

Queen Anne’s take on the traditional Cunard ballroom is fascinating - it couldn’t be more unapologetically modern and different to what I’d seen on the other ships. This was a general theme throughout the whole ship, in my opinion - unapologetically modern and different - you’ll probably see me use this expression a few times throughout this review, I’m sure.

The Queen’s Room on Queen Anne spans both decks two and three, with the main dance floor, stage and bar area being on deck two and a mezzanine seating area up on deck three. In all honesty, I can understand why some people don’t like this compared to the rest of the fleet, but I personally thought it was super refreshing to see a cruise line like Cunard trying to do something completely new on this ship!

I would admit that this space doesn’t feel as grand as it does elsewhere in the fleet, but I still thought it was a really great space.

I’ll show you more of the ship shortly, but first, let me show you our cabin, which was a Balcony Cabin on deck six.

Here’s our stateroom for this cruise: 6014.

Before we go any further, I’ll be using the term ‘stateroom’ and ‘cabin’ interchangeably throughout this post. Don’t worry - I’m referring to the same thing! Some cruise lines refer to your bedroom on the ship as a stateroom, while others call it a cabin, hence the slight differences in my terminology. On a Cunard ship, most people will know your room as your stateroom, but either will make perfect sense!

We were allocated stateroom number 6014 for our cruise, which is a ‘BE grade’ Balcony cabin. If you’re not familiar, there are actually seven grades of standard balcony cabin onboard Queen Anne(!). There are actually nine types of balcony cabin overall, but two of these are for the ‘Club Balcony’ category, which is different, so we’ll stick with seven for this review. 

Two of these seven grades of balcony cabin are for ‘partially obstructed view’ balconies, and the remaining five are for standard balconies. You’ll find the ‘BE grade’ staterooms both at the front and the back of the ship, across decks 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9. Our cabin was right at the front of the ship - in fact, there were only five staterooms further forward than ours! I did worry about this when I saw the allocation come through - the rooms right at the front of the ship can often feel the most movement, and I was hoping that we weren’t going to be impacted too much. I rarely feel seasick when I cruise, but when it hits it can be really quite debilitating!

So, let me tell you about the room itself in a little more detail. You can see in the photo above that we booked this stateroom as a twin format, meaning that we would have two single beds in there. This was perfect for us sharing as friends, and the beds were honestly among the most comfortable beds that either of us have ever slept in on a cruise ship!

At the far end of the room, by the balcony doors, was a nicely fitted unit which housed some shelving, and elements like a mirror and also the mini fridge for the room. I loved the design of this unit - it felt so premium to have the round, back-lit mirror behind the desk instead of the usual really large generic mirror you’d find in most cruise ship cabins. This unit instantly added to the premium feel of this cabin, although I personally wish it went all the way to the roof, instead of finishing a little short.

I loved this unit in our stateroom - it instantly made the whole room feel more premium.

Moving to the balcony, there’s not a huge amount to report. We had two chairs and a small table out there, but it’s worth highlighting the word ‘small’ when we’re talking about the table. It wouldn’t be much use for more than a cup of coffee, so don’t go planning to be enjoying lots of outdoor dining out here during your cruise.

For those wondering, despite our forward location on the ship, we didn’t have an enclosed or cove-balcony - it featured the same glass frontage that most onboard do.

One element that I should highlight here is that the door out to the balcony is different to what you’ll find on lots of cruise ships. Instead of a typical sliding door to provide balcony access, it’s a door that opens outwards onto the balcony. This doesn’t impact too much out there, but a difference worth noting nonetheless!

Here’s our balcony: a good size, with three pieces of furniture.

The bathroom of this cabin was excellent. I got to see inside a few different cabins while cruising on Queen Anne, and they’re all fairly similar.

It’s fully tiled, with a large screened enclosure on the right side as you look in. On the left, there’s a large mirror that’s lit using built-in LED lighting, and a large sink directly infront.

You’ve got some storage underneath the sink, a wire basket in the shower enclosure, and then some glass shelves over by the sink - more than enough for a cruise ship bathroom, and more than you’d get on plenty of other ships out there.

In short, the bathroom got a big ‘thumbs up’ from me!

The bathroom in this cabin was the first thing that reminded me which class of ship Queen Anne belongs to. She’s a Pinnacle class cruise ship, and she shares this class with multiple of the ships in the Holland America Line fleet, namely Koningsdam, Nieuw Statendam and the new Rotterdam. I cruised onboard Rotterdam, and she remains one of my favourite cruise ships to date, so I had high hopes for Queen Anne. On that note, if you’re at all familiar with Pinnacle class ships, you might notice some familiarities between them and Queen Anne throughout this post.

We were overall really impressed with our cabin for this cruise. It was really comfortable, and the colours used made it feel really moody and luxurious. I don’t often cruise in balcony cabins because I often cruise solo and the solo supplements on these rooms are often huge in comparison to their interior counterparts. For this reason, it was SUCH a luxury to have our own private outside space with this cabin, and we did get use out of it throughout the cruise! The room did feel noticeably smaller than lots of other cabins I’ve cruised in in the past. The sofa was really tight for 2 people, and the area by the bathroom door felt like a tighter squeeze than I’m used to. All of that said, a really great cabin, and I wouldn’t hesitate about recommending this one to you for your future cruise!

My biggest frustration with this cabin was a night light, which was over by the bathroom door. The reason this was annoying for me was that I couldn’t figure out how to turn it off, resulting in me piling up cushions over the light every night to block it out - I’m a bit of a nightmare for not being able to sleep with a light on in the room, so you can imagine when I thought I couldn’t turn the night light out…

On the final morning of the cruise, as we were packing our bags before leaving the cabin, I realised that this light was controlled with a switch beside the bed that I simply hadn’t tried, so entirely my fault… D’oh! I’ll know for next time, I guess…! 

For anyone wondering from my earlier point - the forward position of this cabin ended up not being an issue at all from a motion point of view. Okay, we didn’t travel far (we went from Southampton across to Rotterdam) and the seas were pretty smooth, but zero issues to report!

Here’s the view from our stateroom balcony. As you can see, we were right at the front of the ship (that’s the Bridge up there!).

Leaving the cabin behind, let’s talk about a design feature of this ship that I really, really liked. Queen Anne, like lots of cruise ships out there, has been designed with three main stairwells and lift lobbies: one towards the front, one in the middle, and one towards the back of the ship. When you’re in the long corridors of cabins, it can get quite disorientating and difficult to remember where you are.

For that reason, Cunard have opted to install carpets with coloured arrows throughout all of these corridors. Each of the lobbies has a different colour associated with it: the one at the front is blue, the one in the middle is yellow, and the one towards the back is red. The coloured arrows on the floor will then tell you not only which direction to walk to your closest lobby, but also which lobby you’re walking towards. Clever, isn’t it?! So remember - blue at the front, yellow in the middle and red at the back!

Here’s the coloured arrows on the floor. Based on the above narrative, can you tell which way you’d be walking if you followed the blue arrows?

Here’s the red elevator lobby, which you’ll find towards the Aft (back) of the ship. Clever, isn’t it?

This cruise was a short 4-night cruise from Southampton and it only actually took us to one port.

We’d set sail from Southampton on Day 1, arrive into Rotterdam in the Netherlands on the afternoon of Day 2, stay there overnight and then leave on the evening of Day 3. We’d then spend Day 4 ‘at sea’ to enjoy the ship, before returning to Southampton on Day 5.

This is a relatively common short cruise route for ships going out of Southampton - you’ll see these advertised throughout the year at various points. They’re often a great way to try out a ship, which is largely why we opted to book onto this one!

We booked this cruise to experience Queen Anne - we knew that we’d spend a fair amount of time on the ship rather than out exploring the port, so the actual itinerary and ports didn’t matter too much to us. The fact we were going to Rotterdam was a plus point though - I’ve taken lots of cruises to here, and so I was excited to show Laura around, as this would be her first time visiting the city.

Of course, we headed up to the Markthal for some Dutch fries… If you’ve never been to this place, please add it to your list - it really is absolutely fantastic, and it’s really easy to get to from where the cruise ships dock!

Of course, our cruise calling at Rotterdam meant we had to visit the famous Markthal!

My favourite thing to order from the market - a masterpiece!

We didn’t spend a huge amount of time ashore (as expected), mostly due to the fact that I really wanted to film a full ship tour for YouTube while we were onboard. I always aim to film these with as few passengers in shot as possible, and I’m delighted to report that we managed it! If you’d like to watch this tour now, you can click into the video below!

Let’s jump back to our Southampton departure. We had a beautiful afternoon for sailing out of port, with the sun even making an appearance for us! If you’ve sailed from here before, you’ll appreciate that this isn’t something that’s guaranteed…

We chose to watch the ship leaving from the Panorama Pool Club, which is the pool deck at the back of the ship on Deck 9. It felt as though the rest of the ship had the same idea - it’s always nice to see a U.K. sailaway party out on the decks busy, rather than being rained off and everyone trying to see through the windows from the inside of the ship.

Everyone was in really good spirits, and the cruise was off to a fantastic start!

The Panorama Pool Club provides a fantastic setting to relax and enjoy a sailaway onboard Queen Anne.

It was great to see so many other passengers with the same idea - let’s get this ship out to sea!

After sailing away from Southampton, we took a walk along the top deck spaces before heading down to the cabin to get ready for dinner. This is when we found one of my favourite spaces onboard Queen Anne: The Pavilion.

‘The Pavilion’ is the name given to the main pool space on the ship. It’s on Deck 9, with a mezzanine level up on Deck 10. There’s then another level up on Deck 11 that looks down into this space. Decks 9 and 10 are protected by a massive retractable roof, making this a good choice of ship for both cold and warm weather itineraries. There’s also a large screen at one end that can be used for things like sports and movies, making this a pretty versatile space! 

The Pavilion is where you’ll find the primary pool onboard Queen Anne. It’s quite a feast for the eyes!

You’ll also find a large digital screen here, in addition to numerous eateries and a staffed bar.

This area has a poolside grill serving up everything you’d expect from a cruise ship poolside food option, and also the Pavilion Wellness Cafe upstairs. This quickly become one of our favourite food venues on Queen Anne - you could get salads, build your own bowls and lighter bites here - a big thumbs up! 

Long story short, there always seemed to be something going on within the Pavilion area, and isn’t it just such a stunning space to look at?!

Let’s now talk about the ship itself. Queen Anne entered service in 2024, and she’s the 249th ship to sail under the Cunard flag. That’s right - 249th(!). She was built in Italy by the teams at Fincantieri.

She was christened in Liverpool, England, and the city was announced as her Godparent, an unusual appointment for a cruise ship in this fleet. The other ships in the Cunard fleet have very different Godmothers: the late Queen Elizabeth the second is the Godmother of both Queen Mary 2 and Queen Elizabeth, and Queen Camilla is the Godmother of Queen Victoria. At the point of Queen Victoria being christened, Queen Camilla was then Camilla, the Duchess of Cornwall.

Queen Anne’s a big ship - much larger than her fleet mates. She’s 322.5 metres long, and she rises to 64 metres above the water. To put that into perspective, I’m about 6 feet (or just over 1.8 metres) tall, so Queen Anne is the length of 176 Fraser’s (that’s me!) lying head to toe, and she’s the height of 35.5 Fraser’s (again, me…!) standing on top of each other. A terrifying thought, I know… Don’t worry - that’s not ever going to be an official measurement, but you get the picture - this ship’s a big one - let’s move on…

Here she is - she’s a much bigger ship than the others in the Cunard fleet!

Thinking about the onboard experience, let’s go back to my earlier point about this ship feeling unapologetically modern and different to the rest of the fleet. Queen Anne is genuinely one of the most refreshing ships I’ve been on in such a long time.

Cunard has a reputation across the industry that I know can turn lots of younger or less experienced cruisers off, largely due to the fact that they don’t like (or maybe feel intimidated by) the more ‘formal’ feel of the ships. I remember walking into Queen Elizabeth’s Grand Lobby for the first time and feeling like I was on a really historic ship, and not one that launched in 2010. 

Here’s ‘me’ in Queen Elizabeth’s Grand Lobby, shortly after boarding the ship in California.

By comparison, the Grand Lobby on Queen Anne does feel like a luxurious environment, but it’s a far more understated and modern luxury than the rest of the fleet. It feels more like a ‘main atrium’ on a modern cruise ship than a ‘grand lobby’ on a Cunard ship.

I’d say that the Grand Lobby onboard Queen Anne reminds me of what you’ll find in a really lovely hotel or resort on land, rather than a Cunard ship. I wouldn’t say that’s a bad thing, but I know some may disagree. Regardless of whether you love it or hate it, you can’t deny it’s a really impressive space!

The fluffy red carpets that you’ll find on her sisters are a thing of the past on here, and they’ve instead been replaced by much more colourful and abstract designs throughout, with the lowest level of the Grand Lobby being tiled. 

By contrast, here’s the Grand Lobby onboard Queen Anne. Impressive, right?!

One feature that I loved about Queen Anne’s main atrium was the huge art piece that’s in the middle of the space - this art changes as you move around the lobby. The picture uses lenticular fins to change between three scenes depending on which direction you look at it from that all show different aspects of the Cunard story.

During this cruise, I was also able to take a look at the most exclusive areas onboard that are reserved for only those cruising in the most premium accommodations: the Grills. Onboard Queen Anne, you’ll find a Grills Lounge that’s available for use by anyone staying in a Princess Grill or Queens Grill stateroom during their cruise. In here, there’s a bar to keep you watered, and also a Concierge to help with any needs, questions or problems you might have during your time onboard. The lounge area itself doesn’t have any windows to offer direct views of the ocean (which I did feel was a missed opportunity), but they’ve cleverly got around this by installing a massive roof light window to flood the space with natural light.

Here’s a few shots of the Grills Lounge.

The Grills Lounge: a relaxing space for those staying in the most premium accommodations onboard Queen Anne.

There are no outward-facing windows in this space, but a large roof lantern has been installed to introduce natural daylight to the space.

Coming off one side of this lounge is the Princess Grill, the restaurant reserved for Princess Grill Guests. On the other side, you’ll find the Queen’s Grill restaurant. Both of these venues are absolutely gorgeous, and do feel like a really intimate and special place to enjoy your meals while you’re cruising.

They both offer a far more intimate experience than what you’ll get by dining downstairs in the Britannia Restaurant. Here’s some shots to show you around.

The Princess Grill offers a more intimate dining experience for Princess Grill Suite guests on Queen Anne.

It’s a bright space, with huge floor-to-ceiling windows running along one side of the venue.

The Queens Grill is reserved for only those staying in the top Suites onboard.

This is another bright, airy space. It’s much larger than I had expected it to be!

A third shot of the Queens Grill dining venue.

Directly above these venues, you’ll find the Grills Terrace.

This is another space that’s ‘sealed off’ from the rest of the ship - in other words, regular cruisers can’t even walk through here. This is one of the elements of Queen Anne’s design that can make her quite an annoying cruise ship for the ‘average’ cruiser. As you walk forward from the back of the ship on deck 11, you’re met with locked doors on both sides of the ship that you can only unlock with a Grills Suite room key.

That means that, if you’re not cruising in a Grills Suite, you need to turn around, walk back along to the back of the ship on deck 11, go down to Deck 10, down again to Deck 9, walk through the Artisan Food Hall (or the onboard buffet), through the Pavilion pool area, and then back up the stairs at the forward end of the ship. Not the end of the world, but highly annoying at times!

Putting the annoyance to regular passengers aside, here’s a few shots to give you a feel for what’s on the exclusive side of the locked door: here’s the Grills Terrace.

As a Grills guest, you’ll unlock access to the Grills Terrace, a space offering you a much more private experience than the sun decks elsewhere on the ship.

There’s an array of seating out here, from sun loungers to rattan sofas and armchairs - the choice is yours!

In contrast to this setup, when I was on Rotterdam (my other Pinnacle Class cruise that I mentioned earlier), the design was much friendlier for the masses onboard.

Instead of this locked off ‘suite guest only’ area, this space on Rotterdam was taken up by a sports court and general deck space, which most people used for walking during the cruise. Their ‘premium’ locked-off area is then found at the front of the ship on deck 12, out of the way of the main ship thoroughfare.

That said, it’s much smaller than the Grills offering on Queen Anne, so maybe they needed to do this in order to fit everyone in, due to the large amount of Suite accommodation available on this ship.

I really like and respect the fact that Queen Anne is a clear signal from Cunard that they’re open to trying new things. On our first night onboard, we went to a show at a venue called the Bright Lights Society. In the evening, this place is a dimly lit supper club-style venue, and it offers some entertainment options that I’ve never seen from Cunard before. One example of this is the show that we went to, which was called ‘Noir’. It was dubbed as an interactive Murder Mystery, and wow - I didn’t quite expect it to be as interactive as it was. 

As I usually HATE being plucked up on stage, we avoided the front row and sat one row back, but little did I know, that didn’t do much good here tonight… A couple of audience members were plucked out to take part in the show, and I found myself to be one of the chosen few… Don’t worry - I won’t give too much away incase I ruin it for you…

We tried an event entitled ‘Noir’ during our cruise, and it really was fantastic!

I promise - I don’t usually wear a beret - it was a prop for the show!

Another aspect of Queen Anne that makes her ‘different’ to the rest of the Cunard fleet is the Wellness Studio: a stunning open air fitness venue all the way at the top of the ship. Can you imagine doing your morning yoga with the mountains of Alaska surrounding you, or maybe while the ship is docked in Sydney Harbour?

The possibilities really are endless with this one - it looks great! Before you ask - no - I didn’t try morning yoga with the city of Rotterdam as my backdrop…

If you’re interested in finding out more about fitness classes and timings, then check your Daily Schedule once you get onto the ship.

Here’s the Pavilion Wellness Studio, a brand new space for a Cunard ship!

What a great space for your exercise class in the open air, don’t you think?!

So, the next big question that you might have… What was the food like on Queen Anne?

Well, in a nutshell, we were really happy with what we ate onboard!

We ate mostly in the ‘included’ dining venues, but we did try a Speciality Dining option on our first night. Queen Anne’s got fifteen dining options onboard, so there was plenty to choose from throughout our short cruise. Infact, I’d like to return for a longer period to have a fair chance of getting round them all!

Remember - four of these are main dining rooms, but three can be used only by passengers cruising in a suite, or an upgraded Club cabin. 

For us, we ate most of our meals in the Britannia restaurant down on decks 2 and 3 of the ship. I remember thinking the same on my last Pinnacle class cruise, but how nice a dining room does this ship class offer you? This place felt like, if it were on land, it would cost a fortune to dine here. We never had a bad meal onboard - everything at lunches and dinners in here felt good quality, the right temperature and an ideal portion size.

The Britannia Restaurant, which is also known as the ‘Main Dining Room’ to the majority of cruisers on the regular fares on Queen Anne.

Isn’t this space absolutely stunning?! I couldn’t believe this is the restaurant that’s included for everybody!

The Britannia Restaurant onboard Queen Anne features two floors with an impressive vaulted circular section in the centre.

Our favourite thing to do on Queen Anne was to have dinner in the Britannia restaurant, and then head back to the cabin to order a room service dessert. This allowed us a window each evening to relax in peace and quiet before heading back out around the ship for a few hours in the evening before bed. 

The only meal that I had problems with onboard Queen Anne was the Eggs Benedict in the Britannia Restaurant, which was one of the worst I’ve had on a cruise ship in a long time. If you’ve followed me for a while, you’ll probably know that an Eggs Benedict is my ‘go to’ breakfast option when I cruise - I really love it! However, the yolks weren’t delivered ‘runny’ on any day of my cruise, and were the worst I’ve had in a long while.

Instead, we opted to dine at the Artisans Food Hall (the buffet), as we found the overall quality to be much better up there!

Here’s my Eggs Benedict, unfortunately not a Queen Anne speciality…

In terms of Speciality or ‘Upcharge’ restaurants, you’ve got quite a few to choose from on Queen Anne. First, there’s Aji Wa, specialising in Japanese food. Next is Tramonto, the onboard italian restaurant. Then, just across the hall from Tramonto, you’ve got Aranya, which is their Indian restaurant. Elsewhere, you’ll find Sir Samuel’s', the steak and seafood venue and the Golden Lion pub, which offers typical pub food included in your cruise fare, with some more premium chargeable extras.

If all of this sounds too much, you’ve also got the Artisan’s Food Hall, which is Queen Anne’s answer to the traditional cruise ship buffet. This food hall seemed to work really well during our cruise - it was BUSY - but we always found a seat, so no issues there at all! From a quality point of view, I really was a fan of this venue. Everything on offer appeared to be made fresh, with multiple ‘live cooking’ stations throughout the venue - brilliant!

If you’re still hungry(!), then of course you’ve also got daily afternoon tea service down in the Queens Room. We did this multiple times during the cruise, and it was SO BUSY every time!

Based on what I saw, if you’re not there at least 30 minutes before it starts, you’re not going to get a seat. It’s a really lovely experience: classical musicians usually perform in the middle of the room, and you’re served your afternoon tea by the formally dressed waiting team - a moment of bliss on a busy ship! If you’re new to Cunard, you really must add this to your ‘to do’ list. It’s totally included in your cruise fare, so why not?!

Afternoon Tea in the Queens Room onboard Queen Anne is a real staple of a cruise onboard.

You’ll be served a selection of finger sandwiches and cakes throughout Afternoon Tea, of course accompanied by a pot of tea.

Scones are also on the menu, too. Which do you put on first: the jam or the cream?

So, how much did we pay for our cruise, and was it value for money?

We paid £1,538 (or $2,063 US) for our 4-night cruise, which works out at £769 or $1031.50 each.

When you look at this on a ‘per night’ basis, that comes in at £192pppn or $258pppn.

That got us our 4 nights accommodation on the ship, and it included things like food and entertainment.

This fare didn’t include service charges - Cunard charge a fixed rate for this, and that’s $17pppd for our grade of stateroom, which meant a further cost of $68 or £50 each for the duration of the cruise.

Everything we then bought from the bars was also subject to a service charge of 15% per purchase. This is a service charge that always really frustrates me, because it makes the bar menu much more expensive! If you’re ordering a glass of red wine for $14 at a bar, that glass of wine ends up costing you over $16 before you’ve even taken a sip. Cunard aren’t the only line to apply these service charges to onboard purchases, but I really wish that these charges were just built into the prices of the products, rather than added as extra charges…

What I find frustrating about these service charges is that the teams then ask for a ‘tip’ on top of this, as the service charge apparently has nothing to do with a server gratuity. I’ve never fully understood where this service charge is going - it’s probably something that I should read up on!

Our onboard purchases were subject to a service charge of 15% per purchase. This included things like our drinks from the onboard bars.

Now, did I think this was good value? To be honest, not really. As I mentioned earlier, we were really keen to experience Queen Anne, and so this price worked for us. However, when you compare this price for a 4-night cruise to some of the itineraries now available on this ship, it’s actually really quite expensive.

So, Queen Anne - is she as good or as bad as the reviews suggest? Well, in all honesty, after spending 4 nights cruising on here, I can conclude that she’s what I would probably call a ‘marmite ship’. People are probably either going to love or hate a cruise on here, with those in the latter camp probably being the really loyal Cunard audience who want the ship to feel as traditional as the other Queens do. My challenge to you - if you’re cruising onboard Queen Anne in the future, and you’ve experienced the other Queens, board this ship with a really open mind, and you might just be surprised how you get on!

From my perspective, I absolutely loved my time onboard - she’s a stunning ship, and she’s already got a really special place in the Cunard fleet, in my opinion. As I’ve mentioned earlier in this review, I’ve got HUGE amounts of respect for Cunard as a cruise line, for actively questioning if the way they’ve always done it is right, and for challenging that by launching a ship as different and as unique as Queen Anne.

I reckon this ship will, after a bit of a turbulent ‘settling in period’ settle really nice alongside the rest of the fleet. My biggest bit of advice to you - and you’re already doing it if you’ve made it this far into this video - is to do your research. Queen Anne’s launch means that the advice I’ve previously given for cruise lines like P&O Cruises now absolutely applies here. 

The ‘product’ that you’re going to experience across different ships in the fleet varies, and it’s important that you know what to expect before you go onboard, so that you’re not left disappointed. If you’re looking to feel like you’re on a historic ocean liner, you’re not going to want to book a cruise onboard Queen Anne and you’ll instead want to go for Queen Mary 2. At the same time, if you’re looking for modern luxury, Queen Mary 2 probably isn’t going to be your number one choice.

I really hope you’ve enjoyed this review of my cruise onboard Queen Anne, the newest cruise ship to join the Cunard fleet. If you did, then please support my channels by either checking out some more pages of the website, or by coming over to my YouTube channel. As I mentioned earlier, you’ll find me by searching ‘Fraser at Sea’, or you can click here to go straight there now.